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Critical analysis of depiction of women in mass media
Body image in the twenty first century
Critical analysis of depiction of women in mass media
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Unlike things happened in the past time, in a world where there is information overwhelmed, we are supposed to live in a more equal situation between men and women. However, in fact, gender inequity has just developed a new form to exist online. Women still continue to suffer from oppression towards themselves. It’s like the shadow of violence along the way with women. What is more, since the Internet shapes the world more united, it is not a case of a particular culture or society, but the whole world that we can see holding against women. One of the most common form is judging women’s bodies on social media through the comments of fling abuses or sarcastic remarks. People, especially men, are judging women’s bodies about if they’ve met the standard of socially-given …show more content…
Women today tend to post their body related pictures online, but some of them are easily under criticizing as “ugly” and “shameless” for their unshaved or over-sized bodies. Petra Collins was one of those victims, Collins pointed out the situation in the article Why Instagram Censored My Body: “No nudity, violence, pornography, unlawful, hateful or infringing imagery. What I did have was an image of MY body that didn 't meet society 's standard of ‘femininity.’” (Collins, Petra “Why Instagram Censored My Body” huffpost.com) It is zero tolerance of seeing those unworked bodies online, even those bodies with less cloth covered and unshaved pubes. Given by the conditions of beauty, women should be delicately classy and fabulous, to present this requiring women to own a skinny and smooth limbs and trunk. Anything without
Beauty is a cruel mistress. Every day, Americans are bombarded by images of flawless women with perfect hair and smooth skin, tiny waists and generous busts. They are presented to us draped in designer clothing, looking sultry or perky or anywhere in between. And although the picture itself is alluring, the reality behind the visage is much more sinister. They are representations of beauty ideals, sirens that silently screech “this is what a woman is supposed to look like!” Through means of media distribution and physical alteration, technology has created unrealistic beauty ideals, resulting in distorted female body images.
The plain truth, however, is that things have not always been this way. If you take a look to back in the 1950s, the iconic sex symbol Marilyn Monroe epitomized the typical standard of beauty as she flaunted a size 14. “She was every man’s dream girl and the envy of every other woman. She was beautiful, charming and exuded the aura of an angel—or so we hear”(Waters 2). We are constantly evolving our thoughts of what is ideal and because of this, there is ...
Like a blueprint or instruction manual, the objective of a rhetorical analysis is to dissect a written argument, identify its many parts, and explain how all of them come together to achieve a desired effect. Susan Bordo, a professor of Gender and Women’s Studies at the University of Kentucky, wrote “The Empire of Images in Our World of Bodies”, published in 2003 in The Chronicle of Higher Education. Her essay examines how the media plays a pervasive role in how women view their bodies to the point where we live in an empire of images and there are no protective borders. In “The Empire of Images in Our World of Bodies”, Bordo not only effectively incorporates numerous facts and statistics from her own research and the research of others; she also appeals to emotional realities of anxiety and inadequacy felt by women all over the world in regards to their body image. Ultimately, her intent is to critique the influence of the media on self-confidence and body image, and to remind her audience of the overt as well as subconscious messages they are receiving on a daily basis.
Our society is entirely based on looks and how “the perfect women should be”. To be pretty you are expected to have the perfect body with the perfect face and hair. You could never cut your hair short because you would be considered a dyke. If you’re makeup isn’t perfect you are considered ugly and if you don’t have the “hourglass figure” you are considered fat and overweight. “Despite higher global self-esteem, women do not feel good about their appearance. This disconnect can be attributed, at least in part, to concerns about body image.” (@PsychToday, paragraph 4) Our society and social media is so caught up on how every woman should look that our own judgment has been clouded and we always believe we need to look and act that way. “The truth is that women’s insecurity about their appearance is driven by competition with other women.”(@PsychToday, paragraph 16) All we do nowadays is compare ourselves to others and that’s not how it should be. You are considered to be a “whore” such as Eve if you sleep around, so women are afraid to do it. You are considered to be “weak” if you stay at home and can’t support yourself, such as Lori. Our world is so caught up in people thinking that they need to be a certain way in order to impress themselves and others. Why do women shave their legs? Why do woman dye their hair? Why do woman get spray tans? Everything we do has to do with our appearance in order to impress
The use of edited photos in magazines and social media of many kinds, has many negative effects on those viewing and how they view their own bodies. The beginning age of when people start to feel bad about
Mostly females, feel this pressure to have a “perfect” image, a minor amount of females blames it on society, other, put the blame on themselves. For example, a campaign exists today against the classic Barbie doll. A majority of women, feel they are in competition with this plastic doll. A large number of people, notice this doll as “unrealistic”, stating that the doll’s waist is viewed as an “unrealistic” view of women. Another example, would be the view on models. Another chunk of women, notice models as “unrealistic” for women, stating that a majority of females cannot execute the “model look”. Nearly all models are skyscraper high, muscular and extremely thin. Women, spot this as a “ridiculous”. A minor amount of women has those features. Women also detect this “impressive” for women and desire to see themselves as “impressive”. This puts pressure on females to be viewed as “perfect”, while “perfect” cannot be achieved. As much as these problems can affect people, it can improve people. Even though, women notice these as “unrealistic” expectations, these are “unrealistic” expectations. Today, women are compared to the unthinkable and judged to their breaking
