The Media 's Influence On Women

Janna L. Kim (2007) discoursed (as cited in Vandenbosch & Eggermont, 2012) Media as a tool that can shape the perception of females on their ideal figure. “Sexual objectification in media is characterized by a striking emphasis on female appearance. The media’s ideal women are styled according to the latest fashion trends, and their bodies have all the right curves.” (p.

“The media has taken many celebrity appearances into their own hands, many times without permission” (“The Objectification of Women” par.2). Because of the media photoshopping women 's beauty on TV, social media, and even advertisements, it began to create a high rate of accusations of teenage girls’ all over the world. “In a recent study, the University at Buffalo sociologists found that the portrayal of women in the popular media over the last several decades has become increasingly sexualized, even pornified"( Donovan par.1). Due to this, women have been treated as sexual objects everywhere. Objectification comes from the lack of confidence and media 's portrayal of beauty; Due to this, the portrayal of men is not the same as females objectification is when women are treated like sexual objects. ‘Objectification is often defined by physical appearance, rather than personality” (“The Objectification of Women” par.2). As a result, women should not struggle to keep up with these trends today. “In order to achieve a ‘perfect’ look, the media manipulates photos using unnecessary editing in Photoshop to completely contort the original, creating an unnatural image” (“The Objectification of Women” par.2). The media is the dominant cause of these actions of teenage girls insecurities, high rates of surgical treatment, and males creating these fictitious assumptions. Objectification in social media should end because it causes teenage insecurities,

Media represents males and females by gendering them in different categories. According to a presentation, the author states, “Media perceives women in a very sexual manner whereas men are symbolized as powerful (Khan). Over and over again, the one thing that the media reveals is that women are very sexual beings. They show that they are only good for taking care of the home and the man is very powerful. For example, the author on the presentation shows a ad that a man is in a life guard outfit with him having muscles which portrays him to look like a hero. On the other side there is a picture of a woman who looks stressed with babies all around her crying with both her hands full. One side she is holding a math test with a F on it and the other side is holding a pot full of baby bottles (Khan). This shows that women are “supposed to be the only one taking care of the house” and because of that the women looks stressed. In the article, “Face it”, the author states,

In western culture your image seems to be the most important. From watching models strut down a catwalk to music videos, we are constantly reminded of how we should look. Not only does our appearance matter, but our behavior as well. Women on television are constantly fighting, backstabbing, and being obnoxious in attempts to be recognized in the celebrity world. The media is the leading outlet to the people of the world. It affects everybody whether you want to believe it or not. Body dissatisfaction is defined as “a negative subjective evaluation of the weight and shape of one’s own body”. (Eating Disorders). Body dissatisfaction is very common in women, but more in young girls. The media portrays women as a prize or an object, making our youth feel they have to look a certain way to be accepted or liked. The media today needs to stop objectifying women and start promoting positive self-image.

Recently in media, there has been a focus on the hyper-sexualization of the female body, as well as very specific body images which have been presented as the perfect body in society. Both of these issues enforce ideas of unrealistic, and even unhealthy beauty standards among teens, and even adults in today’s society. Though it may not be the sole cause of society’s body image issues, media has certainly had a very clear impact on these issues. Media today has a profound impact on the perception of the human body and how it should be as a result of increased use of modification softwares to distort society’s image of the human body, the use of social media to give

The media is a well-known, influential aspect on gender roles that broadcast negative messages to society through television by the images that are mainstreamed, which has an effect on people’s thinking process. Television brainwashes both men and women to believe they are not perfect, unless they have the body image of a celebrity. Though it is just a fantasy and not reality, “81% of 10 year girls are afraid of being fat, half of those girls believe they feel better about themselves when they were on a diet” (Reed 2016). The media paints a broad spectrum of ways it is stereotypical to not only just women, but men too. Women are pictured as a walking toothpick, while men are muscular. How can someone enjoy watching television when it is manipulating people’s lifestyle? We should not support the media when it is doing no good than harm. From advertisements to commercials, “it controls social life by invisibly transferring the dominant hegemonic ideology” (Wolska 2016). The media portrays many unrealistic stereotypes about gender, which often leads to not feeling acceptable in today’s world.

The people have the choice of accepting or rejecting what is shown to them. Every expression of idea pressures the reader to adapt its thinking, but the power of cynicism and criticalness prevents a person from gullibly taking in and believing everything he or she is exposed to. The media, undoubtedly, presses unachievable ideals into the minds of adolescents, who are much more vulnerable to the effects of media exposure. But rather than trying to censor the media, a solution can be found in media literacy to debunk the distorted realities that magazines and advertisements may present. People know how women and men look and “we know when images are spurious — no paternalistic formal disclaimer needed… The problem isn’t altered photographs; it’s our failure to alter our expectations of them” (Fortini, 2010). Regulating the media is the least of our concerns if people fail to be media literate. Adolescents “must be taught to analyze the production and consumption of media products as ideological texts” (Alexander and Chambers, 2007 ) because there “there is no definition of the physical characteristics that make someone attractive or what is seen as beauty. It is simply a system of ideologies that have evolved over time” (Keyes, 2014). The idea of body image is a changing one and what the media presents to the public should be approached in the way every other expression of imagination –

W hat contemporary ideals for young women are presented and promoted by Rookie to its community of readers? To what extent do these values both disrupt and reinforce those promoted in mainstream media?

