Why Do People Use Photo Manipulation?

I grew up reading magazines and gawking over waistlines and standards of beauty that I believed were normal. I can remember the first time I watched the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show. It was from a treadmill at the gym. I believe that I could achieve that body from hard work and dieting, but it took years to realize that could never happen. Those women are genetically blessed and they are born to have these types of careers. I believe that this trend of objectifying women is extremely harmful, and shows women that they can never achieve an unrealistic standard of beauty set by the media.

There has been increasing controversy surrounding the idea of how women should be portrayed in the media. Although the perception of beauty tends to change throughout the decades, the issue we are currently facing is that women are not equally represented in the media. Since the 2000’s, women featured in the magazines, ads, etc. have continually gotten skinnier and it has become common to see their photos edited to the point where the models, themselves, are unrecognizable. Promoting these women sends the message to young girls and women everywhere, that in order to be considered beautiful in the public-eye, it is obligatory to have flawless skin and a perfect body.

Some people always look in the mirror and think they look bad or ugly. They may do this because they spend hours and hours on end looking at pictures that are very much fake and photoshopped. Many people may compare themselves to other celebrities and people. Social media is the main cause of this. “There are no positives to comparing yourself with others. Comparing yourself with others will lead to either an inferiority complex or a superiority complex. Both of which will have a negative effect on your self improvement in the long run” (Selvam). When young girls are spending the majority of their day on social media and they are looking at these pictures they do not know any better and are of course going to compare themselves to others. The young women might not even be looking at real pictures of people instead photoshopped and “unrealistic” bodies. Us teens believe it or not, can sometimes be like monkeys. We would much rather have something sweet than a boring vegetable. That something sweet could be having a hot or sexy body. Rather than a have a boring and ugly body like the boring vegetable. We really are beautiful on the inside and outside and we most definitely do not need to edit our bodies to the "ideal" image for the public and the rest of the

If magazines stated portraying women with their real bodies and embracing their flaws, women would be impacted positively and it would result beneficial for their self esteem instead of bringing them down by showing images of woman that seem to be perfect. The only thing and the main factor that is stopping the Fashion Industry from portraying woman that embrace a positive image and that show their natural bodies, is money. As Naomi Wolf states in The Beauty Myth “ by making women feel bad about their faces and their bodies, they spend more money on worthless products than they would if they felt innately beautiful.” This demonstrates how the industry is able to sell this ideas and products by making woman feel bad about how they look, or what they are wearing. As long as the industry is able to keep selling these ideas, women would continue to struggle with image and self-esteem

There are no questions to whether the media has influenced the self-consciousness people have on their body or not. Whether it is the front of a magazine cover or in a film or television show, the selection of models or actors are primarily thin or fit leading readers and viewers to worry or want to change the way their body looks. Body image is the way one sees oneself and imagine how one looks. Having a positive body image means that most of the time someone sees themselves accurately, and feels comfortable in their body; negative body image, what the media exemplifies for the majority of the time, is just the opposite. The media uses unrealistic standards of beauty and bodily perfection to drive ordinary people to be dissatisfied with their body image which can result in the search to obtain these unreachable goals.

As you’re walking down a street you may notice a young group of girls or women walking and they see a huge billboard of a beautiful model. They might stop and stare at her and then discuss about her perfect her body is. Not knowing in the next five minutes they’ll be comparing their bodies to the model and feeling bad about themselves wishing that they had her body. Not to mention, that the photo may be photoshopped to make it seem as her body is perfect, or she had plastic surgery to fit the idea of having the perfect body. The fact that the media thinks they’re encouraging young girls and women to embrace their beauty, they’re influencing them that they have to have a perfect body in order to get attention. The media has put a lot of pressure on young girls and women to look perfect and second guess their bodies, when plastic surgery is never the answer to build their self-esteem up.

The media needs to stop being the judge of what beauty is because everyone is pressured to look like the photoshopped version of the people the media portrays. Bad body imaging can lead to mental and eating disorders, and “fear of becoming fat” has become a common phenomenon.

