
The NYC Girls Project reports that currently 4 out of 5 girls at the young age of ten years old are afraid of becoming fat (NYC Girls Project 1). In a few short years they develop a hatred for at least two parts of their body. These crucial years in puberty are reported to be the worst for a girl’s body satisfaction (NYC Girls Project 1). This epidemic has stemmed from the pressure of the media and has only escalated since the introduction of the manipulation of desired and unattainable body structures displayed in magazines. There are evident consequences to introducing young women and girls to images that are manipulated by Photoshop, leading to an increase in body dissatisfaction.  In the late nineteenth century the fashion industry realized they could experiment on the female identity using cosmetic enhancements (Schweitzer 258). This means that the beginning intentions for advertisements of products were to investigate how mass promotions would affect women’s looks and behaviors. Lately, these effects have developed into a “makeover” effect as the degrees of transformations grow to an extreme (Schweitzer 258).

Testimonial advertisements dating back to the 1910’s have included models advertising products such as corsets, cosmetics, and hair curlers, all of which are methods of improving one’s looks (Schweitzer 257). These products, respectively, bring the illusions of smaller waists, cleaner and prettier skin, and more curly natural-looking hair. The first products to enter the advertisement market were meant to conceal flaws by disguising imperfections. 

Spokeswomen included models, actresses, singers, and other role models who endorsed beauty products to improve their reputation while tempting their audience to transform their bodies. This is an issue in and itself since there is a lack of professional role models for women to follow. Men are able to look up to political, economic, and scientific role models while there is a deficiency of female role models with these same qualifications (Moloney, Pelehach 120). This leaves women to look up to other females who are manipulated for a living since they are constantly projected through the media. They must constantly look good and are criticized when they walk to the grocery store in sweatpants with no makeup on. Being comfortable in their own skin is no longer acceptable and they are held to unnecessary high standards. This projects on the average woman when they read publicity magazines and see their role models ostracized for being natural, whether they have acne, wrinkles, cellulite, or as mild as wearing sweatpants and no makeup.

Of course, these features are natural effects of transitioning into the later stages of life. For example, wrinkles can develop from squinting or spending too much time in the sun. The skin breaks down and loses healthy elastic fibers that keep the skin looking plump. Products have been created to naturally treat these conditions, which are then advertised to the public. If a model is selling an acne medication and has wrinkles, it is up to the marketing agencies to decide whether or not to get rid of her wrinkles that have nothing to do with the acne medication. This is where there is an unclear line as to whether or not it is ethically right to manipulate the model’s skin in order to sell the product. This creates false misconceptions. The audience is left with three assumptions, either the model had perfect skin to begin with, the product also clears wrinkles, or it has been altered. 

Companies have a strong history of changing images to better suit the goals of the advertisement. They may use products like Photoshop to digitally enhance photos. These alterations may include: teeth whitening, slimming figures, or clearing the skin of wrinkles, blemishes, or moles. Two brothers, Thomas and John Knoll, invented Photoshop in the late 1990’s. There are more than 40 professional spin offs of the original software, although most marketing agencies use Photoshop to manipulate their mass advertisements. 

Some people claim that removing the technology and the culture that has been successfully implemented across the media markets will create more disastrous consequences than it causes currently. In fact, Elizabeth Perle’s response to the American Medical Association’s (AMA) announcement shows her concerns for immediate costs of this massive change.  Their announcement in 2011 stated that the use of Photoshop and other image manipulation software is detrimental to one’s health (Perle 2). Perle argues her initial reaction included a fear for a world where models and performers remain under enormous amounts of pressure to make their bodies attain a desirable look (2). She believes that taking Photoshop out of the advertising equation will cause a dramatic increase in the amount of eating disorders and worsen the burden to adhere to unnatural standards. She inherently believes that advertising agencies will become more selective of their models and use those who dedicate their life and their body to fulfilling the role of a lifelike mannequin. 

Currently, “Photoshop-free!” is seen as a marketing campaign (Perle 1). Instead of envisioning this change as a temporary stir in the media, Photoshop free culture supporters are suggesting a permanent truthful standard advertising agencies should abide by. This includes a suggestion to display an almost “Surgeon General’s Warning” on advertisements that have been digitally altered – even slightly. This would bully marketing companies into producing original, untouched photos since no one would want to ruin their images by admitting they’ve changed the effect the product promises. Whether it be the case where a teeth whitener ad digitally bleaches the color of the teeth or  it gets rid of the model’s laugh lines, the warning would not specify what has been changed and would lead the consumer to assume the worst. They would turn to more truthful products that show honest results. Therefore, there would be more trust between the consumer and producer and the producer would be more motivated to enhance their product to more desired results that would otherwise only be obtained through image manipulation. 

