In today’s world, body image is a central focus for many women. No matter a woman’s age, looking good is almost always seen as a necessity. It seems that being skinny and attractive is a major objective for women. Unfortunately, looking good and losing weight are often a struggle.
Ever since I can remember the definition of looking good is far from what looks healthy. And the key to looking good is not always your boobs, your butt, or your legs, but your weight. Weight is often one of the first things that people notice about a person. Joan Brumberg, author of “The Body Project,” writes, “Yvonne eventually learned that a slender body was central to female success (Brumberg, 100).” Females have long been told that feminine is skinny. It is rare to see a large actress, model, or singer. Skinny is seen as the “correct” weight, at least in the U.S. A person’s success should not be based on his or her physical appearance. Unfortunately, that’s not the way things work today. In a lot of ways, appearance is everything.
When I look at a magazine or an ad on TV the female on the cover or in the commercial is always skinny. The way the media portrays women affects how young girls view themselves. If it was larger women in movies, in magazines, or on TV, then maybe that is what would be seen as the proper weight for women. But that is not the way things are. Girls look up to singers and actresses and models and because these women are often famous; girls aspire to be like them, to look like them.
Weight is a major issue today. It seems like a new dieting book comes out every day. There are so many more things that we should be worrying about than our weight. We should be more concerned with our health and less concerned with achieving the weight that is deemed acceptable by society. We need to learn to be comfortable in our own skin, to love our bodies. Both men and women die every year from eating disorders. People take these risks and do these things so that others can think of them as beautiful or good-looking. A lot of times people don’t transform their bodies solely for themselves, but more so for others. We are so much more than our bodies, than physical appearance, and we need to know that our personality and intelligence are much more important than our weight.
Women’s breasts are also a feature that has been criticized throughout time. Brumberg writes, “An adolescent girl needed a bra in order to prevent sagging breasts, stretched blood vessels, and poor circulation, all of which would create problems in nursing her future children. In addition, a ‘dropped’ breast was ‘not so attractive,’ Crowell said, so it was important to get adolescents into bras early, before their breasts began to sag (112).” There are such high standards for women to meet in order to be seen as sexy, that it is almost impossible to do so. So a woman’s breast sags a little bit, one is bigger than the other, big deal. No one is perfect. That’s what people need to realize today—everyone’s body is different. We need to break the stereotype of what the perfect body is, break the boundaries and redefine what a perfect body is. Actually, there should be no definition of a perfect body. Every person should be able to view his or her own body as perfect.
“Today, many young girls worry about the contours of their bodies—especially shape, size, and muscle tone—because they believe that the body is the ultimate expression of the self” (Brumberg 97).
ReplyDeleteContemporary girls have a tough life: we have been taught that our appearance matters. In fact not only does it matter, but it tells the world who we are. That is a lot of pressure and a lot of responsibility; it is enough to drive a girl crazy (or make her anorexic, as the case may be). Walking around campus, a shopping mall, or really any public sphere, you will overhear self-deprecating statements like “I look so fat today!” or “I’m having the WORST hair day, I shouldn’t have left the house!” This is an element of our society that has been inculcated in girls since they were babies, as we clothe them in cute little dresses and tie ribbons on their head. The idea that “modern femininity required some degree of exhibitionism” (Brumberg 98) seems to reflect many of the ideals of the raunch culture that would later permeate our society. Femininity is viewed as a performance of sexuality and creating the illusion of the perfect body (whatever it is defined to be).
It is interesting to consider the evolution of these ideals. We did not always value such slim figures and revealing outfits, so it seems to reason that we could possibly change these values again. How? Media and advertising seem to play a large role in teaching young girls what they need to do in order to be considered mature and attractive, whether it is wearing a bra, cutting their hair, etc. The other issue that immediately arises is how manufacturers size clothing. Girls all want to fit into the smallest sizes possible; if a body does not fit into standard sizes that supposedly represent the norm, there must be something wrong. Self-consciousness among women is often due to this comparison between what is normal or desired and what is true. Women resent those who can fit into the size they have been dieting to achieve; it is a competition. Sisterhood is challenged by these pressures placed on women, because not everyone can achieve “the look.”
It will undoubtedly be difficult to create a revolution in terms of body image ideals, but it is more than necessary. Brumberg shares that in 1995, “middle-class white girls define[d] perfection as five foot seven inches tall and 110 pounds” (119). According to BMI calculations, such body proportions would classify a girl as underweight. Our patriarchal society is asking girls to endanger themselves in order to appeal to men. While girls will always value their appearance (and I do not think this altogether negative), we need to reconsider the images that we hold ourselves to and create ones that are healthy and practical for our young girls to embrace.
