The Pros And Cons Of Photoshopping Stereotypes

Photoshop has many uses. It is used to design posters and create art. However, it has negative uses too. For example, manipulating images. Manipulation using Photoshop to alter model’s bodies in the media negatively impacts society by creating an image that imposes an unrealistic body standard and is the root cause of recent adolescent eating disorders. Peoples of all genders are impacted by the modification of model’s bodies. Whether it be one is not skinny enough or one does not have enough muscle, it generates a frequent belief that one’s body is not good enough.

Digitally altering pictures or ‘Photoshopping’ is the norm of not only the fashion industry but any industry related to print media nowadays. Retouching pictures has not blossomed due to technology, we can trace it back to 1500’s when the period of high renaissance art was fading away a new form of art was emerging known as Mannerism which applauded the modified physic of the subjects over the regular ones(1). Setting impossible standards, models are made to look like virtual perceptions and nothing like their own selves. Being in the fashion industry, models that are already in perfect shape and in the pursuit of the ‘size 0’ are slimmed down to a point where the alteration is very apparent. Their faces enhanced, their curves made

Within the past few decades, technology has completely transformed. The height and talent of today’s technology has completely changed America and its views. Technology has completely changed and expanded over the past 20 years. Within the past decade a new form of editing technology was created, and that technology is Photoshop. Photoshop is a software used to alter images. In todays day and age, photoshop has become the norm. It is everywhere and it cannot be escaped. Photoshop is used on everything and everyone, and it is affecting us at an extremely negative rate. Due to the works of Photoshop being used on every single media platform, society has adapted to the perfection in photos that were altered by Photoshop. What the world sees when they look at a photoshopped picture is what a company views as perfection, and this image creates an unhealthy comparison between the viewer, the image, and those around them. With Photoshop, images are altered beyond recognition. The Photoshop software takes away any blemish and flaw, and it can make the model used in the photo unrealistically thin, and by this it creates an unachievable body image. When these images are viewed by society, they only see the photo, and they don’t see the hours and hours spent altering the image to actually make them appear this way. So, when society, especially young children and young adults, see these insanely altered images they see something that isn’t real. They see someone that isn’t realistic,

By taking a different approach and using comedy and entertainment, Tina Fey has brought people together to understand the important topic of body image in a way people will listen. Body image for women has been a major issue in our world and there has been little change to stop it. “‘Why can’t we accept the human form as it is?’ screams no one. I don’t know why, but we never have. That’s why people wore corsets and neck stretchers and powdered wigs” (142). Everyone wants perfection. Everyone wants what they don’t have. No one is perfect. Everyone has flaws. If the world cannot accept this, people will continue resorting to modified images to produce this “ideal beauty.” One of Fey’s more interesting stories is when she talks about photoshop. Photoshop is a tool which contaminates how people see the human body. But this “perfect body” is intangible. Fey states that everyone is beautiful, and it takes a strong society to believe it. “Photoshop is just like makeup” Fey states, “when it’s done well it looks great, and when it’s overdone you look like a crazy asshole” (142). She relays on the idea that we are taking away the reality of our bodies when using photoshop. Fey’s attachment of a joke with the large and complex idea that photoshop dehumanizes a person is what keeps the reader captivated with the story and wanting to know more. Fey is able to reveal that a picture is an alteration of the true beauty of a person when put through photoshop. The reader is therefore able to assume, beyond all of her funny jokes, Fey

The dove beauty campaigns are again a perfect example of this, as they depict a digitally altered photo of a woman being presented on a billboard (Tpiper). Depicting a remarkable transformation of an ordinary woman, this video shows a billboard model being produced through means of excessive makeup and hair styling in conjunction with digital editing after the photo was taken. This woman is not natural. She has pounds of makeup on her face, as well as photoshopped touchups, and yet she is perceived by the public as the standard of beauty. Nobody is able to compare with such a carefully sculpted face, and therefore this establishes unrealistic expectations

Stereotypes are widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular person or thing. Racial stereotypes are when you mentally exaggerate a racial group that we hold automatically, not as an individual. We develop stereotypes through our cognitive scheme, which we know for categorization, to make the world more predictable. Just like the worldly opposites, there are negative and positive stereotypes for African Americans. Some negative stereotypes are that black people are criminals or affiliated with drugs. And some positive stereotypes are black people are good singers or really great athletes. The victim(s) of the stereotype takes the steps to counter the bias opinion about themselves. In the series of questions asked, the determination of whether one's bias opinion is true and the group own up to that stereotype to make it true. Or one actually creating the stereotype for their group which is pointed out by another group. These questions were asked towards white and black members of Argo Community High School. White Response (WR) and Black Response (BR) is how the determination will be evaluated, to infer a theory as an general answer.

In the documentary “killing us softly 4”, Jean Kilbourne discusses the toxic environment that leads to the dehumanizing of females. She goes into intense details on how females have been misrepresented in advertisements over the years. She explains that in advertisements, females have been subjected to inhumane ways such as being a product of sexually expressive methods. Even though in recent years men have been subjected to the same media exploit as women, Jean Kilbourne expresses that it is not as half as bad as what women have been going through, and it is now worse than ever. Jean Kilbourne also expresses how Photoshop is the newest tool in promoting women. Using Photoshop as an advertisement tool allow authors to make women look unrealistically slim.

