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Body image issues in teenagers low self esteem
The issue of self esteem and body image in adolescents
Self esteem and body image challenges among adolescents
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Essay 1: Television
“How plastic and artificial life has become. It gets harder and harder to find something…real. Real love, real friends, real body parts” (Scott). In the highly popularized TV series Keeping Up with the Kardashians, the show depicts our increasingly materialistic society. The series showcases the Kardashian family’s lavish lifestyle, jam-packed with spa dates, luncheons with friends, exotic cars, luxurious homes, entrepreneurial events, glamorous vacations and the daily family drama over irrelevant issues. At the same time, the show focuses a great deal on the importance of maintaining a certain physical appearance, making millions of dollars via appearances, signings, and promoting their products. At first glance, Keeping
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Time after time, Keeping up with the Kardashians has created unrealistic expectations and ideas of beauty that are reflective of today’s young female society. The show reflects a generation of young people, particularly females, obsessed with maintaining or obtaining a specific physical image, despite the cost. From Botox injected lips to breast implants and butt enhancement surgeries, adolescent girls are already seeking physical altering medical treatments to “fix” or “enhance” their natural features that are deemed ugly. An example of our narcissistic society, specifically young girls, can be seen during the “Kylie Jenner lip challenge”. During this challenge, many females attempted to plump their lips by placing shot glasses directly over their mouth while sucking extremely hard until all the blood would concentrate to their lip area. This challenge was undertaken by numerous young girls simply trying to simulate the effects of Botox directly after Kylie Jenner had openly admitted to facial injections on an episode of the show stating, “It’s a insecurity of mine and that’s what I wanted to do, so I did”. Though many viewed this challenge as simply a stupid trend, I strongly believe this challenge and the overall show accurately reflects our growing narcissistic young female society. According to an educational video created by Lauren Zalaznick titled, “The conscience of television”, she explains that television in fact truthfully reflects and evolves according to our society’s conscience. Zalaznick elaborates on this issue and gives example after example on how the society at any given point in time directly correlates with what is portrayed on television. Therefore, if Zalaznick’s theory is indeed true, Keeping Up with the Kardashians may actually suggest far more concerning implications. The show may be reflective of
Since the beginning of time itself, Television has been one the most influential pieces of media that the world has ever encountered. The beginning days of television depicted stereotypical mothers cooking and cleaning their homes for their husbands and children. Yet, as the decades passed, television took a dramatic turn, leaving the days of drama free entertainment as a vast memory. Now a day, however, when one hits the power on button to Bravo, the screen lights expand to ritzy socialites dealing with their everyday lives as “housewives”. Bravo TV’s hit number one reality television show, The Real Housewives of Atlanta, deals with the everyday lives of modern-day housewives. When speaking of these women and their family life, the reality series shows its viewers that family life in modern times is dramatic, full of misrepresentations of how people are perceived, and that fame comes at the cost of family.
Do you know the guiltiest pleasure of the American public? Two simple words reveal all—reality TV. This new segment of the TV industry began with pioneering shows like MTV’s The Real World and CBS’s Survivor. Switch on primetime television nowadays, and you will become bombarded by and addicted to numerous shows all based on “real” life. There are the heartwarming tales of childbirth on TLC, melodramas of second-rate celebrities on Celebrity Mole, and a look into a completely dysfunctional family on The Osbornes. Yet, out of all these entertaining reality shows arises the newest low for popular culture, a program based on the idea of a rich man or woman in search of the perfect marriage partner. The Bachelor, and its spin-off The Bachelorette, exemplify capitalist ideology founded on the Marxist base-superstructure model and establish the role of an active American audience.
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
13 Nov 2013. Poniewozik, James. A. “What’s Right With Reality TV.” Time 175.7 (2010): 92-97. Academic Search Complete. Web.
