Girls look at the
pretty lady on the cover of magazines and want to be them. They want her long
blond hair, her size zero waist, her thirty two D bra size, her flat stomach,
even her lips and her eyes. Young girls look at these women and see nothing but
their flawless features. This is the goal they have set for themselves;
perfection. Those women you see on the cover of magazines such as Seventeen or Vogue, are nothing more than a digital artist’s great Photoshop
masterpiece. Girls of all ages, even as young as three years old, have been
worrying about their body image. Young ladies need to know its ok to look
different; that’s what makes you, you.
A friend of mine took a Woman’s Studies course in college
and her final term project was to make a PSA about body image. Click here to
view her project.
Body image is not something teenage girls deal with
alone. Girls as young as three years of age know what it means to be considered
fat. They think they will get teased at school if they have a little extra body
mass compared to other kids. However the sad part is, that statement it very
much true. Young girls compare themselves to others and feel the need to
compete to be the skinniest girl in the room. Kids worry about becoming fat and
they can tell when someone needs to lose a little weight. A little girl will
say whatever is on her mind and she’s not afraid to tell someone they need to
lose some weight. When the topic of making yourself look beautiful is on a
child’s mind, just imagine what they’ll be like when they enter their teen years.
Every week, girls spend an average of three and a half
hours in front of the mirror. They look in the mirror and all they see are
their flaws. They see giant thighs, big nose, too much fat around their
stomach; the list goes on and on. If they were to spend half that time admiring
how beautiful they are, their self-esteem could easily be ten times better. We
are our worse critics and we focus primarily on our flaws, not our best
features.
Media portrays stunning women as being tall, thin, and
big boobs. You see it everywhere you look. From models, to advertisement, to
actresses, and even in toy dolls such as Barbie. This is one of the main stream
ways for the media to corrupt female children into thinking they are not good
enough to be beautiful. If they do not look like Barbie, then they’re not
considered pretty. Barbie wears dresses, so little five year olds think they
have to wear dresses to be pretty. Barbie has big boobs and a tiny waist. If
your waist is bigger than your chest then you’re considered fat. Many public
figures say we need to take care of our youth because they make up the future.
If people truly believe this, then why are they telling little girls they need
to look a certain way? By implanting that idea in the minds of children, it
continues to grow into their adult years; which makes the future look pretty
scary.
Ladies need to know its ok to be different. Why would you
want to look like someone who starves themselves and has bones popping out of
their skin anyways? In reality, the models and actresses people perceive as
being perfect are constantly being judged by how they look and act. Perfection
is a nonexistent perception and girls need to realize they are perfect just the
way they are.
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