Recently, I found a copy of Seventeen Magazine at the grocery store. Normally, I wouldn't bother picking it up, but today I did. It's no shock to me that 90 percent of girls from the age of 15-17 years want to change something about their bodies . It seems the majority of teenagers only care about how many followers they have, how good looking they are, and if they have the hottest boyfriend. In fact, the reason I am mentioning this at all is because in Seventeen there was an article entitled "You can be a YouTube STAR too!"
In this article it actually gave tips on how you could boost your social media numbers-- "Use equipment you already have". My thought was, why people would care so much about climbing to the top social media wise? Seventeen also had little headlines with objects under them and one of them actually said "Get A-list locks"
Honestly, what was going on through my head was something like, "Why would I actually want to alter my appearance that much and why do I just have to have these A-list locks? Will having A-list locks give me some advantage other young girls my own age don't have?" I would thumb through the boots section and think, "What? the clothes i'm wearing aren't already good enough?"
Long story short, it bothered me today that little girls have to grow up thinking they have to be as good looking as a supermodel in order to get the perfect guy. It bothers me that guys have this warped view of what a woman SHOULD look like. Boys seem to have this idea that girls need to look like little plastic barbie dolls but thats not a reality.
The fact that this magazine was filled with pictures of how we should dress, what kind of makeup we should put on, and this social media article got me thinking the words, "What if these ideas the media gave us didn't exist?"
I feel like we would see a lot more girls wearing their own things. I feel like these numbers that we each give ourselves wouldn't be an issue anymore. I feel like boys would have a better understanding of what being beautiful really is.
Maybe if the media never gave us an idea that all girls had to look like celebrities, we would start looking like ourselves. Woman. Beautiful. It is a fact that 80% of children who are just 10 years old are afraid of being fat. Man, if they're already starting at ten years old, how crazy is this world?
I wish little girls could understand these models they see are not even mostly real.
In the year 2015 Zendaya actually pulled her Modeliste Magazine's issue off of the shelves because they photoshopped her.
"Had a new shoot come out today and was shocked when I found my 19 year old hips and torso quite manipulated. These are the things that make women self conscious, that create the unrealistic ideals of beauty that we have. Anyone who knows who I am knows I stand for honest and pure self love. So I took it upon myself to release the real pic (right side) and I love it😍😘 Thank you @modelistemagazine for pulling down the images and fixing this retouch issue." - Seventeen.Com
How amazing is this girl? She stood up to them even then. This debate about body image and the media is still going on today and is still extremely relevant.
Here is a video that shows all the things that young models have to go through before and after...
The message I have for young girls is to not give into the media's idea of how a girl should look. Think for yourself. Don't let the media control you. You don't have to be a size 6 to be pretty. Love yourself. Love others. Be yourself.