This follows the AMA’s statement that, “such alterations can contribute to unrealistic expectations of appropriate body image …”  (Goldwert 1). They go on to claim the impressions are most seen in young children and adolescents (Goldwert 1). This is shown in studies where three year-old girls are shown pictures of women of varying body types and associated positive characteristics to thinner models and negative to the overweight women (Faubion 1). Also, these honest preschoolers have admitted to being more likely to friend skinny people verses those who are overweight (1). 

This hatred for those who are bigger only grows with age. Donna Eder’s article On Becoming Female: Lessons Learned in School observes the connection between middle school girls and how attractiveness affects their relationship with boys and each other (173). Femininity is constructed with the concept that girls are more preoccupied with attractiveness than they are constructive elements that will help them grow what they are capable of accomplishing (Eder 173). In one experiment, the writer visited a middle school where cheerleading tryouts obviously showed a bias towards more attractive potential cheerleaders. Weight also played a factor as the coach told the judges, “to pay attention to the person’s weight… ‘If you don’t like the way they look, you wouldn’t want them to stand in front of you’” (Eder 174). Cheerleading is meant to be a way enthusiastic students can show pride for their school, except in this case, the best candidates must also be attractive. The points received for attractiveness were covered by the terms “clean and neat appearance” so the cheerleader would maintain a feminine appearance despite the demanding physical aspect. They also were encouraged to smile throughout the routine, hiding any sign of pain or concentration. This translates to how in today’s culture, women are held to a higher standard. They are expected to be perfect and show no signs of weakness. Stress is a normal part of any lifestyle and may be seen as a sign of weakness; a physical consequence of stress is wrinkles and worry lines. Girls are conditioned to think of these imperfections as signs of weakness instead of a toll of life. 

The competition in young girls rises from ranking each other and competing for the attention of boys. In the aforementioned middle school, some girls found an informal list of girls a certain group of boys thought were attractive (Eder 175). The only similarity between the girls on the list was that they would all be considered “early figures”, a term that indicates they are prematurely showing bodily characteristics of a young woman such as: wide hips, larger breasts, and smaller waists (Eder 175). The girls in this school also admitted to gossiping about other girls in their free time; this backfired as they become more self-aware of their own appearance because they focus on others’ (Eder 176). Eder recognized the basis of a girl’s appearance was dictated by her fashion, weight, and body type (176-177). She observed that the lower class students were often not able to afford name-brand clothes and were often blacklisted for their poor fashion sense (176). As for their weight and body type, Eder observed that girls were made fun regardless of whether or not they were obese (177). Some girls were made fun of for having large hips or breasts, both of which develop during this key time in a girl’s life. This kind of bullying leads girls to think they can control not only their weight, but also their body structure, by dieting. In severe cases, this can manifest into eating disorders such as anorexia and bulimia (Eder 177). 

A study in 2016 determined an extreme development of the pressure to be skinny and attractive. The investigation followed 27 female participants between the ages of 15 and 18 and explored their views on case studies of women who had undergone cosmetic surgery and reported their observations (Ashikali et al. 112). This study focused on four crucial themes, each of which contributes to the dissatisfaction of the relationship between Photoshopped advertisements and the self-esteem of young women (Ashikali et al. 112). 

The first theme identified the dissatisfaction with their appearance and the ominous pressure to look good. Participants recall that no matter how seemingly perfect someone may look from the outside, “’everyone’s self-conscious’” (Ashikali et al. 115). They identify the primary source of this threat to be the media. This stems from the fact that the media portrays celebrities, those who are deemed to be more special than the average person, to have faults; the media survives on celebrities making mistakes and looking less than flawless. If the media holds this “supreme-person” to an unattainable standard, they are therefore intensifying the pressure on normal people by lowering their value in advertisements that mock everyday challenges associated with the progression of life. Though these girls were not fooled by the assumed airbrushing and proportion altering photos, they stated the difficulty to remember what they are looking and comparing themselves to is not real (Ashikali et al. 115-116). 

