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In this essay, I will be examining “Losing Bodies” by Susie Orbach, an essay on the effects of how humans shape themselves to fit into the new trends of social media and society. Media has a clear influence in our lives on a daily basis as we can see from the essay, from the Westernized nose to the two-thousand fifteen praised “thigh gap.” Television shows use subliminal messaging as a tactic to show that being plus size is deemed as bad, that puts the image into teenagers’ minds that being plus sized is not socially acceptable.
Citizens around the world are drastically influenced by the media around them. Every day life is constantly changing because of the new trends on what is popular. As Ms. Susie Orbach stated “Social media […]
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has quasi-democratized the possibility of having a voice,” (Orbach 244). The media is lowering everyone’s points of view and creating one standard for everyone to live their lives by. Women across the globe are having operations done to make themselves more “acceptable” to the rest of the world. People are going to extreme lengths to make themselves basically unnatural. “Some obstetricians have been prepared to allow women to follow the example of movie stars and celebrities who proclaim the virtue of caesarean sections at eight months for the spurious cosmetic purpose of regaining their pre-pregnancy bodies by six weeks postpartum” (Orbach 248). Society is being controlled by the media’s perception of the world. The public image is constantly telling us that our natural bodies and style are wrong. Conformity to the newest trends are leaving an emotional scar on people.
By changing our appearances to meet the standards of society we are setting an unacceptable example for the next generation. It is telling our children that being unique individuals just isn’t favorable anymore. “So persuasive is the sense that our bodies are not okay as they are that private organizations see profitable opportunities” (Orbach 248). Companies are steady taking advantage of our insecurities. Businesses are taking advantage of women especially, “There is no stable body for a woman […] The body is being reshaped by visual culture in literally thousands of presentations weekly through television” (Orbach 248). For example, Heinz’ Weight Watchers, Nestle’s Lean Cuisine, and Unilever’s Slimfast. Also during the developmental years of middle and high school students are being taught the Body Mass Index scale. This scale categorizes kids into body groups of large, medium, or small. And based on height and weight the child could be categorized as “obese”, “average”, or “underweight” for their body frame. Furthermore, this breeds discontent in children’s hearts for their natural bodies. Constantly making modifications is a sign that humanity isn’t confident in itself
anymore. Susie Orbach tackles an important topic that plagues society today. Our image is consistently changing due to the media. People have learned from the media that what they have isn’t satisfying enough or they just aren’t shaped right. This forces society to go to extreme lengths to make up for what they think they lack. The world needs to take a stand and accept what they were born with and know that they are marvelous. Self enhancements aren’t needed for you to make it in life. To summarize Ms. Orbach’s point, individualism and self confidence are the true keys to a happy and successful life.
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.
Susie Orbach, a British psycho-therapist wrote an article called “Losing Bodies”, in which she focused on body shapes and how it had changed over the years. Simple terms such as hourglass, pear, straight and apple can be used as descriptive words, but it can also be the name of the four body shapes categories. These body shapes were generally used to differentiate the different shapes and sizes, however, nowadays women take it a lot more seriously. Women are losing confidence in themselves due to the heavily influence by the mass media and the widespread of Western cultures.
Media is a wide term that covers many information sources including, television, movies, advertisement, books, magazines, and the internet. It is from this wide variety of information that women receive cues about how they should look. The accepted body shape and has been an issue affecting the population probably since the invention of mirrors but the invention of mass media spread it even further. Advertisements have been a particularly potent media influence on women’s body image, which is the subjective idea of one's own physical appearance established by observation and by noting the reactions of others. In the case of media, it acts as a super peer that reflects the ideals of a whole society. Think of all the corsets, girdles, cosmetics, hair straighteners, hair curlers, weight gain pills, and diet pills that have been marketed over the years. The attack on the female form is a marketing technique for certain industries. According to Sharlene Nag...
The media is a fascinating tool; it can deliver entertainment, self-help, intellectual knowledge, information, and a variety of other positive influences; however, despite its advances for the good of our society is has a particular blemish in its physique that targets young women. This blemish is seen in the unrealistic body images that it presents, and the inconsiderate method of delivery that forces its audience into interest and attendance. Women are bombarded with messages from every media source to change their bodies, buy specific products and redefine their opinion of beauty to the point where it becomes not only a psychological disease, but a physical one as well.
According to Beverly Ballaro, the combination of two trends, the technology-enabled media saturation of the American public, and the promotion by this media of highly unattainable body types, is largely responsible for an epidemic of body image pathologies afflicting American girls and women, as well as an increasing number of boys and men. She also mentions that the media has given certain images for each gender. Generally, for females the body image is extremely thin, and there is an emphasis on large breasts and for males, tall, slender, muscular and toned. For both genders, the most valued and appreciated appearance i...
Society is obsessed with fitness and weight loss. Ever since I was in sixth grade I have had issues with my weight and self-image. The article “Fat Is a Feminist Issue”, by Susie OrBach focuses on how our society puts this unrealistic image of what women should look like into everyone’s heads. The media and magazines urge women to conform, at any cost, into a constantly changing expectation of what is beautiful. Women are taught to look at themselves from an outside view, to be a sex image for men and fuel the diet and fashion industries. Society thinks if women do not fit within the unrealistic image something is wrong with them. The highly glorified concept of beauty marketed by the media contributes to the concern over body image that causes many women, including myself, to eating disorders and poor self-image.
