A girl stood facing a rusty mirror in the bathroom. She looked at the reflection in the mirror as her head went down in sorrow. Soon tears ran down her face, her face damp with sweat. When she thought no one was around, she screeched with anguish into the mirror “Why am I so ugly? Why can’t I be like the other girls?” Echoes of her screams filled the hallway of Forest Park Middle School.
Nevertheless, the girl screeching in horror of her own reflection is not the only teen, who talks about, each and everything they despise about themselves. Furthermore, this girl relates to Charlotte, in the book Girl In Pieces, which is about a young 17-year old girl that was so insecure that the cuts that were imprinted on her wrist, she was determined to hide them. She made such an effort to look somewhat normal that she had to wear long-sleeves even when it was scorching hot outside. She was so insecure about herself, which caused her to suffer on the inside. This is the problem, teens suffering because of their insecurities.
Obese, skinny, unattractive, stupid. All of these words come around at Forest Park Middle School, surrounding middle schoolers heads, like a tornado spinning around a house. Callous kids only doing one thing, lowering other teen's self-esteem and making them insecure in their own bodies.
Their own face not good enough.
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We asked Savannah Bloedel, a student attending Forest Park, states that she hears teens calling each other dumb, stupid, ugly, fat, and skinny in the hallways. This proves, because kids are being so mean to each other it really does make teens insecure and does lower their self-esteem. Girls looking in the mirror, and wishing they never existing because of how they look. As a result to students say these mean things to each other, they then take it to heart and feel like they are being mocked for that one
Most teenage students, when given the option, will choose not to share their opinions with their class. This is due to the fact that most teens are self conscious and afraid of being wrong. Once a student becomes confident in themselves they can grow as a student and as a person. Confidence is a key factor in any type of personal growth, no matter who it is. In the short story “Celeste's Heart” author, Aida Bortnik, generates a reflective tone, through diction and characterization, to show that self confidence is necessary for personal growth.
The name of the book is Girl in Pieces. This is the perfect title for the book and sparked my interest when I heard it.
In a world where many are led to believe that they fall short of what society depicts as “perfect”, it is still true that everyone is beautiful in their own way. There are even more demands on girls now a days than there has ever been before. Some may think they need to fit in, so they become someone they are not or they begin to act like a totally different person. “Barbie Doll” by Marge Piercy, illustrates society’s high and unrealistic expectations on the physical appearance of women, while failing to see that a woman’s self-esteem is at risk of being diminished.
Teenagers are young, naïve and impressionable. They are also insecure and usually sometimes unable to express themselves so they put others down. They are pressured daily to do things they really don’t want to do. They often find themselves doing something they said they would never do. Because of the influence of those around them, they are trying to cover their insecurities by saying things to make others feel bad about themselves. The traits above describe the two main characters in the short story “Bernice Bobs Her Hair”. Both Bernice and Marjorie are young teens dealing with the pressure of being popular and fitting in. Bernice, being the quieter, shyer girl, deals with trying to fit in in a place she feels she doesn’t belong. Marjorie, the louder, seemingly confident girl puts on a front about who she is, deep down being an extremely jealous person. The characters in the story are both dealing with insecurities, each reacting in there own way.
The girl is healthy, intelligent, and strong. However, society can not see past her physical imperfection and see her inner perfection. The preconception that outer beauty reflects the inner beauty, was society cursing her. Society tells her to "play coy" and "exercise, diet, smile and wheedle" . She hears and interprets it to mean that she is nothing but a "fat nose on thick legs".
People are always complaining about how they aren’t as pretty as models on billboards, or how they aren’t as thin as that other girl. Why do we do this to ourselves? It’s benefitting absolutely nobody and it just makes us feel bad about ourselves. The answer is because society has engraved in our minds that we need to be someone we’re not in order to look beautiful. Throughout time, society has shaped our attitudes about appearances, making it perfectly normal and even encouraged, to be five feet ten inches and 95 pounds. People have felt trapped by this ideal. Society has made these beauty standards unattainable, therefore making it self defeating. This is evident in A Doll’s House, where the main character, Nora, feels trapped by Torvald and society’s standard of beauty. The ideal appearance that is prevalent in society is also apparent in the novel, The Samurai’s Garden, where Sachi is embarrassed of the condition of her skin due to leprosy and the stigmas associated with the disease. The burden of having to live up to society’s standard of beauty can affect one psychologically and emotionally, as portrayed in A Doll’s House and The Samurai’s Garden.
I handed my school photograph to my mother. She stared from the photograph to me. Lord sweet Lord how come she so ugly. UGLY. UGLY.'
