A quote specifically struck out to me in the video is when one of the girls being interviewed said, "it meant more than just wanting to be thin." I replayed that line over and over again, I couldn't grasp the idea behind her reasoning, later the doctor said it was the idea to be in control of something in one's life. In this case, holding the control over eating. Nevertheless, in Jean Kilbourne's reading, she talks about how many grade schoolers, mainly girls think that they are watching their weight, "...more than half the forth-grade girls were dieting and three-quarters felt they were overweight...boys expect girls to be perfect and beautiful. And skinny." These young girls feel pressure to look and to be "perfect" not for themselves but for the society, for the boys. Another important aspect that Kilbourne points out is: "a woman is conditioned to view her face as a mask and her body as an object, as things separate from and more important than her real self, constantly in need of alteration, improvement and disguise" (121).
In Maggie Wykes/ Barrie Gunter's essay they brought upon these Starving to Perfection commandments that are just brutal. I can only imagine what goes through the heads of these young beautiful girls that starve themselves to be thin. Especially after watching some anorexia stories on YouTube. I researched a few ProAna websites, and they left me speechless. My heart ached as I skimmed through their photos and comments.
Wykes also talks about the heavy impact the media advertisement has on the female population in which, "women simply try to comply until they die- sometimes early and tragically when the effort ends in self-hard and disease- whilst others reach the threshold of womanhood, say no to what is offer and simply self-starve themselves back to childhood" (208). Women are the biggest target audience of consumers; there are all different types of products designed for women. Yet, there are no representations of "real" women in any of the ads, "publicity is not just advertising but all means by which information and ideas are made public"(208). All the mainstream beauty products have celebrities and well-known beautiful people as their spokesperson. These people have huge followers that the public (teenage girls and women) looks up too. However, these celebrities are shown in their best shapes and looks. It just seems to make sense for woman to want to "look" like them and follow their footsteps in reaching that star beauty standards.
Advertisements of food are also disturbing. It is always the big juicy streak for men, and the fat-free light yogurt for women. Women are told to watch their weight all the time and even if they were to get a taste of chocolate or ice-cream, it is always described as “sweet at the tip of the tongue.” “The displacement is necessary to insure that the grim actualities of women’s eating problems remain obscured; the point, after all, is to sell ice cream, not to remind people of how dangerous food actually is for women” (Susan Bordo, 108). These negative food images are endangering the lives of thousands of young females; yet, advertisers only care about what makes money and what sells. Both men and women are humans that may enjoy eating but why do women always need to watch and count the calories in their food? Based on statistic from Kilbourns reading, advertising companies spend about 120 billion dollars every year for their ads. Similarly, they would rather remain on the conventional safe sexist ads than to try to give some equality for women and men.
Similar to what Susan Douglas said, “American women today are a bundle of contradictions because much of the media imagery we grew up with was itself filled with mixed messages about women should and should not do (9).” Younger girls are being fed by these beautiful photo corrected images in magazines and billboards that there is no way that they would be happy with themselves. Even the wonderful tasty food is slowly drifting away because of the "weight watcher" ads and all those calorie counts in magazines targeted towards female teens and young adults. The same can't be said towards males even though they also get pressure from the society, however, there are not many boys that are anorectic.
Women have it tough in the society, Gloria Steinem; co-founder of Ms. Magazine tried so hard to stray from the mainstream media and conventional beauty portrayals. However, it was close to impossible to pull in advertisers, which were the core for their financial bases for the magazine. The president of Estee Lauder refused to advertise in Ms. And said, “Ms. Readers are not our women. They are not interested in things like fragrance and blush-on. If they were, Ms. would write articles about them" (119). Not only are there sexism in the society, now there's a new level of differences between women who beautify themselves and those that do not.
There needs to be more feminist activist like Steinem that truly believes in wanting to change the mass media. These advertisements are not only a misrepresentation of both women and beauty but presents possible threats and may endanger lives of beautiful young girls who think they are not good enough. In a world where technology is constantly expanding, we are being exposed to ads more than ever. Extreme photoshop should be banned, it is NOT okay to digitally alter a person's image because no one, not even the actual model LOOKS like that!!!
This change is not something that can be changed easily but what we can do is educate young people and make them aware of this "fake" representations at an earlier age. Honestly speaking, personally I really just became aware of this issue while taking this course, which is sad. Everyone should be educated about the truth behind advertising and media industry! Of course, this is easier said than done, but it has to start somewhere. We need to educated ourselves and open our horizons to not only take on the actuality of media but to critically exercise our brains!!! Slowly but surely, WE can and will make a difference. ^__^
This change is not something that can be changed easily but what we can do is educate young people and make them aware of this "fake" representations at an earlier age. Honestly speaking, personally I really just became aware of this issue while taking this course, which is sad. Everyone should be educated about the truth behind advertising and media industry! Of course, this is easier said than done, but it has to start somewhere. We need to educated ourselves and open our horizons to not only take on the actuality of media but to critically exercise our brains!!! Slowly but surely, WE can and will make a difference. ^__^
While reading the Huffington Post the other day, I came across this article:
Thank you for this,Danielle. The documentary of Dana broke my heart, too, and like you say, what's upsetting is that there is so much more behind just "I want to be thin". We are taught that anorexia and other eating disorders can sometimes be displaced attempts at control---but maybe the "control" these girls seek is the casting off of an image that essentially damns a young girl as a failure at 13.
ReplyDeleteI also liked that you pointed out that advertisers have nearly no incentive for embracing progressive images of women because the financial risk is too great. It's so true---who is going to do that to their client and be the first one out of the gate? This drives home the point that finding alternative media is more important than ever before. Great work!