Welcome to America 2011. Where family time means watching MTV reality stars. Where a good meal is a double cheeseburger and dollar fries. Where Wal-Mart is your favorite and only store you shop at. And when most importantly, the media warps how we view ourselves and the world around us. This is the one place where you think you have to “Keep Up With The Kardasians” just to feel loved.
Every day, millions of Americans sit down in front of their televisions with their TV dinners and celebrate Snooki slam down a few drinks and make a fool of herself. We all are thinking the same thing, ‘This is disgusting. Why am I watching this trash?’ Yet we continue, because it’s entertaining, popular culture, The “American” way. The media destroys our self image and creates a warped sense of who we are and should be. I walk across campus every day, passing carbon copy girls with their Northface jackets, Ugg boots, and Vera Bradley wallets. They seem so confident and happy. But a part of me knows deep down inside that they feel worthless and insecure. They wake up every morning and weigh themselves, faces falling as they notice they’ve gained .2 lbs in the last few days. ‘Why isn’t this diet working,’ they think, ‘It worked for Nicole Richie. I NEED to lose this weight so I can fit into those size zero jeans.’ They spend hours picking out the RIGHT outfit, wearing as much makeup as possible, and practice dumbing themselves down to seem more desirable to men. A few of them will eat under 500 calories a day or throw up everything they put into their mouths just to keep up with celebrities. Who can we blame for this? Who destroyed the self images of our friends and family? Media. Plain and simple.
It starts with a picture on the cover of Self magazine, “Lose 30lbs in 30 Days: Look Sexier than ever before”. A girl buys the magazine, shares it with her friends and they begin the journey towards their “perfect selves.” They make themselves believe that they are worthless unless they are thin. All across America this epidemic is taking over. In Culture Jam on page 75, Lasn states, “One way or another, their cheeks are cut by the beauty industry, which has persuaded us that if we are thin and toned and well tailored, we will be loved. They have manipulated us badly.” They have manipulated us.
The internet is making connecting with other people with eating disorders even easier. People trade tips and tricks showing how they lose weight so quickly and how to hide your disorder from everyone. Here is a website advertising "Thinspiration" which are basically pictures of extremely underweight girls that are suppose to inspire you to lose weight. ( http://www.prettythin.com/thinspiration.htm ) Even I have fallen victim to this “Thin is in” motto. I’ll go on eating binges, followed by purging, followed by consuming barely any calories, followed by exercising until the exhaustion gets to the best of me. Some people believe that this warped sense of yourself doesn’t happen often and if it does, it doesn’t come about until we are in our teens. On the contrary, this mindset may start at a very early age.
In this article (http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2007/nov/18/health ), we look into the life of a recovering anorexic. We see these kinds of stories all the time, but what’s strange is how young she is: 8 years old! It’s scary to think that someone that young can so easily think that they need to be thin to feel loved. They feel the pressure at school from other girls that tease and taunt over how they look; their weight, their hair, the clothing they wear. Sadly, this will continue throughout their lives. We can’t help it. Cosmo tells me that I have to have a “sexy body” to catch a guy’s attention. What girl wouldn’t want to feel wanted?
So ask yourself next time how the media affects your body image and how you view others. Are you scrutinizing the new girl because her legs are a little chubby? Or maybe wishing that you had a flat stomach like the girl down the hall? Guys can’t be excluded from this either. Not saying that all of them judge girls based on their looks only, but they also try hard to “improve” themselves. We all suffer from this ‘TV reality’ life. We need to stear away from this fantasy life and get back to the real world. On the way we must teach ourselves that each of us is perfect in someone’s eyes. Honestly, that’s all you need.
This was a really provocative post Megan. Most interesting, I thought, was the idea that "family time" means sitting down to watch Reality TV.
ReplyDeleteDo we consider this family time?
Although how "wrong" it is to consider that family time, with the way the modern family is going these days, its safe to say that anytime spent together is good. Many families will go sit in separate rooms watch separate programming, and some families will rarely communicate all together. Maybe they need those shows once or twice a week to watch a bunch of drunk Italians make a family feel good about themselves, share some laughs, and talk about how stupid they are.
ReplyDeleteIt’s interesting if you think about it all the stupid ways we try to make ourselves desirable. We put on makeup get surgery and do tend to act differently around the opposite sex. I don't understand who came up with the standard of beauty. It’s sad that we have become so sallow and insecure do to all the medias twisted perception of how I should look or dress. This type of standard causes depression, self hatred and suicide. It disappointing that we all let ourselves get so caught up in this media driven society.
ReplyDeleteSociety does place too much emphasis on image. I think boys struggle just as much as girls with image, they're supposed to be macho players with super cut bodies in order for girls to like them. Girls are supposed to be thin and blonde. Media is the blame. I'd like to think i'd still wear make up and dress the way I do because that's how I want to dress but at the end of the day some celebrity wore something similar, and then a clothing company made the same article of clothing cheaper, and where else do you get clothes besides in the store? Media has infected our lives in every way, and there's no getting around it.
ReplyDeleteIts gross to know that we change our bodies and do harmful things to our bodies just to fit in with society or feel “accepted.” No matter how hard people deny the fact that they don’t care what people think of them is a total lie! Since we were young, kids all across America try to fit in with certain crowds. Think about it, even the kids that don’t wear designer clothes or play sports, in some way they act differently to fit in with a certain crowd. To me I believe everyone is hypocritical in this situation. As Megan said, we have let the media choose what we wear, how we look, and who we want to be. It’s very sad but it is the truth. We can’t be the ones to blame for this because it’s the only thing we have ever known. Many kids today get this media drama from their parents and learn it from them. How many parents do you see trying to fit into society and look younger by wearing Abercrombie and Fitch, or the new pair Jordans? It’s transformed ALL of us no matter who you are.
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