American Women Research Paper
In the American culture, women are starving, and gorging themselves, their children, and their loved ones. Some women hate and want to get rid of everything that makes them female; a pear shaped body and curves (Keresey). Many eating disorder specialists agree that chronic dieting is a direct consequence of the social pressure on American females to achieve a nearly impossible thinness. Women are taught from childhood to judge the worth of their bodies looking at an emaciated standard of beauty, which the media has been blamed for upholding and possibly even creating (Schneider). To explore the broader context of this controversial issue, this paper draws upon several aspects on how common body dissatisfaction in adolescent females is,
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People magazine asked 1,000 women, ranging in ages from 18-55, about their bodies and how the images of Hollywood's slender stars influence their self-esteem. Eighty percent of the respondents said that images of women on television, and in movies, fashion magazines and advertising make them feel insecure about their own looks. How insecure? Enough so that 93 percent of the women have tried to loose weight, 34 percent said they would consider or have had cosmetic surgery and 34 percent would be willing to try a diet even if it posed as a health risk. Some 28 percent of the woman surveyed admitted that they had turned down social invitations because of discomfort with their looks, and 10 percent have avoided medical appointments because of their weight. When the women were asked what caused their greatest insecurity with their body, all fingers pointed to the mass media with 37 percent off woman saying the portrayal of women on television and in movies, 24 percent pointed to fashion magazines and another 19 percent responded with advertising. These results indicate that many women are unhappy with their bodies and acutely aware of how they compare with the mass media's images of the "ideal" body (114+). As Judy Lightstone quoted, "If we place pornography and the tyranny of slenderness alongside one another we have the two most significant obsessions of our culture, and both of them focussed upon a woman's body"
People magazine asked 1,000 women, ranging in ages from 18-55, about their bodies and how the images of Hollywood's slender stars influence their self-esteem. Eighty percent of the respondents said that images of women on television, and in movies, fashion magazines and advertising make them feel insecure about their own looks. How insecure? Enough so that 93 percent of the women have tried to loose weight, 34 percent said they would consider or have had cosmetic surgery and 34 percent would be willing to try a diet even if it posed as a health risk. Some 28 percent of the woman surveyed admitted that they had turned down social invitations because of discomfort with their looks, and 10 percent have avoided medical appointments because of their weight. When the women were asked what caused their greatest insecurity with their body, all fingers pointed to the mass media with 37 percent off woman saying the portrayal of women on television and in movies, 24 percent pointed to fashion magazines and another 19 percent responded with advertising. These results indicate that many women are unhappy with their bodies and acutely aware of how they compare with the mass media's images of the "ideal" body (114+). As Judy Lightstone quoted, "If we place pornography and the tyranny of slenderness alongside one another we have the two most significant obsessions of our culture, and both of them focussed upon a woman's body"