For example, Jennifer Lawrence was recently featured on the cover of Flare magazine, but it wasn’t entirely her. An already beautiful woman was altered and refined so that she could fit the qualifications of the magazine editors. They photoshopped her to look thinner, have more appealing features, and even changed the shape and color of her hands. If a famous actress that is already looked to as gorgeous had to be modified to look better, how can common women ever feel good about themselves? Only 5% of women in the U.S. are said to naturally have the picture-perfect body that is portrayed in media. 40-70% of girls that are in grade school either want to lose weight because of magazine pictures or think that the perfect body is depicted by magazines. 42% of girls in 1st through 3rd grade want to lose weight. 81% of 10 year olds are scared of getting fat. The media’s interpretation of the ideal body is even affecting kids. We can prevent that by stressing that being “average” isn’t what you see on magazines, being “average” is any way someone can be

The photos have been edited and airbrushed to look perfect, even if it is not the reality. Which means that when people compare themselves to these pictures they are comparing themselves to something that is unrealistic and unreachable. When people feel inadequate because they do not look like what others consider pretty they look at alternative methods to change themselves. This is often times how people develop Anorexia, because they see people in the media being praised for being thin and they want to be like them, and eating less makes sense to them. With the banning of Photoshop, there would no longer be images out in the media that are unrealistic, and people can see others how they are and even the imperfections in a person can be seen as beautiful and

Body image is “emotions regarding the aesthetic value and relative beauty of the person’s body (Airbrushing).”There has always been a standard flaunted by celebrities of the size zero Hollywood Thin. The average model is 5’11 and 110 pounds, while the average woman is 5’4 and 140 pounds (Unhealthy Picture). The perfect body has been shown to been an extremely thin woman with large breasts and small waist. A runway model is made to be like a hanger, with a straight, thin figure and plain face for the designer to put clothes on and make up to their liking. In magazines, the girls should be thin and beautiful. In fact, 80% of women say that women in magazines or on TV make them doubt themselves and make them feel insecure (Just Say Yes). But these

Throughout the years, the definition of beauty constantly changes. In our society today many children are told to be true to themselves, to be unique, to be who they are, etc.; But on the other hand social media and the celebrities on there are a constant reminder that there is a certain type of beautiful. The juxtaposition between being yourself and being what is “beautiful” has consistent grey areas and blurred lines making it almost impossible to keep up with what’s “beautiful”. The media, whether intentional or not, portrays this certain body image that you have to be in order to qualify as beautiful.

Society follows a norm that requires a general agreement between groups in order to function as a whole. Human beings are social “group animals” (Lessing 1) and need each other to survive with the intention to get along or fit in. These desires to conform “influence our idea about ourselves” (Lessing 1) and people lose a sense of their inner self based on these insecurities. The false concept of ideal beauty of body image is displayed in the media and it pressures young women and men to accept this particular notion of beauty. The role of the media comes into play because it pressures individuals to give in, since they appeal to our need, which is to be accepted. Although, people oppose to media pressuring individuals to conform, it is clear

In reality, this type of perfection is simply unattainable and unrealistic, especially when a young demographic is growing up surrounded in it by our society. Perhaps if more celebrities become more secure with their own body image and demand their photos not be altered and printed without Photoshopping, everyone else will follow in that same path. Perhaps more girls and boys will finally start to realize what it really means to be beautiful once this whole Photoshopping shenanigans starts to wear off. Although it is starting to become better as fewer magazine companies are altering less of their

Self-esteem plays a big part of body image. People have to feel good about themselves and be comfortable in their own skin to be happy. In today's world, it feels almost impossible to be happy, this generation is all about the media which makes having self-esteem 10x harder. Millions of pictures are posted of expectations of how women should look. In an article written by Pavica Sheldon, she states that ”The average American woman is 5’4 and 140 pounds, whereas the average female model portrayed in the media is 5’11 and 120 pounds”. Women are placed into a box telling them they have to look a certain way and if they don't they're simply not good enough. Besides being put into a category women numerously get called nasty names like slut or whore if they show too much. Piggy and fatty if they're overweight. Or “stick” if she's too skinny. Nothing is ever good enough is what it feels like. For example, Kylie Jenner, if you grew up watching “Keeping up with the Kardashians” you know how she looked before all the plastic surgery she got done, she now looks completely different. An account wrote, “What are they giving Kylie?” and someone quoted the tweet and said plastic. So even if women try to fix their imperfections they still get shamed down for it by calling them fake.

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.