Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Misrepresentation Final


 In today’s modern day media women are portrayed a certain way, to look a certain way, to act a certain way, so they can be appealing to the viewer. All women on T.V advertisement’s are pencil thin, white with perfect hair makeup and clothes, all half naked and made to look like a brainless sex toy, used purposefully to attract the male audience into buying a product. “According to TV ratings company Nielsen, kids in 2012, age 2 to 11, watch an average of 24 hours of TV a week. That’s an average of three and a half hours a day” (CBS Minnesota, Feb 13, 2013) When one lives in a society as immersed in media as us modern day Americans, you cannot help seeing the way that women are portrayed. It is everywhere! Young girls and teenagers are negatively affected by it because as they come to glimpses of what the real world is like they will start to compare themselves to this unattainable figure and face. For young women trying to measure up there can only be negative effects, such as eating disorders, lower self esteem, and lower GPA’S. The future does not look to positive for rising generations in the youth of today or tomorrow.

“I worry about how much pressure my daughters feel. In a society that features anorexic actresses and models and television stars, we get conditioned to think this is what women should look like.”(Katie Couric, Missrepresentation) Speaking from personal experience, I know how emotionally traumatic it is to feel like you are nowhere near good enough because you constantly compare yourself to other people. I partly blame the media for the downward spiral that happened in my life as a result of being different than the models, actresses, and singers that are the “idols” for most of the young people now. It is a dark place, feeling that no one will ever want you because you don’t weigh 99.8 pounds. ”The average 14 and 15, height only increases to 63-64 inches but weight increases to 105-115 pounds. By age 16 and 17, girls' height has basically become static at 64 inches and weighs only increases to somewhere between 115 and 120 pounds. Between 18 and 20, girls are still an average of 64 inches tall and weigh between 125 and 130 pounds.” (LIVESTRONG, weight of teens) “Twenty years ago, the average fashion model weighed 8 percent less than the average woman. Today, she weighs 23 percent less, it said. When asked for its source, the magazine cited the website of Rader Programs, which treats those with eating disorders.” Women should never have to compare themselves  to an unhealthy size and weight, however in today’s society women do not have a choice.





 

 

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2012/01/most-models-meet-criteria-for-anorexia-size-6-is-plus-size-magazine/

 


 

http://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2013/02/18/good-question-how-much-time-do-kids-spend-watching-tv/

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