Growing up as a girl in America, I was constantly self-conscious and concerned with the way I looked. I remember even at the young age of 8 wanting to wear shirts two or three times my size in order to hide my curves and body shape. I felt safe all wrapped up in my protective shell of large clothing. I also only wore shorts that went right about my knees because I hated my “thicker” thighs. Every girl I came into contact with or any girl I passed as I walked down a hallway during school, I was immediately comparing her looks to mine and assessing her beauty. Every time I looked in a mirror I would only point out things I wanted to change and my eyes would immediately fixate on my blemishes. I sought after boy’s attention and constantly wanted …show more content…
Society is immersed in popular culture; music, television, art, film, books, fandoms, and fads surround us. Due to its constant presence in women’s lives, women are shown the ideal standard of beauty through multiple outlets of popular culture. This constant bombardment goes into their subconscious and sticks with them in their everyday lives. These standards of beauty pop up in every situation and cause women to compare themselves to other women. One example of popular culture that affects young girls as they are growing up and sticks with them into younger adulthood is the impressionability of Disney’s princesses. As Lamb and Brown put it, “Disney girls are women with Barbie doll bodies” (Hobbs & Rice, 336). Disney places these unrealistic standards of girlhood onto growing girls and show them how girls “should” act and look in order to be considered pretty, get a husband, and live a happy life. Through their research they found that “Disney girls are incomplete without a man, are innocent, have lovely voices, and can’t resist a mirror” (336-337). What Disney also does is deem what characteristics are “ugly,” “evil,” and “abnormal.” These “unattractive” Disney characters are found to be vengeful and cruel, while “female power is itself evil” (337). Disney teaches young girls that if you are “unattractive” or powerful, you will meet your demise, whereas if you are “pretty” or submissive, you will be awarded a handsome man. This type of imaging in popular culture perpetuates the unrealistic beauty standard for women and encourages them to pursue disorder eating in order to fit into society and feel attractive for
Media is a powerful agent in entertaining children. It also influences and teaches the youth of society the suitable and appropriate gender roles that they inevitably try to make sense of. The power of media is very influential especially in the minds of the youth. Disney movies target the youth and plant certain ideas and concepts about social culture into the vulnerable minds of children. Media uses gender to its advantage, just like Disney productions. Humorous caricatures reveal some harsh realities about the portrayal of Disney Princesses in many movies made by the Walt Disney Company. Disney mixes innocence with the ultimate form of fantasy to capture an audience. Predominantly, Disney helps highlight the gender roles by showing the audience simply what they want to see. In the attempt to stick to the norm and portray stereotypical female characters, Disney created Princesses. Presented as damsels in distress and inferior beings to men, Disney Princesses give children an inaccurate portrayal of gender roles at a young age. Through Disney’s social success and intriguing films, such as The Little Mermaid, Snow White, Aladdin, Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, and Beauty and the Beast, Disney Princess movies portray stereotypical representation of gender roles through the denigration of the female image, targeting and ruining the perception of youth today.
"Skin blemishes made it impossible for me to really enjoy myself. I was always worrying about the way I looked" (Brumberg, p. 87). Woman all around the world share the same problem, they feel unhappy and self-conscious with the appearance of their bodies. In The Body Project by Joan Jacobs Brumberg, she successfully illustrates the way adolescents begin to change focus from inner to outer beauty in the early 19th and 20th centuries. Through use of personal diaries and historical research, Brumberg shows her readers the physical differences between girls then and now.
