In what context is judgment of beauty deemed 'acceptable'?

From Katastrophe, whose posting has been troubled:

In our culture, we are bombarded with aesthetic criticisms from a wide variety of sources. Search any website that defines itself as even remotely feminist and you will find article upon article bashing pop culture outlets such as the Photoshop-happy magazine Cosmopolitan or commercials for intimates brandVictoria's Secret, etc., for furthering an idealistic and unattainable concept of physical beauty. These kind of judgments are, rightfully so, condemned by a large portion of the general public.

On the other hand, log onto any major news source like the NY Times or The Inquirer and you'll find dozens of dance reviews under their Culture/Arts sections. While there are undoubtedly a number of talented and informed dance critics who are writing for these and other publications, unfortunately there are still more who write uneducated or, almost worse, barren descriptions of dance. Though they might face backlash from the dance community (see Alastair Macaulay's attack on the oeuvre of Trisha Brown; though not uneducated or barren, the general agreement is that it was uncalled for), the general public still venerates them as a higher opinion on the topic.

Why do we denounce one judgment of beauty and revere another? What exactly is the difference between judging a person's looks based off of an ideal and judging a person's movement based off of an opinion, comparison, or just plain ignorance?

A possible explanation could be that, while one has no control over what one looks like (to an extent, but that's a different debate), one has complete control over their movement. Although it was not my choice to be born a brunette, for example, it is theoretically my choice to choreograph a ballet piece to a song by Prince. Because I consciously decided to do so, I open myself up to other people's opinions and, indeed, judgments.

I am by no means intending to defend our public media's attempt to make people feel bad for not looking a certain way, or to belittle the purpose of the critic. I merely find it interesting that different kinds of judgment, in different contexts, can hold such different weight and meaning to us as people and as creators.

When in doubt, Question!

Situations that require verbal or written communication of reaponses to visual art are sensitive because they make the viewer vulnerable to scrutiny for offering an uninformed response, just as much as they put the artist at risk of being offended or responding negatively to an intentionally constructive criticism. Through training to be an informed visual art viewer and an every day communicator, I have observed that offering a question, rather than stating a judgment or opinion, often minimizes negative outcomes to these sensitive situations. Offering a question may rescue you from offending an artist, or it may allow you to offer an informed response even without necessary research or understanding of an artist’s work. This idea of offering questions is especially pertinent in the realm of responding to dance works directly to the creator of those works.

By offering a question to a creator of a dance work, the creator maintains a choice of how to answer or not answer the question. The creator also maintains their role as owner of their creation. You cannot go wrong when phrasing questions with “was it your intention to…because I noticed…” or “Why did you choose….for that moment in the work” These questions may spark a conversation with great depth and insight into the true intentions or lack of intentions for works of visual art, without risk of a viewer holding back information for fear of offending the artist or an artist being frustrated at a lack of viewers’ understanding of the work.