With nearly global use of the television; it has become a preferred method with which to influence and regulate people’s thinking, creating an unreal and idealistic, hypothetical reality which people strive to emulate. This is accomplished through shows and movies; the majority of which emphasize a perfect world, entirely free of corruption and poverty; where everyone is physically attractive, emotionally stable, and economically wealthy; a distorted reflection of our own world. This leads real people to attempt to create this imaginary world, only to fail; thus generating in themselves a sense of unworthiness, which in turn prompts them to try harder, to stop being individuals and become uniform.
Keeping Up with the Kardashians is a stereo-typical reality show that focuses on attention grabbing antics and high impact drama. When “Keeping Up with the Kardashians” made their debut, it brought something new to the table of reality TV causing the viewers to go wild. While the Kardashians audience consists of middle age to adult women, there are still a large amount of fans that are men. Many of the characters in the Kardashian family are known for their vain, arrogant and high strung personalities. Stereo typical portrayals of how women should react are shown throughout the show. Multiple viewers continues to embrace the illusions that all women are cranky and vain, only interested in living a luxurious lifestyle.
It is no secret that reality television shows often present contrived situations as reality. Many producers claim that there are no scripts used in the production of reality shows. They maintain that nothing in the lives of the participants is planned purely for viewers’ entertainment, and that what is presented in the show is their actual reality. However, most people know this to be untrue to a certain degree. The events and situations in reality shows are often staged, re-enacted, or cleverly edited to make them appear more dramatic, thereby more interesting, than they are. Elizabeth Larkin writes, “After so many “reality” programs, we can discern a pattern of “characters” that isn’t very far different from the stock characters found in fictional programming. There’s the sweet and naive person from a small town looking to make it big while still retaining small town values. There’s the party girl/guy who’s always looking for a good time and who shocks those around them—and the list goes on” (Larkin 290). Participants in reality television shows are often looking to gain wealth and fame, and they are willing to do anything necessary to achieve that.
Imagine a distant post-apocalyptic future in which a large silver box has just been excavated from the ruins of what was once Los Angeles, a box that contains stack after stack of DVD’s with titles like Survivor, The Bachelor, Biggest Loser, The Swan, Real World, The Apprentice, and Hell’s Kitchen. What might anthropologists conclude about our 21st century society if these shows were their only glimpse into how we lived our lives? Francine Prose ponders this same question in her essay “Voting Democracy off the Island: Reality TV and the Republican Ethos,” in which she asks not only what future anthropologists might deduce, but, “for that matter,” what “contemporary TV-addicted children and adults” might realize if they were to more closely examine their motivation for watching these shows (22). Salman Rushdie, in his article “Reality TV: A Dearth of Talent and the Death of Mortality,” suggests that we need to examine reality television closely because “it tells us things about ourselves,” and even if we don’t think it does, it “ought to,” a claim that suggests that if we merely brush off reality television as a fad, we might be missing something inherently valuable about our nature (16). In her essay, “The Distorting Mirror of Reality Television,” Sarah Coleman suggests that reality television offers a distorted reflection, a “dark view of humanity in the guise of light entertainment,” a consideration that asks us to see who we are in this distorted reflection of our values (19). The question then is: what do we see when we see ourselves in this “dime-store mirror” (“Reality TV” 16)? Whatever the answer to this question might be, the question itself suggests that there is something inherently human about our fascination with r...
In the article “TV’s Distorted Images” written by Tom Seibert talks about the powerful ways TV can affect the way people think. TV can ruin a person’s outlook on themselves, thinking, and acting. In “TV’s Distorted Images”, Seibert writes the changes in people’s lives and their self-awareness of how they live. Tom wrote his article in 1995 when TV was brought to Fiji with just one channel working. The young girls that he had talked to were all perfectly happy and healthy and lived life with the biggest smile until two high-rated TV shows became a part of their life. Once the girls started watching shows like Melrose Place and Beverly Hills 90210, they became self-conscious. The girls no longer enjoyed how they looked, believing they were overweight or not pretty.
