Body Image Of A Young Woman Essay

Don’t get me started on stereotyping, in the 21st century in is not unusual for people to be judged, being judged on what they are wearing or just their general appearance. In the 21st century teenage girls are expected to have long hair, be skinny and to be naturally pretty. However this can only apply to a few people. Teenage girls are considered fake if they dye their hair and wear makeup, but the only reason that they do all of this is because they are not what society expects them to be.

The average American will spend around a year and a half of their lives watching television commercials (Kilbourne 395). Presently advertisements are controlling our everyday lives. In Jean Kilbourne’s article: “Still Killing Us Softly: Advertising and the Obsession with Thinness”, she discusses how advertisements negatively portray women. This negative portrayal leads to self-hatred and a negative self-image for women. A major point of this is the idea of excessive thinness for women, which the advertising industry is dominantly influencing how women need to meet this standard.

In today’s modern culture, almost all forms of popular media play a significant role in bombarding young people, particularly young females, with what happens to be society’s idea of the “ideal body”. This ideal is displayed all throughout different media platforms such as magazine adds, television and social media – the idea of feminine beauty being strictly a flawless thin model. The images the media displays send a distinct message that in order to be beautiful you must look a certain way. This ideal creates and puts pressure on the young female population viewing these images to attempt and be obsessed with obtaining this “ideal body”. In the process of doing so this unrealistic image causes body dissatisfaction, lack of self-confidence

These advertisements lower women’s status as the women portrayed in the photographs set merely unattainable standards that only assist in women’s inferiority. Advertisers should not seek to make women feel bad about their appearance as everyone comes in all different shapes and sizes and not all perfect thin and tall models. Women having a negative self-image of themselves is an ongoing issue, because the media unfavorably portrays them as they do not meet their standard of what the ideal body type of a woman should look like. Solving this issue would incredibly increase women’s confidence in themselves and their bodies, diminish eating disorders, and shrink the dieting industry that so drastically affects the health of

In order to keep peace, no one tries obtaining such luxuries. That’s why, for example, it came as a surprise to Winston to see Julia wearing makeup. “He had never before seen or imagined a woman of the Party with cosmetics on her face” (Orwell Chapter 4). Fitting in in a society such as the one they are living in requires women to not wear makeup basically. There is no individuality and that’s not okay.

Due to media advertisements, women have felt the pressure to look good more than ever. In the book Where the Girls are, the author Susan Douglas expresses what women sometimes feel when they are exposed to media advertisements. "Special K ads make most of us hide our thighs in shame. On the one hand, on the other hand, that’s not just me, that’s what it means to be a woman in America" (Douglas 1995). Women struggle every day with these societal pressures that the media has created and sadly it is only getting worst.

This constant fixation on physical perfection has created unreasonable beauty standards for women, ones we cannot possibly achieve on our own. Such standards permeate all forms of popular media, particularly fashion magazines and advertisements. Women are bombarded with the notion that we must be thin in order to be desirable. These images project an

The media portrays these unrealistic standards to men and women of how women should look, which suggests that their natural face is not good enough. Unrealistic standards for beauty created by the media is detrimental to girls’ self-esteem because it makes women feel constant external pressure to achieve the “ideal look”, which indicates that their natural appearance is inadequate. There has been an increasing number of women that are dissatisfied with themselves due to constant external pressure to look perfect. YWCA’s “Beauty at Any Cost” discusses this in their article saying that, “The pressure to achieve unrealistic physical beauty is an undercurrent in the lives of virtually all women in the United States, and its steady drumbeat is wreaking havoc on women in ways that far exceed the bounds of their physical selves” (YWCA).

Psychological Effect: Self-confidence and Self-esteem According to Greenberg (2013), approximately 20% of the girls between the age of 8 and 18 who are using makeup say that they felt unappealing and undesirable without wearing makeup. And as a result of the survey she conducted, girls are wearing or using makeup in early age. They are also influenced by their celebrity idols, other people in TV shows and by the people in the environment they belonged. It says that women are more comfortable going out and socializing when they are wearing makeups.

Men and women nowadays are starting to lose self-confidence in themselves and their body shape, which is negatively impacting the definition of how beauty and body shape are portrayed. “...97% of all women who had participated in a recent poll by Glamour magazine were self-deprecating about their body image at least once during their lives”(Lin 102). Studies have shown that women who occupy most of their time worrying about body image tend to have an eating disorder and distress which impairs the quality of life. Body image issues have recently started to become a problem in today’s society because of social media, magazines, and television.

For almost a century, advertisers have appealed to and or contributed to women's insecurities in hopes of being able to sell them the product. An example of this is in 2009, an Olay ad for its ‘Definity Eye Cream’ showed a former model who was 62 years old, looking wrinkle-free and a whole lot younger than her age after using this Olay beauty product. Turns out the ads were retouched. Digitally altered spots were made in the ad, creating not only a bad misrepresentation of Olay products, but the ad's potentially gave a negative impact on people's body images(Sweney).

Your decisions to comply with society’s view of “beauty” are no longer subconscious, but rather are more conscious-driven decisions. Barbie’s slender figure remains idolized; however, it has evolved from a plastic doll to a self-starving model that is photo-shopped on the pages of glossy magazines. You spend hours in front of a mirror adjusting and perfecting your robotic look while demanding your parents to spend an endless amount of money on cosmetics and harmful skin products to acquire a temporary version of beauty. Consider companies such as Maybelline, which have throughout the ages created problematic and infantilizing campaigns and products for women. More specifically consider the “Baby Lips” product as well as the company slogan, “maybe she’s born with it, maybe it’s Maybelline,” that reiterates the male notions of beauty to which women are subjected.

As I already mentioned, the average citizen of the United States encounters 3000 advertisements every day, so the image that every young girl 's brain receive to be good-looking is just an idealized picture made up by the capitalist western media. According to CNN, every fourth citizen is depressed about their body. It is no wonder that capitalists created a fantastic image for the women to copy because by doing so they established the beauty industry. It is a million dollar industry, filling the pocket of a very few with so much money that one just cannot imagine. It does not only fill the pocket of that very few, but it is the thing which causes misery, anxiety and endless suffering for many women all around the globe.

Introduction This report is about impacts Teenage Magazines have on teenagers. The report aims to raise awareness on the teenagers being affected negatively through teenage magazines and how they impact one’s consciousness of the body. Even though certain magazines influence teenagers positively, most react negatively. Teenage Magazine gives fashion tips and latest gossips on the famous celebrities and rumors. The 21st Century magazines have progressed to become less realistic and more harsh.

It is clear that there is a loss of individuality when it comes to beauty. This is evident to see through social media and dating apps that are based on appearance, which is turning individuals highly superficial in relation to what is physically beautiful. Famous figures and social media influencers, for example the Kardashians, portray idealistic beauty standards. By these influencers selling products as well as themselves and their brand, consumers believe the gimmick that if they buy a product indorsed by their favourite celebrity, they will be one step closer to achieving what Eco describes as ‘the good and the beautiful’. However, this proves to have negative effects on self confidence, signalling that one has to conform to how a heavily social media influenced society perceives