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ReplyDeleteThe body is a consuming project for contemporary girls because it provides an important means for self-definition, a way to visibly announce who you are to the world" (Brumberg 97). When did looks become the only way to define ourselves? What about our sense of humor, our passion, our hobbies?
ReplyDeleteBrumberg discusses how along with new freedom came the need for greater internal control. The transition from corsets to diets illustrates the shift in history...but when will the shift away from appearance as a whole occur? We have shifted from being obsessed with breasts, to waist size, but have never considered becoming obsessed with something more substantial...something that actually illustrates who we are as a person.
Brumberg also discusses the need to alter our bodies to fit our clothing--we need to realize that clothes are invented to FIT US, not the other way around. No body is excactly the same...but nearly all types of pants are made to fit tall, slim women. The same way that Cal struggled to fit a gender category, millions of women struggle to fit into the mold of what society says is beautiful...it is no wonder plastic surgery has become so popular.
The rise of eating disorders in our country is an issue that upsets me on a personal level. Watching my sister struggle with anorexia for the past 6 years has made me an advocate for healthy body image...but it has also made me realize just how big an issue it really is. Women are in such competition with one another that we never stop to think "why am I actually doing this?" Women think that they feel better about themselves when they fit into those size 2 American Eagle jeans...but is that really true? Is that REALLY what makes people happy, or is it the feeling of people looked at as someone who fits the mold of "beautiful?" Before we can change the way society sees us, we have to change the way we see ourselves.
Just to comment on Colleen's last paragraph: all types of pants are definitely NOT made to fit tall, slim women. As a woman who is 6 feet tall and at a healthy weight it is IMPOSSIBLE TO FIND PANTS. Pants are ALWAYS floods on me. I have to spend lots of money on designer pants because they are the only ones that are long enough and even designer pants aren't long enough which then leads me to having to spend more money at the tailors to remove hems to add a couple more inches on pants.
ReplyDeleteFor pants that are long enough, they are often wayyy to big. Clothing stores assume that tall women are also overweight. Why I'll never know. There is never just strictly "Tall" clothing. Its only "Big and Tall." 36" inseam jeans often only come in sizes 12 and up. Furthermore, as a girl with a size 11 shoe it is IMPOSSIBLE to find boots. Boots do come in size 11 now but once again, shoe stores assume if you have big feet you have big calves. NOT THE CASE. I literally cannot walk around in most size eleven boots because there is not calf support because the calves are just wayyy to big. And I am an average sized person, not to skinny/not to big.
As evidenced by both the Steinem and the Brumberg readings, weight issues that plague young American women seem to be tied into the encouragement of conspicuous consumption. Obviously, as we have discussed before, self-image is strongly tied into the ‘ideals’ we see perpetuated in the media. In a body-image regime that is centered on the idealization of being svelte and thin, we are bombarded of images of women with long, thin limbs and flat stomachs. We’ve all heard the rhetoric about how we should focus on being healthy, rather than looking like a movie star and that we should all be proud of our own, unique beauty.
ReplyDeleteHowever, such idealistic notions are difficult to follow when they are perpetually and insidiously undermined by print media. Consider, for instance, the preponderance of beauty ads. Advertisers create an idealized image, which saturates our cultural consciousness, and then provides a commodity with which women can make up their lack. In this way, the beauty ideal becomes something that women can only reach through consumption.
While it may be easy to acknowledge self-serving practices within the ads themselves, Steinem’s piece points out that product endorsements have been taken out of an advertising context and placed into editorials and non-ad space. In this way, messages become removed from cultural places where they are more easily filtered—i.e. it is easier to dismiss beauty tips coming from cosmetic ads because it is obvious they were intended to push product—into places that present themselves as relatively unbiased, such as non-advertisement print pieces.
It is this practice that I think makes magazines such as Cosmo or Glamour dangerous to their readers. Steinem’s article made me realize that magazines are more culpable for the perpetuation of harmful beauty stereotypes than arguments we have heard from Ariel Levy and readings thus far would suggest. Not only do they women that fit only a narrow definition of beauty, they also reiterate unattainable beauty stereotypes and position their advertisers as the solution to an unsolvable problem—that of the “fixer-upper” female body—that exists only because advertisers have created it.
You've all (Regan included) hit on a crucial issue in all of this: the fact that our "ideal body" is singular, and doesn't allow for or acknowledge unique beauties or diversity of beauties. As Regan points out, it's difficult for MOST of us -- tall and skinny included, I know! -- to fit into the clothes that are manufactured, and this inability to fit, as Brumberg points out, prompts us to judge our own bodies, rather than to judge the clothes, the industries that make them, and the media images that we're inundated with. Cait's "fixer-upper body" phrase says it all!
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