Women Depicted
Popular magazines aimed at male and female audiences are a prominent culprit, tending to feature women with bodies that are unattainable for the average woman, and to focus on stories related to either catching or pleasing a man as a route to success and happiness(Portrayal of Women in popular media).
Everywhere we turn, advertising is telling people, women especially, what it means to be desirable. Many of these messages share a common theme: women must be “beautiful.”. Women have always been measured against cultural ideals of beauty, but advertising often uses sexism to make images of “ideal beauty” more prevalent and increasingly unattainable. Twenty years ago, the average model only weighed 8% less than the average woman, whereas the average model today weighs 23% less. Most models today are thinner than 95% of the population.
In a recent study by Dove, the researches found that out of the survey respondents, only 2% considered themselves to be “beautiful.” Many researchers argue that the unrealistic portrayal of women in the media can be detrimental to advertisement viewer’s health. Studies show that advertisements of ultra-thin women increases a viewer’s body-focused anxiety (Jonathan Trenn)
Everywhere we turn, advertising is telling people, women especially, what it means to be desirable. Many of these messages share a common theme: women must be “beautiful.”. Women have always been measured against cultural ideals of beauty, but advertising often uses sexism to make images of “ideal beauty” more prevalent and increasingly unattainable. Twenty years ago, the average model only weighed 8% less than the average woman, whereas the average model today weighs 23% less. Most models today are thinner than 95% of the population.
In a recent study by Dove, the researches found that out of the survey respondents, only 2% considered themselves to be “beautiful.” Many researchers argue that the unrealistic portrayal of women in the media can be detrimental to advertisement viewer’s health. Studies show that advertisements of ultra-thin women increases a viewer’s body-focused anxiety (Jonathan Trenn)
Since the 1950s, the weight gap between the bodies of women pictured in magazines and average American women have grown. The average woman’s weight has increased while the average fashion model’s weight has dropped. This growing disparity has had a well-documented and pronounced negative effect on the body image of the women and girls who read women’s magazines.
SEXUal objectification
Open a magazine or simply open your eyes as you walk down the street and you will see it, the sexual objectification of women.
Sexual objectification is “the viewing of people solely as de-personalized objects of desire instead of as individuals with complex personalities and desires/plans of their own” Example, when you turn to an advertisement pertaining to perfume, there is a 99% chance it will be picturing a women with minimal clothing due to the fact "Sex Sales". At the end of the day, we can not look at anybody but our society to thank for instilling in us how we are depicted as a gender.
Sexual objectification is “the viewing of people solely as de-personalized objects of desire instead of as individuals with complex personalities and desires/plans of their own” Example, when you turn to an advertisement pertaining to perfume, there is a 99% chance it will be picturing a women with minimal clothing due to the fact "Sex Sales". At the end of the day, we can not look at anybody but our society to thank for instilling in us how we are depicted as a gender.