Body Image and Media
Body Image and the media
The idea of the ‘perfect’ body is pasted everywhere in the media. Whether it’s on the catwalk, in Hollywood, or in glossy magazines, the message is clear: skinny is sexy, or if you’re a guy, six packs are definitely in. With these sorts of media messages bombarded at us every single day, it is pretty hard to be happy with our bodies and have high self-esteem, unless, you already have the body that the media and the fashion industry thinks is ideal. And so what is ‘ideal’? Well, for women it’s thin, long legs, relatively tall, flawless skin. For men it’s muscular, tall, and just look ‘manly’ in general.
There are many ways the media can influence us, whether it’s in TV shows or movies, magazines, and maybe even in the newspapers. However, the main culprit is definitely advertisements. Advertisements are especially dangerous because the people advertising the products can be easily manipulated into something more ‘beautiful’ then they already are. Pictures can be airbrushed, cropped, erased and merged to look like something completely different just like the picture below. The model’s waistline has shrunk dramatically, and her neck appears to be longer, she also has lighter skin and brighter eyes.
Pictures like these are then pasted everywhere to convince you to buy the products so you can look, or at least feel like whoever is advertising the products. This can have a detrimental effect on certain people buying the products, because not everything advertised is real. For example, you buy the shampoo that Miranda Kerr is advertising to make your hair stronger and more nourished. You use it at home and you don’t see much change. But then it hits you, you didn’t buy the shampoo because it said it was going to make your hair more nourished, you bought it just because Miranda Kerr was advertising it and you want to be and look like her. The advertising industry knows these can be the behaviour of some consumers so they deliberately put a
The idea of the ‘perfect’ body is pasted everywhere in the media. Whether it’s on the catwalk, in Hollywood, or in glossy magazines, the message is clear: skinny is sexy, or if you’re a guy, six packs are definitely in. With these sorts of media messages bombarded at us every single day, it is pretty hard to be happy with our bodies and have high self-esteem, unless, you already have the body that the media and the fashion industry thinks is ideal. And so what is ‘ideal’? Well, for women it’s thin, long legs, relatively tall, flawless skin. For men it’s muscular, tall, and just look ‘manly’ in general.
There are many ways the media can influence us, whether it’s in TV shows or movies, magazines, and maybe even in the newspapers. However, the main culprit is definitely advertisements. Advertisements are especially dangerous because the people advertising the products can be easily manipulated into something more ‘beautiful’ then they already are. Pictures can be airbrushed, cropped, erased and merged to look like something completely different just like the picture below. The model’s waistline has shrunk dramatically, and her neck appears to be longer, she also has lighter skin and brighter eyes.
Pictures like these are then pasted everywhere to convince you to buy the products so you can look, or at least feel like whoever is advertising the products. This can have a detrimental effect on certain people buying the products, because not everything advertised is real. For example, you buy the shampoo that Miranda Kerr is advertising to make your hair stronger and more nourished. You use it at home and you don’t see much change. But then it hits you, you didn’t buy the shampoo because it said it was going to make your hair more nourished, you bought it just because Miranda Kerr was advertising it and you want to be and look like her. The advertising industry knows these can be the behaviour of some consumers so they deliberately put a