From an extremely young age, the media engraves into our heads that skinny is the only pretty. Everywhere you look there are advertisements trying to make you change yourself. "Get rid of cellulite now!" "Lose 10 pounds in less than two weeks!" "Get rid of wrinkles with this anti aging cream!" All that on top of all the stick thin, clear faced models exclusively being displayed in magazines and beauty commercials then the actresses always portraying the protagonist that finds love. It all sends a sad message: you're worth a whole lot less if you're not thin and society's perception of beautiful.

Long before beauty pageants, Barbie dolls, and extra-ordinarily beautiful girls, came about the idea of the female body. Whether you are a believer of creationalism, scientology, or evolutionism, somehow we all came about with the perception of the “perfect” female. Women have always been seen, and portrayed as a sex symbol, and usually the disobedient one. Dating back to B.C and the story of Adam and Eve, Eve was the naked one who bit into the fruit that god told her was forbidden. Why couldn’t it have been Adam that caused such scandal, and was the cause for destruction, and crime in the world, and not Eve? From the believed beginning of time, to present day, women have really only progressed a small

20% of girls around age 4 want to lose weight while over 40% of girls around age 14 report wanting to lose weight (Serdar, 2014). Men all over the world are being harshly effected by masculine ideology (Ward, Merriwether, & Caruthers, 2006). Advertisements have reached a point that would be considered porn fifty or some years ago. Today, there are 1,848,485 pregnancies to unmarried women and 72.6% of these pregnancies are completely unplanned (Curtin, Ventura, & Martinez, 2014). Now, why is all of this occurring and how is it related? Media is negatively effect women and their self-esteem while posing a ridiculous masculine ideology for men; throughout time, these facts become extremes which results the demeaning of women, the emasculation of men, and ultimately, an increase in unplanned pregnancies.

“We are constantly surrounded by all sorts of media and we construct our identities in part through media images we see”(Ossola, Alexandra). In the world we live in today we are

Everyone wants to be beautiful. What is beauty nowadays? Is it flawless skin, long blonde hair, and skinny waist and thighs? This is what beauty is for most women. Beauty is very predominant in a women’s world. People have their own perception of beauty, but we are all heavily influenced by society as well as the media. The things that the media inculcates into our minds are the things that we contemplate very often. Every time we see a celebrity or a model on television or a magazine we want to be just like them. Sadly, we cannot be like them, as much as we tried. Beauty comes in all shapes and sizes, and we cannot define beauty based on what the media portrays even though many women do so. The media has a negative effect on women and throughout the years we have been trying to have that “ideal” body according to the media through surgical enhancements and many other things, which causes eating disorders and a low self-esteem.

According to a report published by the United States Census Bureau, American spends about 3952 hours on a yearly basis on using media with approximately 1704 hours being used up watching television (Kaus and Thapar 2014). These numbers are equivalent to watching the television for more than two months and five months on other forms of media. In addition to this, more than 70% of women have also dominated all forms of media particularly the social networks (Kaus and Thapar 2014). Therefore, it is outright reasonable to state that what we spend our time on has a direct impact on our lives. This premise has been the emphasis of many research studies. Most of these research reports have specifically looked at the elements portrayed by media and their effect on our perception of ourselves. Furthermore, body satisfaction and self-esteem have been negatively affected particularly by media. Therefore, it is critical to understand the role of media and how it affects the well-being of women (Kaus and Thapar 2014). Once we understand the role media plays in the lives of women, we can begin to understand how to reduce its negative effects. In the subsequent literature review, different research studies that demystify the effects of media on women have been explored. Firstly, the studies that focus on the general effect of media and its influence on women have been examined. Additionally, globalization of sociocultural values is also described and the studies that focus

Many Americans lives today are surrounded by media, whether it is through Facebook, Instagram, magazines, etc. One of the biggest topics highlighted in the media is women. The media portrays women in a “perfect” manner; they are shown with big breasts, large butts, hourglass figures, and almost always half naked. Because the media displays women's bodies in such a perfect manner, the average woman may begin to compare herself and harbor negative thoughts about her own body image. Besides unrealistic portrayals of women's bodies, most media platforms and ads objectify women sexually, because “sex sells.” This fuels the negative connotation towards women because this causes society to group all women together and view them as a vulgar disgrace. The media should stop portraying women in a negative way, because it causes them to become self-conscious, depicts them as a sex objects and leads society to believe women are vulgar.