Final essay.

Media Studies 91250 – What A Girl Wants

Why is our image of beauty distorted? The way society views the image of women is based on the way that they are portrayed by different forms of media. Every day we are all exposed to image of women on billboards, advertisements, TV programmes, movies, videos or in magazines. In the media women are shown as being perfect; having flawless skin with no flaws and having the perfect skinny figure, they are also shown as being seductive and promiscuous and are used as sex objects in advertisements as a way to sell a product. The problem with these images is that they are unrealistic for girls to achieve because most of the images we see are edited and photo shopped to show perfection. This creates self-doubt among many teenage girls around the world as they want to be like the women they see and become self-conscious with their own bodies, they then feel like they aren’t good enough or beautiful. If the media continues to influence the lives of girls in the future, I am worried about when I have a daughter that she won’t think she is beautiful.

One of the ways that the media expresses the image of women is through advertisements.  An example of this is a Tom Ford commercial marketing his sunglasses range. He uses sex appeal in his commercial by showing a woman wearing only a pair of black sunglasses. This commercial represents teenage girls as being seductive and using sex as a way to appeal to society.  The shot size of the commercial is focusing on the woman’s body not the sunglasses on her face; the image shows the top half of the woman from her belly-button up with her just covering her chest with her arm. Why do they need a naked girl on a commercial to sell a pair of sunglasses? This image effects teenage girls because it sends them the message that they need to flaunt their bodies and be seductive, it also sends bad moral values teaching them that sex appeal is the most important thing not teaching them that being smart or ambitious is important. This affects the attitude in society towards teenage girls because people will only look at women for their body not for their brains. The woman modeling in Tom Ford’s advertisement compared to real women in society is unrealistic because the women in advertisements are photo shopped and edited so much to make them look absolutely perfect; they have flawless skin with no imperfections and have the perfect skinny figure. I think it is stupid how advertisers edit woman’s bodies to make them look better because what is wrong with the way that they look originally? Even models that are already attractive are edited. This is unrealistic because normal women do not look like the ones on magazines which is why they take such drastic measures to change their bodies. The consequence of this advertisement is that teenage girls will think that they can’t achieve anything with their talents and wont aim for being successful and having a good job because they don’t think that being smart is attractive in society. Teenage girls will also feel so unsecure about their bodies that it will lead them to dangerous dieting and plastic surgery to try to be perfect.  For example Heidi Montag who had over 10 cosmetic surgeries to make her body look better. Society will see women as less equal to men and not as good workers which will mean that they won’t want to employ them.

Another way that the media expresses the image of women is through music videos. An example of this is the video clip by Pink ‘Stupid Girls.’ The video represents the fact that not all teenage girls are influenced by the media and want to be like the women they see, it shows that some girls would rather show ambition and be successful. The video shows the way that women are seen in the media; with women dressed in pink and glittery clothes to show them as ditsy and blonde and also women wearing bikinis washing a car and wearing short skirts and crop tops which symbolizes the fact that women flaunt their bodies in the media to get attention from the audience. The video also shows the contrast to the ‘stupid girl’ and shows Pink as a president dressed in a black suit with the question: “What happened to the dreams of a girl president?” This is telling the audience that the dreams of teenage girls have been lost because of the media’s influence. The video clip is realistic because it shows that girls can become successful instead of focusing on their appearance and acting dumb because the media tells us that’s what we should do. The video features scenes relating to famous celebrities like Paris Hilton and Jessica Simpson that the audience can relate to and shows them how stupid they look from the audiences perspective. The effect that this has on teenage girls is good as it is showing them that some girls are going against the trend of how the media is portraying women and want to grow up being smart. This will then encourage teenage girls to become ambitious themselves and focus on school and getting a good job instead of focusing on their appearance. This will then lead into society seeing woman as powerful people and not just judging them on whether they are attractive or unattractive.

Another way that the media portrays women in the media is through TV programmes. An example of this is the well-known reality TV show in MTV called ‘Jersey Shore.’ Jersey Shore is very popular with teenagers and has a demographic audience age of teenagers to early twenties. The programme represents teenage girls as being promiscuous and seductive and that they are becoming fake in their appearance. The show has a bad influence on teenage girls that watch is as most of the content shows the actors excessively drinking, clubbing and acting sexual. The women are dressed in short skirts and dresses that are low-cut and show cleavage, they wear excessive make-up and constantly get fake tans. Teenage girls are affected by the TV programme, Jersey Shore because they look up the actors as role models and are influenced by the way they act and dress. This means that teenage girls will start acting seductive at a younger age and start getting fake tans, wearing heavy make-up and wearing clothes that show their bodies. Society then sees women as sexual objects because of the way they look, instead of being seen as classy sophisticated women and will not be seen as highly to men. The woman on Jersey Shore is a realistic comparison to the woman around the world today because it shows how woman act and dress to look better because of the media’s pressure on them to be perfect.