The next concept identifies that cosmetic surgery teaches women to fix everything they’re not comfortable with by getting surgery (Ashikali  et al.116). In the current environment young girls grow up in, they resort to surgery as a way of stopping others from bullying them for having identifying characteristics, such as a larger nose or smaller breasts. This surgery may relieve some of the torment from others, although the participants also admitted to having justification in bullying someone for having surgery as a “quick-fix” instead of not taking pride for accepting their flaws or doing the change for themselves (Ashikali et al. 116). The young age of women who undergo cosmetic surgery also raises concerns that they may not be fully developed. And if they were to wait, would they become more accepting of their unique qualities? Surgery is no longer seen as a last-resort method to fix life-threatening deformities, but instead is confused as a way of surviving slightly more successfully on a social level (Ashikali et al. 116). The term “slightly” refers to the concept that the young client will still likely be looked down on by her peers for having the procedure. Cosmetic surgery fails to rid the client of the mental toll bullying has and the emotional consequences of identifying surgery as an easy fix for unwanted appearances. 

The third observation is that although few of the studies’ participants would personally consider having cosmetic surgery, they believe that every girl has considered having a procedure at some point (Ashikali et al. 117). The first cosmetic procedure is seen as crossing a threshold, “‘with cosmetic surgery, you can have one thing down and then you think there’s another thing [to be] done, and another, and it just goes in one big circle’” (Ashikali et al. 117). This introduces the idea that surgery can be seen as an addiction, and an expensive one at that. In fact, more women say that money is a larger determining factor than the possible consequences when contemplating surgery (Ashikali et al. 117).  “If it wasn’t a money issue, I think a scary amount of girls would do it,” states one participant (Ashikali et al. 117). In a hypothetical situation, the participants stated that 40 to 70 percent of their peers would consider surgery. The girls anticipated contrasting feelings as a result of obtaining cosmetic surgery. They predicted the user would feel negatively about themselves since, “’it’s lazy’” and ‘an easy option’” (Ashikali et al. 118). This personal consequence compares to the perceived positive social effects where the user feels more confident about themselves resulting in improvements in self-esteem. 

The final theme this study describes the way that cosmetic surgery is successfully advertised to the consumer through the media. The immense influence of the media has built a norm in the media culture. One participant states, “…you wouldn’t pick up a magazine and go ‘oh my’ because there’s surgery in there… you see it everyday” (Ashikali et al. 118). They observed that stories that do cover new celebrities always focus on the positive side effects rather than the common ones; only in gruesomely extreme cases will they state the dangers. Cosmetic surgery is sold in the media like a fashion piece, calling it “in”. Only instead of wanting a shirt that can be easily returned and is a temporary happiness, the user is permanently stuck with his or her new body. Celebrities make up the majority of women’s role models since there is a deficiency of professional female role models in an economic and political sense. This creates a problem where young women begin to view surgery as a determining method to obtain attractiveness, fame, and success (Ashikali et al. 119). 

It is understood that the ultimate goal of life is to live to the greatest extent. People want to be able to control their life and live the way they want to. Supporters of cosmetic surgery will argue that if someone wants to change their body, whether it be using an innocent amount of makeup or an extreme life-altering surgery, they should be able to do as they please. This belief adheres to the people’s desire to live a free, unpressured life. People shouldn’t live in fear of being judged for improve their life by enhancing their physical life. 

Backing up, this value can get rid of this current mentality. If this desire for freedom was used to get rid of the source, women would be able to live easier. The freedom from pressure of the media to get cosmetic surgery and cover flaws would allow men and women to be more accepting of their bodies. Of course, this is not achieved in a couple months, or even years. This change in our culture, if done correctly, will be more time consuming than surgery, because it’s not an “easy fix”. In the course of multiple generations, the young women of the future will grow up in an environment where it is normal to have models of all sizes, with all of their original proportions, cellulite, and other things that may be seen as flaws today. If girls grow up in a culture where women are confident enough to display their flaws on magazines, then they will develop a mentality that accepts their flaws and makes them comfortable in their skin. 

Jean Kilbourne researched the subconscious messages in food and body image-related advertisements and found that the average American encounters 3000 advertisements every day and will spend two years of their life watching TV commercials (Roefer 1). This toxic daily occurrence can significantly alter our perceptions about how to live. It sends subliminal messages about what to eat, how to dress, and what is deemed as appropriate behavior. Instead of using this reality to create a healthier atmosphere, marketing agencies use extremely slim models to display their products while simultaneously digitally altering their appearance to an ever more unrealistic image. 

If advertisements were to remain true to their original images while implementing a strategy that uses models that represent more average body proportions. This would get rid of the exclusive model-like thin figure that is not attainable while maintaining a healthy lifestyle. Showing these images in advertisements would create and sustain healthier generations with more body-positive mindsets. Instead of being afraid of becoming fat, young girls would simply see curves and natural weight gain as a way of life. They would come to embrace healthier lifestyles that provide them with longer lifespans, happier outlooks, and more successful lives overall. 
