Beauty in the Media

Beauty: "the quality present in a thing or person that gives intense pleasure or deep satisfaction to the mind" (dictionary.com). This concept seems pretty straight forward. For something or someone to be beautiful, they must have any quality, whether it be looks or personal traits. Beauty cannot be pinned to one specific physical feature, yet this is exactly what our media has done to women in the limelight, which has trickled down and given a false meaning and representation to all women and girls of what it is to be beautiful. When the media is so central and influential in our lives, how can we ignore these impossible standards and set our own rules for beauty, and what are the false effects of listening to the media? 

When I googled the term "beautiful woman", this was one of the first images to pop up on my search. I am not denying that she is beautiful, or saying that she should be shamed for her looks in any way. But this image has a lot in common with the hundreds of other photos that came up in my simple search. She is white, thin, large breasted, wearing little clothing, has delicate yet prominent facial features, big lips, has full curly hair, wearing makeup, and is not smiling. This is the standard of beauty that the media has set for all women in society. These standards are unrealistic for all women. Not only does this look take hours to accomplish, but not everyone can even hope to look like this standard of beauty. One image that comes to mind on how the look in Hollywood is unnatural even to these women is this:

This statement speaks volumes on the look of beauty. Not only is the standard in the media achieved by "hundreds of dollars and professionals", but she then goes on to give the sarcastic statement that "you too can look like this". She is fully aware that what people see in her for beauty in this instance is the hours of time and care she put into her looks. But is she not still beautiful without that hair, the makeup, and the hours of primping?

The answer here is yes, she is still beautiful. Not only is she a natural beauty on the outside, and shown here even smiling without all the glam, but she has the qualities the media does not talk about in terms of beauty, which is what can be found on the inside. She is loved by us regular folk for her sarcasm, independence, clumsiness, and how she can be "one of the guys". 

When I googled "exotic beauty", this photo well represents the kind of images that showed up on my search page. There were many light skinned women, even white, with dark hair, clearly "not from here" with clothes from their country, but still with many characteristics of my "beautiful women" search. These women are still thin, with similar facial features, curly hair, and very light skinned. Media has portrayed to us that women of color, women from other cultures, or not our "normal" standards of beauty, should be seen as exotic. Here is another example of exotic beauty:

In the case of this woman, we have actually put her in a photo with a tree just to show how exotic she really is. This woman is clearly beautiful, makeup and all, but why must we see her as "exotic", or not "normal" beauty? The media has told us that this woman does not meet our standards because of the color of her skin. While still beautiful, she is seen as different from "our beauty". 

Photoshop plays a huge role in the unrealistic standards of beauty. Even the women we see as "perfect" and "beautiful" do not look the way we think they do. Even with all the primping, they still undergo touch ups after the photos are taken. To see how photoshop works, and the negative impacts it has on women, click here. Photoshop gives women a sense of how we should look, when the women in these photos have been altered in terms of their skin color, weight, eye color, face shape, hair, and much more. The implications of these images are tragic. Girls believe they need to be thinner, to be unhappy with the way they look, and that they need to look like a celebrity in order to be satisfied. 

Here are just a few of the countless number of body shapes that a woman can have. This does not make them less beautiful, it makes them human. Here are some examples of beautiful women that do not meet our media's standards:

Adele

Kelly Clarkson

Lupita Nyong'o

These women are not seen to the standards of beauty, but have talent if nothing else. Why must we judge them on their looks, which are beautiful, rather than what they have to offer in terms of beauty? 

What happens when we listen to the media and decide that our natural beauty is not enough? We put women and girls under pressure to look an ideal way. We tell them they are not good enough. They develop low self esteem, eating disorders, believe they fit into a category of beauty and do not appreciate the beauty of others, and will do just about anything to be "beautiful". We get shows like The Swan:

In this show, women who are judged "ugly" enter into a beauty contest. But before they are allowed into the contest, they undergo a transformation. This includes boob jobs, nose jobs, chin implants, lip lifts, and countless other surgeries in order to meet the media's standards of beauty. This show is sickening to say the least. Women lose the entirety of who they are physically in order to meet societies set of rules. Women in the show say things like"people don't understand what it's like to feel ugly", and "I'm afraid no one will love me". Well, we do understand. Women know and feel the pressures, and we are made to feel alone in our "ugliness". To say that no one will love you just shows the low self esteem of women because of the pressures put on us by the media. If we do not look like supermodels or Hollywood actresses, we are told we are automatically ugly. But how can we change this? How do we set our own standards for beauty?

Women need to ignore the media. Yes, this is hard, but we can do this by understanding that the beauty we see is not only unreal, but unachievable. By understanding this, and knowing women in Hollywood feel these pressures as well, we have some weight lifted off of us. We need to know that we are not alone. Most importantly, we need to realize that we are beautiful in all sorts of ways, just the way we are. It is ok to do our hair and makeup, to dress up nice, but it is also ok to do the opposite. We need to let our other beauties shine through, like our talents, our brains, our humor, and our kindness. Only then can we and the world see ourselves as good enough and beautiful.

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