After seeing the way that the media portrays the image of woman it made me realize how superficial the industry is and how obsessed woman are getting about being attractive because of the pressure. I feel like teenage girls are trying hard to compete against each-other to be prettier, skinnier and to have fuller chests when we all should be happy with how we look and feel beautiful. Even though I know that most images I see are edited or photo shopped I am still one of the main consumers of the media because whenever I see a woman I think ‘I wish I had a body like hers’ and I still want to buy products that are on commercials like make-up.

Jersey Shore.

Jersey Shore follows eight male and females whose favourite hobbies are tanning, working out, clubbing, getting drunk and having unprotected sex with multiple partners. The well-known MTV TV series called Jersey Shore is one of the most viewed shows from teenagers to a early 20 year-old demographic.

What sort of message is this programme sending out to teenagers watching it?

The girls including: Snooki, Samantha Sweetheart, J-Woww and Nicole all seem fake on the show. They cake their faces in makeup with black eyeliner and eyeshadow, curl and straighten their hair and then overly spray it with hairspray, have fake nails, constantly get fake tans, wear short dresses with high heels and low cut to show their cleavage.  Which shows a bad influence towards the many girls watching the programme.

Since so many teenagers watch this programme , the Jersey Shore crew has become role models to many teenagers all over the world who want to be like them. Teenagers who watch it will want to be like them by getting fake tans, dying their hair, wearing heaps of make-up and short skimpy clothes; therefore becoming fake, putting their bodies on show and not showing their true beauty.  Do we want to see every teenage girls walking down the street looking too dressed up and fake, wearing outfits that are suggestive and sexual, and who look tacky and non-classy. What happened to the classy, sophisticated look that role-models of women should be like?  Instead of the media influencing women to wear skirts so short you can see your undies.

The shows also shows a bad influence towards teenage girls watching the show by the way they have promiscuous sex with random partners and go out clubbing and binge drinking. The Jersey Shore characters even named a "smush room" in the house which is a guest bedroom that members reserve for a night.  Even with all the sex featured in the programme with multiple partners, not once on the show has talked about birth control or forms of protection.  Since this is a reality show, teenagers watching it will be influenced to have sex and express sexual feelings because they are seeing girls doing on TV which is is meant to be real-life, without feeling the need to use protection or contraception.

The sexism and objectification used by the men in the programme of women when they are trying to lure them is revolting. For example, the men have a strategy they call "fishing" where they stand on a balcony and whistle at women they find attractive and wait till one women responds to the whistling. This is degrading to women around the world as it shows that they are only useful to men if they are attractive and men only talk to them because they want sex.

The influence that this show has on teenagers watching shows them that they won't be accepted by men if they aren't attractive and the image of 'attractive' in the show is fake tans, make-up, skimpy clothes showing off their bodies and more. This is a bad influence on teenagers because they think that they need to dress-up like that to be pretty. Also the many sex scenes throughout the programme influences teenagers that they should be having sex and getting drunk. 

Instead of looking up to these women as role models, teenage girls should be looking up to smart women who are getting successful jobs and are going far in the world instead of looking up to trashy girls who get drunk every night. The result in teenagers looking up to these girls means that they think that they need to be pretty and do the same things that Snooki does instead of focusing on her education to get a good job. 

Images In The Media

Anywhere you look in your everyday life you will see images of women everywhere, in magazines, billboards, advertisements on television, posters, or movies. But the images that we all see in these things are fake. Most of the photos in magazines have been photoshopped to make the women look the absolute best that she can, they make her flawless. They edit out wrinlkles in her face to make her have perfect skin, photoshop her hips to make them smaller or make her boobs bigger for example. The reason that almost every photo in the media is edited is because our view on beauty is distored. These images aren't true beauty, they are fake. Why do magazine editors feel like they need to edit these images of girls? Aren't they fine the way they are?

