The Media Presents Negative Role Models Essay

When one thinks of media, one tends to relate media to television, news, magazines, newspaper articles, and so on. Many people do not think of media is something that portrays negative effects on young women. However, young women are more susceptible to lower self-esteem resulting in eating disorders or depression more today than ever before. The media projects negative and undermining images of women and one does not have to look very hard to realize this. The media projects images of unrealistic women who only look the way they do because of plastic surgery or airbrushing techniques. The media has much greater effects on young girls than anything else in our culture today. Our society has created an environment so obsessed with

According to Sociologist Craig Calhoun, socialization is “the process through which individuals internalize the values, beliefs, and norms of a society and learn to function as its members”(Calhoun, 2013). With that in mind, media, particularly the music video and advertisement industry, are essential parts of contemporary socialization, especially involving the perpetuation of gender roles in our culture. At a very young age, children learn, without difficulty, the differences between boys and girls, and what standards they are held to. Women are often objectified, systematically demoralized, and dehumanized in the music video industry and mainstream advertisement. External forces, such as the media, not only guide children to understand the norms of each gender, but these forces also shape children and adolescent’s perception of the self. The documentaries Killing Us Softly 4 directed by Jean Kilbourne and Dream World 3 directed by Sut Jhally explore the distorted and fallacious ideals of femininity and sexuality expressed in contemporary media.

During these times, once you turn on your television set you are abruptly notified on yet another absurd act that a celebrity had committed the night before. The media becomes engrossed by the despicable behavior and ravages at it as if it was the final grain of rice. Once they have completed a story that is at the right level of crudeness, they deliver it to the public. The vulgar news reaches households all across the world, and then it soon pollutes the minds of innocent and young children. At a young age, boys and girls commonly compare themselves with reference groups of people who occupy the social role to which they desire. The constant negative and sometimes provocative images that are displayed by celebrities are what define

African Americans have been in the media either positively or negatively for decades. This research will show you different types of negative media representations and positive representations of African Americans in the media. Also a brief interview with an African American man and how he feels about these issues and his own personal experiences. This will address the problems of African American stereotypes in the media.

“People learn more from media than any other single source of information” (Missrepresentation). This quote exemplifies how society learns and creates their standards about people, places, and things. All sources and mediums of media impact billions of lives every day. The media holds this power over society and it’s time to change that; especially when it comes to the media’s view of women. Women are constantly being misrepresented. This misrepresentation of women in the media is negatively impacting America by corrupting both the youth and adults. This is occurring because of the hyper-sexualization of women, wrongly portraying women in leadership positions, and creating stereotypes of women in movies and television.

This is consistent with the research of Larson, (1995, p. 538), who claims media plays a key role in influencing youths. In other words, strong attachment to mass media can be regarded as ” para-social relationships” where even though people have not had any personal encounter with a hero or she-roe, they feel they have a connection with the person in question. Notably, it can be deduced that some heroes and she-roes indulge in illicit and unethical behaviours. However, this may exert negative effect on the followers’ decision and lifestyle.

The idea “sex sells” is largely influential for celebrities like Beyoncé to deem it necessary to objectify their bodies for they're so called image. The repercussions of this behavior, however, are the lasting affects it will have on both female and male children and young adults of this generation. Behaving in a sexualized and objectified manner has the potential to corrupt young minds and manipulate their views on sex, body image and their role in society. Beyoncé Knowles-Carter is a powerful and influential woman in today’s generation. Her audience ranges from boys and girls

The article describes how children are impacted by popular culture and how popular culture has an effect on their identities and personalities through those celebrity.

Popular culture has an undeniable influence on how society perceives itself. When examining mass culture, one must keep in mind the equilibrium between how much we, as a society, affect the way popular culture is constructed and to what extent popular culture influences the way we view ourselves and shapes our ideologies. An aspect of popular culture that may serve to greatly exemplify this theory of society as both the affecter and the affected is the genre of magazines targeted at young women. Though these publications are targeted as the representation of our society’s adolescent females, they actually have a great influence over the ways in which teens view and construct

2. The study revealed comprehensively that in all forms of media girls and women are under represented. Research notes that although the role of women in society has changed dramatically over the years there is still a disproportion of male and female representation. The research indicates that the media climate is representative of the 1950’s versus 2010. The research leads to the question of how consumers are affected by media content. Will young females feel less important or have lower self esteem if they are not appropriately represented in the media? Another area of under representation is with respect to health related media content. This begs the question as to whether women’s risk factors relating to specific health concerns are overlooked. The study

Television doesn’t just affect children, it also affects teenagers and young adults, but more so their self-identity and self-esteem than physical development. Television sends messages to these immature self-identities and shapes them according to popular cultures beliefs and values, modifying healthy and realistic self-identities to unrealistic standards of beauty and popularity. This effect is found more with females than with men; but men are more likely to have their standards modified through music videos than television (Ward 2002).

Redbook magazine are devoted to selling products ranging from shoes to shampoo. The entire magazine only has only 210 pages. Approximately 6-8 min of every half hour television show is produced by ad agencies. Americans are bombarded with advertisements. We see them everyday in many different forms and through different mediums. Advertisers study America’s population through a systematic breakdown and analysis of our likes and dislikes in relation to our differences. These differences include gender, sexual orientation, economic status, location, race, ethnicity, and more. Advertisers have substantial knowledge of what appeals to each of these demographics and how these demographics will respond to

Stereotyping has to be one of the main ethical problems in media. Both advertising and entertainment media make substantial use of stereotypes. Stereotypes in most cases negatively affect people's perceptions of themselves or promote socially unwanted behavior. The stereotypical affluence of ethnic groups is one of the main examples of major area of debate especially on African Americans in the United States. One stereotype is that, Black people Abuse the Welfare System. According to Blackenterprise.com “On September 11, 2011, a non-black woman named Amanda Clayton won $1 million in the Michigan State Lottery. Before receiving her winnings, the 24-year-old mother of two brought in $200 per month in food stamps. After receiving her

This excerpt shows how more emphasis is put on women’s appearance and its keep up, and also shows the negative connotation of this prettiness; it is associated with shallowness. Not only is there an assumption that women spend much of their time on their appearance, but also there is the connected fact that others pay more attention to their appearance than their other character traits. This is still a reality of today as can be seen on the red carpet. Female celebrities have a whole industry devoted to making them look fashionable and pretty for events. The focus of these events becomes what they’re wearing rather than their work as actresses and singers.

Media such as the internet, broadcasting, and publishing is a way to express opinions and keep up to date with the latest fashion trends. While these trends continue to go on, new trends are thought of, the trends may be a little tricky to keep up with even for celebrities. While the thought of being perfect for society, cause many adolescents to breakdown for following the false beliefs of society. Some people may use the media to be updated on important news. On the other hand, others believe the media is a horrible setting, resulting in adolescent to do whatever it takes to become just like them, poisoning their minds to become something they are not. The media produces bad influences for body image and messes with adolescents’ minds.