Diller, V. (2011, July 8). Is photoshop destroying america’s body image? Retrieved March 21, 2017,

Christine Rosen, author of “The Image Culture”, talks about the way the human culture is changing because the world is now in an era dominated by the image. Another author that believes the image culture is tearing apart society is Torie DeGhett, who is a famous journalist who writes for the Atlantic. Christine Rosen is successful in her argument about image culture by successfully showing how technology, such as Photoshop, affects images, and by using examples of war and natural disasters to persuade her readers into realizing the dangers of the image and the “destruction” to come. Torie DeGhett is successful in her argument about visual culture by successfully using pictures of war and using examples from editorials in newspapers that didn’t print Jarecke’s photo to get readers to realize the modern fixation of the image and the long term dangers of visual exposure. DeGhett supports Rosen’s point that everyone has the power to create, distort, and transmit images which evidently alters people’s understandings and acceptance of what they see questionable by backing up Rosen’s views on the topic of

Throughout history, women’s bodies have been subject to fluctuating patriarchal norms and standards. There has always been pressure for women to look a certain way, but the emergence of new technology has exacerbated these expectations. This technology has made contradictory promises: photography has developed a reputation for authenticity and objectivity, but as photo editing software has emerged, we see a sharp increase in images that are laden with subjective meaning. In a culture where women’s bodies have long been admired, judged, analyzed, and altered, the messages women receive about their bodies today are more confusing and contradictory than ever before. This paper analyzes how Photoshop and other photo editing software

To stop the negative impact of Photoshop on teenagers, photographers should only use Photoshop for the good of photography and not to give false images of the social norm. In opposition, many would state that Photoshop provides beauty and promotes financial in marketing. The primary objective is to get money for false looks. American culture is highly obsessed with beauty. Everywhere you go there are advertisements and misleading images. Whether it’s for models or food alterations are used to sell the image. Models appearances on these photos are admired and sought after from the society. Jessica Walker stated in an interview “I do not think Photoshop is bad I use it to make my photos better, but I don’t like what people use it for...The user and its intentions are bad not the program itself”(Walker). The issue is defined as the images being presented giving a false perception. These photos have been tampered with by professionals, in which they think that their model is what society wants to see. Both genders are being affected by the medias view of body image. However, women and teenagers changed the most. Teenage girls have continuously been presented with images that they are supposed to look like, which is unrealistic images. Photoshop causes some teens to have self-esteem issues and many other disorders.

The spectator is whoever is looking at the image; they are a wildcard that the representer cannot control. The spectator has all kinds of personal associations and meanings. They can change the way things are being perceived, they are unpredictable. In this episode, the boys are the spectator. They perceive the photoshopped pictures of the girls to be real, they think that the pictures represent what the girls actually look like. The photoshopped pictures of the girls become their identity. The boys claim they “had no idea they were that hot” (The Hobbit). The boys fall into the falsehood that is represented by the photoshopped pictures, the photoshop is the medium. Photoshop has the ability to create unique images with little or no connection to an original photo. It is most controversial when it is used to enhance faces and bodies in line with mainstream beauty ideals of youth, and has become an integral part of the performance of public life with celebrities (Attwood, 22). This controversial element to photoshop is what gives the girls in the school power, changing their faces and enhancing their bodies to be portrayed as perfect like the photo of Kim Kardashian. Photoshop has become such an issue is some places that there has actually been laws implemented on photoshopped photographs. Israeli legislation popularly known as “Photoshop Law” came into effect on January 1st 2013. The law

Although Sturken and Cartwright claim it is quite easy to fall for the misconception that photographs are “unmediated copies of the real world” (Sturken & Cartwright, 17), this is no longer true, if it ever was. While cumbersome, even before the advent of image editing software, it was possible to modify photographs. Furthermore, in contemporary society, we have completely lost faith in mass media representation; rarely do people expect images to be completely unmodified anymore. This is especially visible in western culture since people are pressured to conform into highly specific aesthetics where even a “natural” look is artificially crafted with makeup and digital filters. Even disregarding direct manipulation to a print through methods such as Photoshop, photographs are manipulated in such obvious ways, it almost seems absurd to point it out. The framing, lighting, and positioning are always adjusted by the photographer. Therefore, people themselves are a type of manipulation; a representative filter through which biases are imbued. In effect, Sturken and Cartwright’s conclusion that all camera-generated images bear an “aura of machine objectivity” (Sturken & Cartwright, 16) stemming from “the … legacy of still-photography” (Sturken & Cartwright, 17) is

Every single day when I wake up in the morning, one of the first things I do is look at myself in the mirror. Am I skinny enough? Is my skin clear enough? Do I look like the girl from the magazine I was reading yesterday? No. I don’t. But I’ll keep asking these questions each and everyday because that is what the media tells me I need to look like. Because if my waist isn’t small enough I’m not pretty. Because if I have cellulite on my legs there’s something wrong with me. Because if I don’t slot into this unattainable standard. I'm not beautiful. Airbrushing and photoshopping models in pictures to display through media is something that frankly speaking is appalling. We are alienating beautiful human beings because of the media’s dictations on what we should look like. I am sick of being brainwashed to the point where all I can ever seem to do is single out the ‘flaws’ in myself. If we display, real, beautiful, raw pictures of people in media then so many problems caused by this would no longer exist.

This generation has changed the way others view stereotypes. Stereotypes have been an issue for decades. Our generation tends to deal with men and women playing both roles. Have you ever heard the saying “Are you wife material?”. What does “Wife material” even mean? I ask myself that question all the time. Women always gravitate towards those conversations. Conversations that at the end of the day defines who you are as an ideal wife for men. Men always look for the best looking apple in a tree. They never go for the rotten ones unless they aren’t looking for a relationship. Women aren’t objects, women aren’t toys that you could play with and throw across the room when you are bored. Women demand to be respected and honored.