In Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye, three young African American girls (among many others in their society) struggle against a culture that defines them as ugly and/or invisible. They are regularly contrasted with symbols of whiteness and white icons: the white movie star, Shirley Temple, Mary Jane's face on candy wrappers, and the little white dolls they receive as gifts and are expected to love. The mothers of these girls contribute to promoting a cycle of self-hatred and conformity to white beauty standards by admiring young white girls in their community and in the media instead of finding beauty in their own black children. Their daughters, then, are faced with the harsh reality of being inferior to “pretty” little white girls, and must decide whether to continue to give in to this cycle of degradation and oppression or to define beauty in their own terms. One character in particular, Pecola Breedlove, tragically succumbs to this system of oppression in a way that causes the dissolution of her identity. For Pecola, the acquisition of beauty means the potential to get things in her life that she never had: attention, love, blue eyes, and ultimately, whiteness. Praying for blue eyes, Pecola prays for whiteness, the one thing she believes will solve all her problems. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Pecola's story is told by her search for beauty. His experiences are recorded over the course of four seasons in which he endures a harmful environment at home, at school, and in his neighborhood. The mother's energies are concentrated on devoting maximum attention to her job as a housekeeper for a white family. Her father is an alcoholic who ends up sexually abusing her more than once. The teachers ignore Pecola in class, instead giving their attention to Maureen Peal, a “dreamy little girl of deep yellow with long brown hair” and “sloe green eyes” (Morrison 47, 48). Furthermore, Pecola's classmates ridicule her for her ugliness, even though they are also black. Through all of these experiences, Pecola is marginalized by a culture that defines whiteness as beautiful and lovable. So, Pecola begins her quest for beauty in an attempt to answer the question, “how do you get someone to love you?” (Morrison 32). The answer, she decides, is to have blue eyes - and therefore, essentially, to be white. Pecola feels ugly because in her mind, skin and eye color are directly linked to ideal beauty. The beauty emphasized in American culture is that of white women, and Pecola must deny this and find a way to form her own identity based on her beliefs, or conform to the white ideals that are constantly imposed on her. Unfortunately, due to the conditions in which she lives, conforming to this ideal of white beauty and attempting to achieve it seems for Pecola to be the only way to escape the harshness of the reality in which she lives. Wishing for blue eyes day after day gives herself hope that one day she will be beautiful and loved. Unfortunately, the symbols of beauty that Pecola chooses to focus on are not within her reach and never will be. Shirley Temple's hair will always be yellow and her smile will never fade because she is an actress and is always seen in movies. The skin and eyes of the white dolls will never change: they will always look the same because the dolls are not real people. The reason Pecola feels so ugly is mainly because she spends her time comparing herself to the unreal. Whether these symbols and icons are actually beautiful or not would be impossible for Pecola.