The media has had an increasingly destructive effect on young people who are becoming worryingly obsessed with their body image. The media is saturated in sexual imagery in which young people have to face every day. The sheer volume of sexual imagery in the media today has resulted in the vast majority of young people to become hooked on looking as near to perfection everyday by using the latest products and buying the latest fashions. This used to be enough but lately the next step to achieving perfection is cosmetic surgery. Everyone wants to look attractive, especially teenagers who are not only put under massive strain to succeed but to look beautiful and climb the ranks of the social ladder, and it seems that the only way to achieve the much desired beauty is to turn to drastic measures.
To many, the notion of a teenager undergoing plastic surgery is appalling and unbelievable. For others, such as eleven-year-old Julia, a nose job was able to help her lead a happier and more normal life. To eighteen-year-old Kristen a breast augmentation is a traditional rite of passage of the family. She claims that she “just wanted to look normal,” and that after surgery, she does. (Sweeny, 2009) In these types of cases, cosmetic surgery can be beneficial to the confidence of teenagers in what Ann Kearney-Cooke calls “an epidemic of low self-esteem among girls.” (Sweeney, 2009) Whether it is a physical deformity, such as protruding ears, or simply a lack of something that other peers have, such as large breasts, cosmetic surgery can help teenagers cope with self-worth in a world where beauty is ridiculously selective. However, aside from the confidence-boosting possibilities resulting from teen cosmetic surgery, there are many reasons why it should not be taken lightly for an adolescent. Although cosmetic surgery can potentially be beneficial, there are also many extreme risks for teenagers, including medical complications and in some rare cases death, and thus should be solely a last resort after meticulous analysis for serious cases. Furthermore, neither the adolescent brain nor body is even fully developed.
Flipping through the pages of Vogue's latest edition, 23 year-old Susan seems quite upset. She struggles with the thought of lacking the perfect body and delicate features in order to be considered attractive. Surprisingly, Susan is not alone in this kind of an internal struggle. In contemporary society, every other woman aspires to have the lips of Angelina Jolie and the perfect jaw line of Keira Knightley. Society today looks down upon individuals that do not fit in, whether in terms of body shape or facial attractiveness. This forces them to consider the option of 'ordering beauty.' Since cosmetic surgery is no longer a social taboo in America given its widespread popularity, more people are promoting it which ultimately affects the rest of the world due to the unwavering influence of American culture. Cosmetic surgery should be deterred in the US because it promotes the idea of valuing appearance over ability, gives rise to unrealistic expectations, and brings with it high cost to society.
Reality television has changed the world today by encouraging violent behavior, elevate imprudent personalities, and depict woman of their values. Many reality TV shows are driving young kids to be driven by money and fame. Our reality television make us seem ignorant to other countries. Young viewers of these reality TV shows do not realize that most of the shows are often scripted and are not “real”. Although the programming of reality TV can be highly entertaining, it is important to be aware of the messages, and values that these shows often portray. Since reality TV has such a strong foothold in American pop culture, it is likely not going anywhere or changing its content any time
In American culture today, society's view of beauty is controlled by Hollywood, where celebrities are constantly in the lime-light. The media watches Hollywood's every move, and is quick to ridicule “A-listers” whenever they dare to gain a few pounds or to let an uncontrollable pimple show. The media has created a grossly distorted mental image of what should be considered beautiful, and with almost every junior high and high school-age girl reading and viewing this message, the idea has been instilled in them as well. This view of beauty is causing many teenage girls to become obsessed with a highly problematic and unattainable goal of perfection.
A second reason for people’s love of reality television, is the fact that reality TV can stir the viewer’s emotions. “While some cheer for their favorite celebrity on Dancing with the Stars….” (Lehmann). “ Or cry with joy watching Say Yes to the Dress…” ( Lehmann). These are just two of many example quotes that show that people sometimes get very emotional by simply watching other people live out their lives so publicly. Many people id...