The Relationship Between Media and Body Shame

According to a Yahoo health survey 94% of American teenage girls have been shamed for how their body look. Incredible, isn’t it? Most women in the world have insecurities and they like to feel embraced by their beauty. The images and attitudes projected in social media is causing many teenager girls to feel pressured about having a “perfect” body, since most models and influencers  project a “perfect image”.

Body shaming is indirectly shown in the entertainment industry every time. According to Carolyn Abate, Health Lyne writer said, “for decades the media has pushed unrealistic images of how the female body should look. This includes movies, television, and print.” It is unbelievable that some websites give society a fake image to sell or have a better advertisement.  The language around body shaming is in our everyday and we don’t even realize when it happens.

Social media has projected this beauty schemes that for women it has become a rigid obligation to get to. Society has imposed women to have perfect body measurements and toned bodies, but what most of them don’t realize, is that most of the pictures hanging around the media have been retouched and redesign by the photographers who are trying to make society see women as a product. The media has been projecting this “perfect bodies” to women, especially teenagers. This is because women want to look perfect for themselves to feel secure and project that to society.

Society has influenced women to believe in an ideal body, but the majority of pictures posted in the media are retouched and aren’t 100% real. Kendyl M. Klein, body image expert, and digital strategies says, “In reality, these slender bodies in many magazines and advertisements have been airbrushed – with most companies in the industry.”

Unbelievable that society is so fulled, that believes everything they see in the media, even though many of what we see can be fake and modified. High league companies have influence women to believe everything they see in their advertisements, this companies have a tendency of hiring a specific type of models hiding their imperfections behind the camera. This causes society to follow this “ideal image” that most women want to accomplish is not as realistic as it seems. The media has been classifying this photographs as  “perfection” and indirectly controlling women into being like that, nowadays women use the media to find beauty inspiration that later becomes an obsessive habit.

Social media has become a focal point for beauty standards on women, though this makes them feel incompetent. According to Crystal, Masters-level Registered Dietitian Nutritionist, said, “A study completed by the Dove Beauty company found that more women than ever are looking to social media for beauty inspiration, though this influence is not always a positive one.” Technology nowadays is an everyday use. People can find everything in the media and use it for their beneficially for them. But sometimes, it can cause the wrong impression and cause low esteem since maybe the media can project an unreal image that people don’t really know it is fake.

According to Andrew Cohen, a spiritual teacher, “It is true that women tend to be more identified with their bodies because in this crazy world, both men and women measure women’s value as human beings in relationship to their physical appearance.” Physical appearance is one of women tendency addiction, this causes health disorders but some women prioritize beauty over health. According to Brittany Tackett, a life coach, “Just as social media can fuel eating disorders for many people, it can also help others find strength to seek and follow up with treatment.” Many people are beginning to use Instagram as a way to document their recovery and build a community of support and inspiration, either way, there’s much more people that see thing on the media as a target, rather than a support, and it may cause more in-depth problems.

What is better for this society problem is to consider taking a break from the internet and the media. Most times, we feel that we are dependent of the social medias, and that everything we see in there is suppose to be reality, but we are so fulled and wrong. Being more proactive to follow accounts that lift our self esteem and make us stronger and more sure of ourselves.

Work Cited

Body Shaming on Social Media. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.healthline.com/health-news/body-shaming-in-social-media#2

    Crystal. “Relationship Between Body Shaming and Social Media Use.” Eating Disorder Hope, EatingDisorderHope.com, 25 June 2018, www.eatingdisorderhope.com/blog/body-shaming-social-media-use.

Klein, Kendyl M., “Why Don’t I Look Like Her? The Impact of Social Media on Female Body Image” (2013). CMC Senior Theses. 720. https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cmc_theses/720

Tackett, Brittany. “How Social Media Affects Body Image.” Project Know, 16 Nov. 2018, www.projectknow.com/eating-disorders/and-social-media/.

Yuko Yamamiya,Thomas F. Cash,Susan E. Melnyk,Heidi D. Posavac,Steven S. Posavac. “ Women’s Exposure to Thin-and-Beautiful Media Images: Body Image Effects of Media-Ideal Internalization and Impact-Reduction Interventions.” Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink, Mar. 2005, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1740144504000737?via%3Dihub