In these images of celebrities we can see that they have been photoshopped. These images affect the lives of teenage girls the most because they are the ones that are trying to be skinnier, taller, blonder, sexier and prettier because this is what the media is telling them that they should be striving to look for. They photoshop out tiny little imperfections from the girls photos which gives the messages to teenage girls that they are actually perfect, which they aren't. This then will give them the idea that they are ugly because they have flaws but everyone does.

These images from the media are favouring the perfection in women. They give out the idea that these women actually look like this because most of the girls looking at them won't know that they are photoshopped.

I think that it is stupid that magazines and commericals change the looks of womens body's to make them even better than they were in the first place, i think that they should just leave them they way they were because there is nothing wrong with some imperfections, it says that we are all human but beautiful anyway.

Teenage girls are being extremely affected with theses images that they see everywhere and then get involved in the media world aswell . This French model, Thylane Loubry Blondeau is only ten years old and is already modelling shoes for Vogue. Anyone else see something wrong with this? No ten year-old should be modelling for a commerical with make-up on and her hair done perfectly.

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advertisements in the media.

Advertisements are one of the major type of media that shows a bad image of women, today they use sex appeal to sell their products and mainly target women by using their bodies to seduce the buyers.

In this advertsiment by Tom Ford you can clearly see the sex appeal that he has showed to help sell his product, sex is really common in todays commericals and everyone believes 'sex sells.' Advertisemenets are seen by people everyday probably without them even realizing what they are looking at becuase it has got so normal.

This advertisment is trying to sell a pair of sunglasses made by Tom Ford, the idea of the commerical is that the buyers will want the product because they are seduced by the women standing naked. I think that this commerical is demeaning towards women because it's showing that the only thing girls are useful is their bodies and in the future people will not see them for ho smart they are or what they are good at doing they will just see them as a sex object.

Advertisments favours the sexual side of women in the media and represent them with hardly or no clothes on. The is demining to women as it shows the world that all women are useful for a their bodies and sex.

Advertising sex in the media has a huge affect on teenage girls, they are too young and are not ready to take in the images that they see in magazines or on advertisments on television. We can't blame them for trying to change their bodies to look like the ones on the television or try to look sexy because of what they see, the images have a big effect on anyone espically teenagers. Wouldn't anyone be influenced by the images that they see everywhere? We are bombarded with images of sex and perfection everywhere we look.

Even looking at this magazine, all the articles are based on sex. Cosmopolitian is a magazine made for teenagers to read but is it to saucy? The articles in the magazines are mainly about: ways to get a better body, sex tips, dating advice and men and often have raunchy photos of teenage celebrities on the cover. This is  inappropriate for teenage girls to look at and read as it will be a bad influence and the headlines are obviously promoted sex to teenage girls when they are a very young age.. For examples articles to be about things like "His best sex." or  "Shrink your inner thighs." No wonder teenage girls struggle with loving their bodies as heaps of ways to make their bodies better and sexual images of other teenagers that they look up to is thrown in their face.

This magazine and the advertisements show that sex is everywhere in the media, and that girls are a main target.

Pink - Stupid Girls.

Stupid Girls by Pink is a song explaining about how young girls aspire to be like female celebrities rather to strive for their talents and a career.

In the video a young girl is sitting on a couch watching tv, she has an angel on one shoulder and a devil on the other symbolizing her good and bad influences of her future. The devil is the influence to be a 'stupid girl' that falls into the influence of the media about her body and self esteem and the angel is the good influence to a smart and ambitious girl. 

She turns on the television to show a women teaching a class of girls about how to flick your hair. The girl, after seeing this, imitates the tv and flips her hair. This symbolizes how big of an influence media has on young girls that watch tv or look at magazines because they copy what they see. She then changes the channel to a girl walking into a clothing shop who is representing young female celebrities such as Mary Kate Olsen. She walks into the store with a tiny dog imitating celebrities today like Paris Hilton, but on her way she walks into the window expressing the fact that she is a dumb and ditzy blonde. Alot of pink and glittery clothes are used in this scene to imitate the 'stupid girl.' In some other scenes she portrays the negative image on other celebrities like Lindsay Lohan with the scene with the red-head girl in the car running over someone on a pedestrian crossing. She also mocks Jessica Simpson with the scene of her in her bikini washing a car which is relating to Jessica in 'Dukes of Hazard.' In these scenes she is trying to show the negative image that girls are seen from society in their jobs and that they are not taken seriously.

