Real Women

We have all seen the pictures of anorexic or bulimic models on the cat-walk, praised for their bodies and for their achievement of the proper "beauty." Because proper beauty for as long as I can remember, and more and more as time goes on, is the beauty that is thin and young. Anything outside of this is not considered beautiful by the media and therefore not considered beautiful by the many vulnerable and impressionable women (and men) that look to the media for direction as to what beautiful is like. Taking it back a couple of steps, I think it is safe to assume that we all crave to be "beautiful." In fairy tales, all the princesses, despite being poor, haggard, or orphaned, had the one redeeming quality of beauty. It is this beauty that allowed for the redemption of Cinderella, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, and others. Beauty could certainly be considered a covetable quality to have and unlike brains or humor, we are taught that beauty is not something we are only necessarily born with, but something that we can achieve! For children that are not taught by their parents and other influences that their beautiful qualities are many and may be different from others', they can only look to the media for direction as to what "beautiful" is. And we honestly can't blame them. When lacking proper direction, children will succumb to the societal norm of instruction, which usually ends up being the television, magazines, and the internet. 

So we are from a young age susceptible to the instruction the media provides. And we all know what we see: thin, young, blonde, fashionable women who are desired by men. Wolf asks the question I often ask myself: “why do women react to the “ideal,” whatever form she takes at that moment, as if she were a non-negotiable commandment (wolf, 59)? For young women and girls, I would say that they take the "ideal" as a commandment because it is a source of instruction on a topic they are not being instructed on, but that is endlessly important to their social lives. Like I said before, women want to be beautiful: for themselves, for men, and for society. And when they need an image of what this beauty actually looks like, instead of looking to their mothers and sisters, they follow society's norms and look at this "ideal." But in doing so, the young woman is not fully aware that this is an "ideal" created by the mass media in order to sell her something, and that the "ideal" is inherently not something most women look like. Instead, she now has a goal to achieve and clear direction as to what she is to look like if she wants to be beautiful and desired by men. I like to think that this is not true for most grown women, because they should be educated and adequately literate as to what the media really does and the truth behind the images we are constantly being presented with. But the truth is that educated women are not always above succumbing to this "ideal" and may be even more susceptible to it in an attempt to fit in to society's expectations: whether in the professional world or as a home-maker.

What women are essentially taught is that beauty is extremely desirable, and to their luck, achievable  by anyone, if you are willing to put in the work necessary. Wolf adequately writes,

“Somehow, somewhere, someone must have figured out that [women] will buy more things if they are kept in the self-hating, ever-failing, hungry, and sexually insecure state of being aspiring “beauties” (Wolf, 66). And this is precisely what the media does on a daily basis. And whether we are the 8-year old 3rd grader or the 45-year old attorney, we all fall prey to this to some extent. One of our earlier readings talked about the schizophrenic feeling of being two people: one that hates what the media portrays and is fully aware of the distorted reality of it and the second, that still secretly wants to achieve this distorted reality. I would have to admit I am a schizophrenic myself; thanks to several courses I have taken, I have become aware of what media does and how it works. Yet, the beauty it portrays (over and over) is so pervasive that I find myself losing track of reality and getting sucked into this world where every woman weighs 110 pounds and is eternally young. In a room full of women, I can guarantee that a high percentage is currently on a diet or using an anti-wrinkle cream. I have been on several diets of my own and have thought about preventing wrinkles (I am 22) because I read an article telling me that "it is never too early" and "prevention is better than treatment." And of course, I heard that Britney Spears had botox at 21, so I must keep up to the "ideal."

Thinking of myself as an educated, informed woman, who still is still admittedly at times overtaken by the images I see in the media, I get restless and uneasy as to how it affects other women who are less informed and less aware. I don't want to see any more pictures of super-thin models or hear about the new celebrity that has admitted to having an eating disorder. It would be an impossible undertaking to completely shut myself off from media I find inaccurate and harmful. And I know that the "thin" and "youth" industries are much too lucrative to stop selling us products any time soon. What I would like to see is more of this:

Ironic how one of the largest campaigns for fashion for the average women is French.

Great, she's not a size 0. But even here, our model's arms are bound. We'll take what we can get..for now.

And we've all seen the dove commercials that aren't shown nearly enough. As women who have these bodies, I think we are ready to see them on display. I believe Kilbourne said on one of her videos that less than 5% of real women look like the 98% of women depicted in mass media. In an eagerness to belong and to achieve beauty, women fall victim to this discrepancy and endeavor to achieve bodies that for many, might not even be possible. I am a woman and know what my body looks like, and what that of my friends and relatives look like, and I don't see it anywhere in the media. Men too, know what women look like: from their mothers, girlfriends, wives, and friends, and they too are ready to see some real women depicted. I don't know where the taboo began of not showing size 6 and above women on television and magazines. Wykes writes, “The thin message is neither singular nor sudden. Nor is it merely a modern mass media construction. Rather, the mass media reinforce and reproduce thinness within a whole history of cultural constructions of femininity which make it acceptable to audiences and so sellable to advertisers” (Wykes, 207). Well I would like a new kind of historical construction of femininity, and not much has to be constructed. Simply show the truth. I am not an advocate for "real women have curves" because I know many thin women who are indisputably real women. Real women look like what you look like, or what your girlfriend looks like. I ask for nothing more than reality, or an approximation to it, to start. And I am certain that advertising DD bras will be as lucrative if not more so as advertising the B-cup Vistoria's Secret models that represent only part of the population. Advertise to real women, things that real women need, and real women will buy them; not in an attempt to achieve the unachievable, but as finally having found a satisfactory product for their needs. I don't want to see more pictures of models and actresses, I already know remarkably well what they look like.

Sources:

 Wolf, Naomi "The Beauty Myth" 

Wykes, Gunter "Conclusion: Body Messages and Body Meanings"