Societal constructs of bodily perfection have a massive influence on both genders and on all ages. If you look at any magazine, you will see women constantly being compared to each other, whether it is in the “who wore it better” section or in the “do’s and don’ts” part of the magazine, comparing body images and overall appearances. All parts of the media that encompasses our daily lives are especially dangerous for young and impressionable teens because they see people being torn down for trying to express themselves, and are thus taught to not only don’t look like “don’ts”, but also look like the “do’s”. This is dangerous in that women in the magazine set very high standards that teens want to emulate, no matter the cost to themselves or their health. Celebrities have the benefit of media to make them appear perfect: Photoshop and makeup artists conceal the imperfections that are often too apparent to the naked eye. Viewing celebrities as exhibiting the ideal look or as idols will, in most cases, only damage the confidence of both young teens, and adults, and warp the reality of what true “beauty” really is. It makes teens never feel truly content with themselves because they will be aiming for an ideal that is physically impossible to attain and one that doesn’t exist in the real
I did not have the perfect body. I suddenly became aware of my appearance and made sure I wore makeup every day, especially on days I had Art I with Eric. Before every class I would brush my hair and put on lip gloss in order to try and fit in. To grab Eric’s attention I thought I had to wear clothes that made me appear slimmer and live up to society’s expectations of beauty. Pipher defines this as “lookism, which is the evaluation of a person solely on the basis of appearance” (346). Every time I talked to Eric I assumed he was judging me by the way I looked and not by my personality or values. I constantly felt like I was not good enough and that my body type was not the kind that guys found attractive. Pipher states that girls “sense the pressure to be someone they are not” (346). Every day I walked around acting in a play where I could not be myself. The more I put forth an act the more I felt that I did not fit in. Adolescent girls find themselves “vulnerable to the hurricane” (346) of judgement and predetermined expectations of women. After a while, Eric finally gave me the attention I longed for and we started to date. I had never been in a relationship before and I never knew how much tension it would cause between me and my
In the American culture, women are encouraged to objectify each other and themselves through the affects of advertising raunch culture in the media, this contributes to stereotypes of gender roles. Raunch culture has a major impact on society and on people contributing to their development. Disney princesses and Paris Hilton both promote a set body image by creating a perfect standard of living that is very appealing to females. This body image leads to self-esteem issues and insecurities. Females shouldn’t be judged on the basis of their appearance but should know their self-worth.
We hear sayings everyday such as “Looks don’t matter; beauty is only skin-deep”, yet we live in a decade that contradicts this very notion. If looks don’t matter, then why are so many women harming themselves because they are not satisfied with how they look? If looks don’t matter, then why is the media using airbrushing to hide any flaws that one has? This is because with the media establishing unattainable standards for body perfection, American Women have taken drastic measures to live up to these impractical societal expectations. “The ‘body image’ construct tends to comprise a mixture of self-perceptions, ideas and feelings about one’s physical attributes. It is linked to self-esteem and to the individual’s emotional stability” (Wykes 2). As portrayed throughout all aspects of our media, whether it is through the television, Internet, or social media, we are exploited to a look that we wish we could have; a toned body, long legs, and nicely delineated six-pack abs. Our society promotes a body image that is “beautiful” and a far cry from the average woman’s size 12, not 2. The effects are overwhelming and we need to make more suitable changes as a way to help women not feel the need to live up to these unrealistic standards that have been self-imposed throughout our society.
It has recently been brought up that media influences girls in pre-adolescence, which is highly likely since most young girls idolize Barbie (Rintala & Mustajoki, 1992). “Were Barbie a flesh-and-blood woman, her waist would be 39% smaller than that of anorexic patients, and her body weight would be so low that she would not be able to menstruate” (Rintala & Mustajoki, 1992). Most young girls wish that they could look like Barbie when they grew up, but if they knew the reality of having her measurements, their perceptions would probably change. Children frequently fantasize about who they will be, what they will do, and how they will look when they grow into adulthood. Advertisers use women that are abnormally thin, and even airbrush them to make them appear thinner.
In “Little Girls or Little Women? The Disney Princess Effect,” Stephanie Hanes covers the sexualization of young girls and women in every aspect of the media that influences children and teens. She explains that girls see media figures, movies, and sports being sexualized, and how this is causing children to associate looking and acting a certain way to being ‘the perfect women’. Hanes believes the hypersexualized media is causing girls to obtain a negative body image and it’s killing their self-esteem. The author proposes what she believes society should do about overcoming this obstacle, and how people can crush the stereotypes about women; to her everyone is responsible and should aid in fixing these problems. She explains that the media
Women are bombarded by images of a thin-ideal body form that is extremely hard, if not impossible, to emulate. Comparing themselves to these women can lead to feelings of inadequacy, depression, and an overall low self-esteem. (Expand on, need a good opening paragraph to grab the reader’s attention) Objectification Theory Objectification theory has been proposed as a standard for understanding the effects of living in a culture that sexually objectifies women (Fredrickson & Roberts, 1997). Objectification occurs when a person’s body is treated like a separate entity and is evaluated on its own merit, without consideration for the rest of the person.