Pink uses this line as a portrayal of women being used a sexual object "What happened to the dream of a girl president? She's dancing in the video next to 50 cent." which is expressing the point that women would rather be dancing in a video clip looking sexy than being successful in the world. The consequence of girls dancing sexy in as backstage dancers in singers video clips is that people watching will see them as a sex object and the men think that we aren't worth as much as them.

"Disease's growing, it's epidemic, i'm scared that there ain't a cure. The world believes it and im going crazy. I  cannot take anymore. I'm so glad that i'll never fit in, that will never be me. Outcasts and girls with ambition, thats what i wanna see."
This line from Pink shows that women all over the world are falling into the trap of the media and thinks that they need to be sexually attractive to get attention instead of getting good jobs. Pink states that she will never be a stupid girl and that she is frustrated because women are selling themselves short by not realizing their full potential.

This song is significant because in today's world women are bombarded with media everywhere, there is a strong relationship between the message that media sends about women and how they are treated in society. The image of woman as sexual objects places an emphasis on physical appearance which makes this a problem for most teenage girls because the beauty portrayed in the media is limited, only skinny women with big boobs are seen as sexy. The character in Pinks video clip getting a spray tan and getting plastic surgery shows how desperate girls get to look like the women they see in the media. The scene in the bathroom shows another dark side to the pressure from the media on teenage girls showing a girl in a bathroom saying "Oh my god you guys, i totally had more than 300 calories. That was so not sexy." and then sticks a toothbrush down her throat to throw back up her food to make herself skinnier. Pink also shows the fact that girls feel like they need to use their bodies as a sexual object to get attention especially from men. This is shown in the scene at the gym when Pink is on the treadmill but the gym trainer goes towards another girl because she is bigger boobs which makes teenage girls feel like need to change to compete with them. 

At the end of the video she shows the character as a female president that gives us hope that women will change and use their brains. She represents the opposite of 'stupid girl' a women with ambition and power that isn't worried about her appearance. Then the young girl has a chance to pick between playing with a football or playing with her barbie dolls, she picks her football showing the audience that smart girls are out there and not everyone follows the current trend.

This video favours girls and women all around the world saying that not all teenagers are after perfection and influenced by the media, they just want to be themselves and not try to look like someone else. However many girls are still after perfect.

Heidi Montag - Obsessed with being perfect

Heidi Montag is an american actor and singer who starred on MTV reality series, The Hills. She started having many plastic surgery's because she didn't feel comfortable with her body and wanted to be perfect. 

In this article with People Magazine Heidi tells them that she had 10 cosmetic surgeries in one day, including: a brow lift, botox in her forehead and frown area, nose job, fat injections in cheeks, nasolabial folds and lips, chin reduction, neck liposuction, ears pinned back, breast, liposuction on waist, hips and thighs and buttocks. She felt like she had to have plastic surgery because she wanted to be perfect as she didn't feel good enough. She became insecure at a young age as she was bullied about her looks when she was a kid.

"Obviously looks matter, its a superficial industry." Heidi said to People magazine that shows that she was influenced by the way that society and the media portrays the image of women. In magazines, advertisements and billboards it shows a 'perfect' image of girls, which makes teenage girls want to look like them and they start feeling insecure about their own bodies. But the images of girls in the media is unrealistic for girls to achieve because they have flawless skin, a perfect skinny figure.

This article is favouring 'fake girls' as it shows that the girls that get plastic surgery to enhance their features will look better than the ones that don't. This is an image that is unrealistic for teenagers to achieve as they don't have the money to get plastic surgery and will then feel even worse about their looks and probably result in dangerous dieting. The article is also favouring the fact that sex appeal in women is the most important thing and if you not sexy you won't get anywhere in life.

This article sends out the message to teenage girls that they need to have plastic surgery or take drastic measures to be pretty or be happy with their bodies and represents the fact that no-one will be perfect unless they do.  Teenage girls all over the world look up to celebrities and think of them as role models for guidance as to what to do with their bodies, which is bad because this article would influence teenage girls to think that they need to do the same thing as Heidi Montag to be perfect. It also sends bad moral values to teenage girls all around the world teaching them that sex appeal is the most important thing, not teaching them that being smart and getting a good job or going to university is important in life. This will consequence in teenage girls not thinking that they achieve anything with their talents and they will not dream to be anything important in their life. This also consequences in the fact that society will see women as less equal to men and not as good workers because of the way that media shows them which means that everyone will lose hope in womens abilitys to do things.

