Women In Pop Culture Research Paper
Women in Pop Culture
The average girl does not easily fit in to society’s view of women. It isn’t supermodels who watch reality television and read the articles on “getting a guy and dropping 20 pounds”(70). Media has become a partial cause to young girls getting eating disorders or plastic surgery just to become “prettier”. They want to become perfect.
Recently, I opened a magazine and started to flip through the pages. It wasn’t long before I started to notice that the majority of the women were tall, ridiculously thin, and scantily dressed. They looked flawless. Women are often evaluated on their looks. Sometimes this evaluation is from men, but it is more often coming from women. Women try to measure themselves up to other women they
may see, especially the near-perfect models gracing the pages of almost every woman’s magazine. The majority of real women that we see every day are not six feet tall and one hundred and ten pounds with blonde hair and blue eyes. Nobody looks like one of those models in every day life. Magazines have desensitized people to what a real woman looks like. Although greatly influential, magazines are not the only aspects of pop culture that women are inaccurately portrayed in. Almost every girl either has or has had a Barbie. Barbie is the world’s definition of perfect. She comes in a designer outfit with her hair done and ideal proportions. Barbie has become a role model for little girls. “They instill in legions of little girls a preference for whiteness, for blond hair, blue eyes, and delicate features, for an impossible uberfigure, perched eternally and submissively in high heels. In the Cult of the Blond, Barbies are a cornerstone” (73). Barbie instills the idea and concept of beauty into little girls’ minds rather than let beauty be judged by the eye of the beholder. Reality TV is another thing that causes “average” or “normal” girls to question our physical appearance. Americas Next Top Model, for example, is a show solely based on looks and pictures. In the past they have had a girl go to a speech therapist to get rid of her trace of a southern accent because it simply wasn’t professional. Other reality shows try to conform the appearances of the girls on it for a certain purpose. I’m tired of seeing the same kinds of girls on those shows. I want to see someone who looks like me, or a friend of mine. Not someone who looks as if she stepped out of a magazine. I know how pop culture and the media’s portrayal of young women affect real women. I didn’t just read or see it. I have experienced it. Two years ago, I was that girl who read every article on how to get the guy and lose twenty pounds. I starved myself for perfection. I wanted the perfect “Barbie” figure. Food became my enemy. Very soon after, I became anorexic. My motto was “beauty is pain”. I was so wrong, so disillusioned by the models in my magazines and on my television that I began trying to change who I was. No girl should ever have to experience feeling inferior to a face in a magazine.
The average girl does not easily fit in to society’s view of women. It isn’t supermodels who watch reality television and read the articles on “getting a guy and dropping 20 pounds”(70). Media has become a partial cause to young girls getting eating disorders or plastic surgery just to become “prettier”. They want to become perfect.
Recently, I opened a magazine and started to flip through the pages. It wasn’t long before I started to notice that the majority of the women were tall, ridiculously thin, and scantily dressed. They looked flawless. Women are often evaluated on their looks. Sometimes this evaluation is from men, but it is more often coming from women. Women try to measure themselves up to other women they
may see, especially the near-perfect models gracing the pages of almost every woman’s magazine. The majority of real women that we see every day are not six feet tall and one hundred and ten pounds with blonde hair and blue eyes. Nobody looks like one of those models in every day life. Magazines have desensitized people to what a real woman looks like. Although greatly influential, magazines are not the only aspects of pop culture that women are inaccurately portrayed in. Almost every girl either has or has had a Barbie. Barbie is the world’s definition of perfect. She comes in a designer outfit with her hair done and ideal proportions. Barbie has become a role model for little girls. “They instill in legions of little girls a preference for whiteness, for blond hair, blue eyes, and delicate features, for an impossible uberfigure, perched eternally and submissively in high heels. In the Cult of the Blond, Barbies are a cornerstone” (73). Barbie instills the idea and concept of beauty into little girls’ minds rather than let beauty be judged by the eye of the beholder. Reality TV is another thing that causes “average” or “normal” girls to question our physical appearance. Americas Next Top Model, for example, is a show solely based on looks and pictures. In the past they have had a girl go to a speech therapist to get rid of her trace of a southern accent because it simply wasn’t professional. Other reality shows try to conform the appearances of the girls on it for a certain purpose. I’m tired of seeing the same kinds of girls on those shows. I want to see someone who looks like me, or a friend of mine. Not someone who looks as if she stepped out of a magazine. I know how pop culture and the media’s portrayal of young women affect real women. I didn’t just read or see it. I have experienced it. Two years ago, I was that girl who read every article on how to get the guy and lose twenty pounds. I starved myself for perfection. I wanted the perfect “Barbie” figure. Food became my enemy. Very soon after, I became anorexic. My motto was “beauty is pain”. I was so wrong, so disillusioned by the models in my magazines and on my television that I began trying to change who I was. No girl should ever have to experience feeling inferior to a face in a magazine.