Having a lack of self acceptance can cause men and women to spend a meaningless amount of time loathing on their imperfections, which can also degrade their self-perception on their bodies. Women who have a hard time looking at themselves in the mirror are in a constant battle with their inner demons, telling themselves that they are not beautiful enough. For example, in the article, "Out-of-Body Image" by Caroline Heldman, she says how, "[Women] are more likely to engage in "habitual body monitoring"-constantly thinking about how their bodies appear to the outside world . . ." (65). Women can spend a futile amount of time feeding negative comments to themselves about their appearance, which can heighten their chances of becoming bulimic and anorexic. Once women start to over-analyze their bodies, it can become difficult to reverse their mindset to generate positive feedback about themselves. Likewise, when men lose their confidence in their self-image, their self-perception can get misconstrued and suddenly they can only recognize their flaws. For example, in the article, "How Men Really Feel About Their Bodies," the author mentions how in general, men are in a constant competition against other males to improve their bodies so that they can survive in the male society ( Spiker, 73). Men are always under intense scrutiny regarding their bodies because they are engendered to be physically strong and built, and that is where the stigma begins in the male society. In order to sustain in the male domination, men are constantly trying to rebuild their bodies to match perfection. When men see others that are more built, their self-perception slowly starts to degrade their confidence, and that is when they have the difficulty of accepting themselves. As a result, men and women who lack self acceptance start to obsess over their
People feel increasingly pressured by the media about their bodies. Each day we are bombarded by the media with all sorts of image related messages about the “perfect
The human body is one of the most complex and yet beautiful things on the earth. We live in a time where our perception of the way we view the body is driven my social stereotypes. In todays world we are supposed to live by the standards of this unwritten code. All of this affects the quality of life we live in. It ranges from the workplace; our personal relationships to the way strangers perceive a person. At this very day in age we are categorized due to being born male or female and things that should be talked about are considered taboo to others.
The World Wide Web and Internet are great places to study, work, or even play. But there is an ugly side of cyberspace. Cyberspace reflects the real world and some people tend to forget that. Cyberstalking and harassment are problems that a large number of people (especially women) are realizing. (Jenson, 1996, p.1)
Men and women were not seen as equal human beings; instead it has been obvious that men were more likely to be on the upper hand. In 1987, it has been recorded that 2/3 of the people who were presented in the media were male. However, it is evident that the media usually presents and sexualizes women who are “young, fit and beautiful” hence probably creating self esteem issues more than confidence, especially in younger women who are religious towards the media’s expectations. This stereotype of a desired body shape only forces women to meet unattainable, perfect physical standards (Gill 2015).
The importance of body image and the idealisation of the ideal body have become more dominant in society today.
Judgments are made every second in society. It is laborious to go through a day without making a remark about somebody as it has become human nature to make judgments. We not only make them, but every single one of us, are victims of them. Through experiences with others we are often judged through our body, clothes we wear, ways we speak, how we move, and the list goes on. I, for one, have been judged over many experiences. Society tends to create numerous judgments based on the body constituting perceptions for human beings regarding stereotypes, power and resistance. These judgments contain society by creating tacitness rules in order for humans to conform and follow the social norms.
...y standards, further resulting in negative impacts on their self-esteem and confidence. Furthermore, this limited perspective of beauty causes women to be blinded and not realize that there is not one specific look of beautiful, but many. In a sense, women are taught to think that beautiful is being thin, having silky hair, toned legs, big breast, blemish and acne-free skin, and so on. However, in order to reach these beauty standards set by society, a woman can overwork her body in order to lose weight by dieting, or not eating to be “thin”, which also puts her health at risk and acts as an additional issue. Women who fail to reach these beauty standards set by society, may feel as though it is their fault and end up feeling even more insecure and bad about their body image, when in fact, the beauty standards were unrealistic and unattainable from the beginning.
A girl scans the sidewalk while walking home after a day of school, hoping no one notices as she hides her face, feeling like an alien in her own skin. Instead of feeling beautiful, she feels hideous because of the words said to her. Body shaming, a term that is becoming an increasingly popular issue because humans are obsessed with appearances. This generation creates these standards and puts pressure on people to live up to and then ridicule those same standards when realizing that the standards are unattainable. Everybody criticizes the way that others look but then began shaming when people began to shame that one's personal appearance. People have separated been into categories based on looks. It’s fat against fit and it is becoming unhealthy. In today's society, body shaming is an ongoing issue. Body Shaming, though active in both genders, is especially harmful to women. Body shaming is pushing women to be insecure, eating disorders, and giving men unrealistic expectations.