Feminism in Magazines

The article titled, "Beauty and Body Images in the Media" mainly talk about how fashion magazines focus on three things: a hot body, sex, and fashion. Media is what promotes beauty, but is also the creator of the standard of what is beautiful. But the truth is, magazines are not reality. The models in the magazines are about 23% lighter in weight than average women. Not only are they ridiculously skinnier, but they are also airbrushed to look oh so perfect! The article claims that the causes of this display of "unattainable beauty" is economic. When women strive to look like the models in the magazines, they buy all the products they could possibly use to look sexy. This includes: fashion jewelry and clothing, make-up, toners, hair products, nail polishes, diet aids, and even different types of cosmetic surgery. The article states that the diet industry is worth between 40 and 100 billion dollars a year. Seeing super skinny women in magazines makes normal women feel insecure and forces them to believe they are overweight. This is the cause of many eating disorders and depression. Anorexia Nervosa is one of the most commonly used "diets." Even young girls are believing they are fat, and are becoming anorexic or bulimic. Could it be that the media industry is pushing the concept of beauty too far?

The other article, "Do We Still Need Feminist Media?" goes into detail about how women's role in media has evolved over the years, but not as much hoped. Feminism forced the media to change and to include women. Currently, women have all sorts of jobs in media, but the article claims that we still need feminist media. The reason being, "Feminist media remains an instigator and a feeder of content, as well as providing a gender lens through which to view the news." Feminist media provides an outlook for issues like domestic violence, rape, sexual harassment, gender bias, and equal pay in the workplace. Feminists are still fighting sexual discrimination to this day, which is why it is necessary for feminist media.

I believe that it is necessary to still have feminist media because it fights for the women who are still unheard. Although the United States has evolved out of its original mentality that men are superior, other cultures in foreign countries have not. Women are still the inferior sex in many cultures, so they do not get as many opportunities as women in the U.S., or the respect they deserve.

Body image is a big issue in today's society. It has changed the lives of many men and women and forcing them to believe they are not wonderful beings on their own. Media has forced this image of thinness and beauty onto women and even men, leaving them to want to change themselves--for all the wrong reasons. I think the worst thing about this is magazines like CosmoGirl and VOGUEgirl are forcing the same concepts on younger females. Girls younger than ten years are now dieting and experimenting sexual relations. I feel like as some women are gaining more and more respect in the workplace, the value of women is consistently declining. How much worse will society get?


Here is a video on "womenly perfection" which shows what society views women as:



As entertaining as the video may be, there is some truth lying within it....