Young Girls in the Media

Never before has the sexualisation of girls in the media been as prominent, explicit and had such lasting harm on girls and women. 9 out of 10 girls say the fashion industry and the media place a lot of pressure on teenage girls to be thin (spark summit video). Ladies and gentlemen, I am delighted to have this opportunity to present my seminar to you on how the innocence of young females is exploited and sexualised in popular culture, particularly in advertising. It is recognised that Australians now spend in excess of 89 hours per week or almost 80 per cent of their waking hours consuming media (who 2012). The sexualisation of girls has been a topic of interest to many over past years, from the 1953 creation of the Barbie doll, the 2001 epidemic of BRATZ dolls, to the controversial perfume advertisements Daisy and OH LOLA! By Marc Jacobs; enforces the representation that young females are positioned to be sexual objects. The unrealistic representations of young women as sexual objects which is portrayed within the social media, is not only harmful to girls, but is also harmful to the wider community.

But what exactly is sexualisation? Sexualisation refers to make sexual, endow with sex, or attribute sex to (Princeton.edu), not something that is commonly associated with when making reference to young women and children. Sexualisation is ever present in modern media and we are susceptible to images of women and children where the emphasis is on attraction, appeal, and seductiveness. The increasing sexualisation of the society in which we live, with a specific focus on female gender representation, plays an influential role as to how young women portray and perceive themselves. The images of women we see in mainstream media portrays to a child that they should convey a higher level of sexual maturity far beyond their years in order to be considered attractive and beautiful. These fascinations can cause severe social implications for young girls, which can