Recently, a lot of controversy has been in the news about the increase in negative body image among women. This negative body image can lead to a number of different problems in individuals including low self-esteem, eating disorders, and depression. Some factors that can influence this increase in negative body image include age, gender peer influence, and family influence. One of the main factors that has been an influence on the way people view themselves is the media. According to Aubrey (2006), “a primary way that an objectifying culture is propagated is through the media” (p. 159). Everything from magazines, television, and celebrities can have an affect on the way people view themselves. The population that is most affected by this problem in our society is young women. Social comparison, which is when someone compares their own body to other’s bodies, is a common factor for thin-ideal internalization and dissatisfaction of their body (Bessenoff, 2006, p. 239).
To begin, social media has created unrealistic standards for young people, especially females. Being bombarded by pictures of females wearing bikinis or minimal clothing that exemplifies their “perfect” bodies, squatting an unimaginable amount of weight at a gym while being gawked at by the opposite sex or of supermodels posing with some of life’s most desirable things has created a standard that many young people feel they need to live up to. If this standard isn’t reached, then it is assumed that they themselves are not living up to the norms or the “standards” and then therefore, they are not beautiful. The article Culture, Beauty and Therapeutic Alliance discusses the way in which females are bombarded with media messages star...
As a woman of color who has always been a big girl, I started struggling with my body image when I reached my adolescence years. Growing up, I did not realize that my body was abnormal and unacceptable. I saw myself just like other peers and age group. My experience of body dissatisfaction first started within my own family. I got teased about my size by family members. My parents, especially my mother, reminded me constantly about how obese I was. Reaching a certain age, she started controlling my food intake and she made sure I ate no more than three times a day. With all those disciplinary actions from my mother and the pressure I felt from family, I started noticing of external standards of beauty and body image. In this lens, one can see that body image is influenced by many factors and my mother became a structure that carried out directives. This example demonstrates that feminine body is socially constructed and taught to us. When this ideal body image or feminine body gets inculcated in us at a young age, it becomes internalized discipline that enables one to distinguish herself from other
This can cause children to form negative self-image issues if they don't look like those “beautiful” characters on the screen. In theory, it is not bad to show princesses and princes with these types of figures; however, it is bad that all of the "good" princes and princesses are depicted with a very similar physique. This teaches young girls and boys that these good characters have ideal physiques, which creates a positive correlation between character and attractiveness. Children aspire to be like these princes and princesses so much that they dress up like them and act like them: they buy wigs and costumes, but eventually realize they do not naturally look like them. In turn, this makes them feel like they are not good enough the way they are, and thus not as worthy as their role models. A media study called the Tripartite Model of Social Comparison Theory was done, which resulted in the discovery of the three reasons people compare themselves to others. The first reason is self-evaluation: this is the comparison of oneself to another based on whether or not he or she is keeping up with the trends. The second reason is self-improvement, which is often seen when a person has a problem and thinks, “What would this person do
In addition to planting false hopes in the minds of easily persuaded young girls, this appalling view of “beauty” now booming in western cultures is shockingly leading to high rates of low self-esteem and eating disorders. In a National Report on the State of Self-Esteem issued by the Dove Self-Esteem Fund (June 2008), it was reported that a self-esteem crisis is prevalent in the Uni...
In society today, there is pressure from all sides to conform to a certain ideal of beauty. People are overwhelmed with the different types of images and media forms that are telling people how to act and what to look like. Media is one of the most powerful tools at our disposal. It has the power to educate, affect social change, and much more, but if taken incorrectly people will take drastic lengths to change something about themselves. There have been many attempts to empower women through different types of media, but many have failed miserably. Over the last couple of years, Disney has struggled greatly with the representation of women throughout Princess movies because young girls are hounded with images of princesses,