Some may say that the media does not have much of a substantial influence on young adults, but some at risk teens have cited that their reasoning behind their development of eating disorders are in response to the many adverts and images that are represented in social media culture. The media in today’s society continuously advocates images of falsely induced perfection women all around the world. The industry that controls what people see on television and in advertisements knows that only a small percentage of average individuals possess these attributes or fit their set high standard of beauty. The idea that one can never be “too rich”, or “too thin” is prevalent in the media as well as in most media oriented images. Social media’s use of unrealistic models send an implicit message, that in order for a woman to be considered up to an acceptable standard, they must be in some sense of the word unhealthy, most people who are being portrayed in advertisements are well below the range of being considered healthy. To understand the reasoning behind why women and even men take this idea of body image to extremes, the term body image needs to be examined. Body image is how an individual feels when they look in the mirror or when they picture themselves in their own mind. It encompasses it what some one believes about their own appearance (including memories, assumptions, and generalizations). Never showing goals or putting emphasize on education or academic achievements. Objectifying the body and making it seem as though appearance is the only achievement to be set in one’s life place little room is placed on young men and women to have more focus on more educational goals.
Every culture around the globe stresses specific ideals for body image. In the United States and many other countries, the media plays a big role in how we view ourselves- it shows us what is "good" and what is "bad." In many ways our society infiltrates our concept of ideal body image by setting unrealistic expectations for both genders. At an early age we are instructed to pay special attention to our appearance. A...
From the average to the dirty, pornography has shaped our desires to conform to idyllic standard. During adolescence, pornography isn’t just seen as “pleasure,” but it is seen as “study material,” that would get them ready for the real deal. Today, pornography has become even more accessible, whereas pornography used to be fairly censored and only able to be purchased in a store, it can now be “Googled” and available in seconds. Statistics show that “Nine out of ten young men and one out of three young girls watched or have watched porn” (internet safety), and the numbers don’t lie, early exposure and easy accessibility to porn has completely warped the way teens view adulthood, and has had a profound effect on our overall understanding of
Recent studies have shown that approximately 75 percent of adolescent females wish to be thinner and over 35 percent of them resort to drastic extremes to achieve the new “thin ideal.” (Body Dissatisfaction in Early Adolescent Girls) Today in our culture, this ideal of body image is portrayed in every aspect of our lives. We see a representation of attractive, extremely thin women in magazines, television shows, movies, commercials, etc. The new body image, which today is described as being perfect, is a new, unrealistic standard of skinny. This type of representation presented by the media compels female adolescents to view themselves in negative ways which results in eating disorders, body dissatisfaction, or even depression. The new standard of the “thin ideal,” according to society, is simply unattainable and irrational. So the question still remains: How has the media altered female adolescence’s perspectives on the “perfect” body image, and how has this changed our female society?
“ The media needs to take responsibility for the effect it has on our younger generation.... why aren’t we regulating things like calling people fat”(Lawrence). The actress Jennifer Lawrence expressed her opinion in what she believes that the media is responsible for the damaging body image that has affected the younger generation into believing this image is ideal. Considering this quote, recently there have been more .The negative body image in female adolescents has been affected by the influence of impossible body types in the media such as the doll “Barbie” and characters in popular children shows.
Social media is a revolution, which we are currently experiencing. It has changed the way people communicate and interact with one another, and opens up many more avenues to share news, information, and just general chit chat. Social media is relatively quiet young, but is here to stay for the foreseeable future. We are now at a point where online, we can share, read and react to lots of individual information being posted on microblogging websites, such as Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Tumblr and more. Twitter in particular has been widely embraced, and will centre most of the discussion.
Society promotes unrealistic physical appearance ideals by producing advertisements which have been altered to fit cultural desires. These cultural desires have caused prejudice and discrimination in the professional world as well as in daily life. People who do not fit these ideals are found to have lower pay and experiences of discrimination in the workplace. These ideals have also caused an increase in mental health problems caused by the unhealthy competition and comparisons that have become and obsession from the infinite access to other people’s lives. It is important to acknowledge the detrimental effects due to technological advancements because we may find ourselves falling into the trap of obsession with cultural ideals that are physically impossible to
Susan Bordo states in her article “Never Just Pictures”, that children grow up knowing that they can never be thin enough. They are thought that being fat is the worst thing ever. The ones responsible for this are the media, celebrities, models, and fashion designers. All of these factors play a big role on the development of the standard and how people view themselves. Everyone at one dreams about being the best they can in any aspect. But to achieve that most believe that one of the big factors is outer beauty. So people look at celebrities and fashion designers, and believe that to be accepted they have to look like them. That’s when they take drastic measures to change their appearance because they’ve been influenced by the Medias idea of “beautiful.” This feeling mostly happens in women but in recent years the gender gap has become smaller. Now men also feel the need to look good because of the media. On the TV, instead of having infomercials ...
Social media can be used in our days as a very helpful tool for many things in changing any person’s life ant attitude. It has a positive impact on the society level. These media will keep the person socially active and open to all what happened in the world. Sharing the latest news, photos, finding new friends and knowing the culture. Also, it allows for millions to keep in touch with each other and update for all the new technology. And, it helps people who have difficulties in communication with others to be more socialized and stronger and develop more confidence to feel more comfortable, protected and relaxed just sitting behind a screen. “It saved me time and money without ever requiring me to leave the house; it salvaged my social life, allowed me to conduct interviews as a reporter and kept a lifeline open to my far-flung extended family” says Leonard(231).