The reason that Heidi Montag thought that she needed to change her body was because of the  media which made me realize that every girl is effected by the image of women in the media, even the celebrities and women who don't need to change anything and are already pretty are becoming insecure. It also shows how much the media is affected women that they feel like they need to have so much plastic surgery.

Women shouldn't need to take drastic measures in order to feel pretty because they should be confident with their body the way it is but the media sends out a bad message saying that they are not good enough which consequences in them making drastic and dangerous changes to their bodies.

Dove

Representaion Of Teenage Girls In The Media

The dove campaign for real beauty -

This commercial produced by Dove, to market their campaign for real beauty, is an advertisement that expresses the way that women are portrayed in the media in today's society.
Dove produced a campaign for women all around the world to prove to them that they are beautiful and that they don't need to look like the women in the media.

The representation of this advertisement is targeting how much the media influences young girls as they grow up and are being exposed to images of women everywhere. At the start of the commercial it shows a young girl who is happy and smiling indicating that she feels good about herself as she has not yet grown up into the artificial society and hasn't seen all the media. It then flashes lots of images on the screen of how women are portrayed in the media, showing the pressure that girls are put under, including: billboards, videos on television, magazines, manikins in shop windows, advertisements on television marketing products that will make you: younger, smaller, lighter, firmer, tighter, thinner, softer. It then shows how teenage girls cope with all this pressure from the media, including scenes of girls weighing themselves on the scales, working out on the treadmill at the gym, sticking their fingers down their throats to throw up their food, and plastic surgery to change their body. At the end it says "talk to your daughter before the beauty industry does.' which is targeting parents saying that they should teach their daughters about the media and tell them they are beautiful, before they grows up to become insecure with their bodies by looking at all these images of women in the world.

The commercial favors the fact that teenage girls are going to be influenced by the image of a 'perfect' women in the media and will feel pressure to be perfect. The commericial expresses the fact that all teenage girls in the world are going to be exposed to the media at some point in their life as they grow up, its saying that all girls will be effected and influenced by the flase image of women. The commerical is also telling parents to tell their daughters that they should be happy in their own skin before the media tells them they are unperfect. 

Serena - Gossip Girl

Gossip Girl

Serena-

Serena van der Woodsen is one of the main characters on the tv programme Gossip Girl. She is portrayed as the 'it girl' around the town as she is really popular and everyone knows her. She dresses and looks very stylish like it comes natural to her and doesn't have to put in any effort to be fashionable. She has an energetic personality but is also known as the 'bad' girl for her wild side. She seems to always get what she wants because of her good looks and  comes across as a threat to the other girls in town and at her school because she is beautiful and mysterious especially Blair, her best friend.

The director shows this in the the scene from the pilot episode when Serena arrives back from boarding school and everyone is surprised that shes back, the news quickly gets round as people tell everyone. This shows how popular she is because as soon as she walked into the airport people are already texting each other and telling them. The director dresses her in a brown coat, striped top and skinny jeans which shows her casual but stylish fashion sense. After being back in town she conflicts with Nate as he still has feelings for her from the past but she doesn't. Nate: But you're back now. Serena: I didn't come back for you. Look, Blair's my best friend and you're her boyfriend and she loves you. That's the way things are supposed to be. This shows that Serena wants to start her life fresh and forget about the past by becoming a better person and not hurting Blair.

Teenage girls in the media are represented as being popular and having the perfect life, this is how Serena is portrayed as everyone in the town knows who she is and wants to be friends with her, she has a good fashion sense, is pretty and has an energetic personality. This makes the audience want to watch the character because it is what every teenage girl wants; to be perfect.

Intelligence and talent are two traits about a girl that are not acknowlaged as much as they should be in Gossip Girl. This is because being smart isn't acknowlaged as being an important trait in the media, it says that the most important thing is to be pretty and sexy.

Serena doesn't reflect a typical teenager in the world today because not everyone's perfect. Serena has the perfect life; she comes from a rich family, has good looks, is popular and gets anything she wants. Even though she has been a 'bad' girl in the past and made some mistakes she is still well respected by her peers. Serena is a girl that other girls around the world want to be like, they are influenced by her tall figure and good looks and want to be the same as her. Some of them even go to drastic measures to look better, for example not eating or getting plastic surgery.

This sends a message to teenage girls in the world today that they don't need an education and dont need to get a good job. They feel like it isn't important to be smart so they will give up on school. It also gives them the message that they will never be pretty enough because of all the pictures of women in the media that is unrealistic.