Diaries hold the most precious secrets that a young girl can have. This includes secrets about boys, embarrassing stories, arguments with parents, and also the true confessions of the transition into womanhood. In Joan Jacobs Brumberg’s book, The Body Project: An Intimate History of American Girls, she examines the struggle with confidence and body image in adolescent girls not only in today's generation but in past generations as well. Brumberg states that “the process of sexual maturation is more difficult for girls today than it was a century ago because of a set of historical changes that have resulted in a particular mismatch between girls’ biology and today’s culture” explaining that the expectations of today’s culture are too demanding for an adolescent girl to uphold when the physical changes, such as weight gain and acne, become prevalent after puberty (Brumberg xvii).
Adolescent egocentrism can occur when teenagers think they have an imaginary audience or think people are more concerned with their appearance and behavior than they really are. In the movie Mean Girls, Regina George, Gretchen Wieners, Cady Herron, and Karen Smith are referred to as the "plastics" by their fellow classmates because of their self-absorbed personalities and glamorous looks. They have a book titled "The Burn Book" in which they talk about everyone in the school in a very nasty way. They believe that these people are concerned with how they look and act at all times. Gretchen Wieners said, "I'm sorry that people are so jealous of me...but I can't help it that I'm so popular." In the beginning of the film, Cady has a very humble personality in which her true friends admire. However, as the movie progresses Cady begins to think that everything she does is important to all of he...
Maureen, her nanny, whose face is riddled with defects, still inspires Coralie to think that, “she [is] beautiful, despite her scars” (10), despite the imperfections she, herself, posses. Then I realized: Isn’t this the true nature of life? Don’t we often look at ourselves, picking out the flaws that we think others will notice? I do this too often, never once thinking that, in reality, people often don’t notice these imperfections or look down on us for them. For instance, Dove had created a commercial that placed women in a position where they had to describe themselves in front of an artist. Accordingly, other women with whom they had met previously were asked to describe them. Of course, the outcome is completely different, yet many women can’t see that. Due to this blind nature, people often try to remove their faults, alike to Coralie, who “attempted to rid herself of the webbing with a sharp knife…” (19), which seems extreme, however many nowadays go through cosmetic procedures to ‘fix’ themselves too. This struggle of accepting ourselves is by no means new—it is an eternal static that doesn’t seem to
Is Cosmetic Surgery giving adolescents false hope that it can “cure” deep insecurities or is it giving teenagers the confidence to be comfortable with their newly improved bodies? “In Miami, FL—Melissa Gonzales used the money she had gotten from her eighteenth birthday to have her breasts augmented. Melissa Gonzales is one of the many individuals who have had success with aesthetic surgery though there are still many who regret their aesthetic procedure like Kacy Long. Kacy Long had gotten implants three years ago. A few weeks following the surgery she began to endure shooting pain in her arms, followed by intense joint pain and crushing fatigue.” (Farrell) These two have had cosmetic surgery but have had different experiences. Aesthetic Procedures have been becoming an international trend, among all ages. The younger audience has been having surgery because they believe that it will allow them to fit in. In just a couple of years the number of surgeries skyrocketed. The “American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery recorded that 160,283 children, 18 and under have had cosmetic interventions in the year 2008.” (Marcus)As a result, cosmetic surgery has become a controversial issue. Some individuals believe cosmetic surgery will help boost adolescents’ confidence, especially in those who have deformities, while others claim that teenagers shouldn’t have aesthetic procedures due to the fact that it is a life impacting decision to make, and teenagers often do not think about the consequences of their actions, so they may later on regret their decision in life. Anyone who is under the age of 18 should not have cosmetic surgery due to the fact that there are so many emotional dangers, medical risks, and that a teens mind and body a...
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...
Adolescents is a time of significant life transitions in which young adults learn to cope with changes that are brought about by physical and emotional maturation (Sands and Howard-Hamilton, 1994). During this time girls begin to become more aware of themselves as females, and learn to identify society’s signals to conform appropriately to their gender (Sands and Howard-Hamilton, 1994). The high school girls that are present in this writers program are starting to understand that they can use their bodies to get attention from boys therefore making them value their individual beauty. Some girls have identified that the “boys” that they like do not value them for their brains, but for their beauty and therefore this is where high school becomes a popularity contest, and academically their grades begin to suffer.
There was a girl named Kandy, she was 15 years old. Her life was extremely boring, all she ever did was go to school, go on her computer, eat and sleep. She spent all summer on her computer. She was really good with HTML and spent her free time making web sites. Kandy didn't have many friends and rarely talked to guys because she was shy and unconfident about her looks. That's why she went into chat rooms. She made a web site with pictures of herself on it and told people in chat rooms to go there. A lot of people would tell her how pretty she was and some would say she was ugly. That made her feel awful. When anyone would say anything nice to her, she wouldn't believe them and think that they were just making fun of her. She only had one real friend that she could talk to, her name was Ang.
In adolescent development, socially constructed stigmas often stunt the advancement of self-expression, there is an idealistic and commonly harsh shaming that is enforced through western social normativity. As such there is an inherent fear that is fostered (at least initially) by many youn...