Is It Better To Further The Consumer From The Idolized Beauty Standards?

Many businesses are guilty of retouching the bodies of models in their advertisements to sell their products. By doing this, businesses create an unattainable beauty standard that many young females strive to achieve. When spreading a single form of beauty for society to accept, many individuals struggle with self-esteem issues when trying to achieve the desired body image. Due to the constant exposure to ads with photo retouched images, adolescent females suffer from a low self-esteem as a result of trying to conform to unrealistic beauty standards.

Businesses frequently use Photoshop to further the consumer from the idolized beauty standard. This allows businesses to feed off consumer insecurity while ensuring constant purchasing of their

In the after photo, her legs, arms, and waist are noticeably slimmer. Additionally, her skin tone has been airbrushed to a fine sheen and her buttocks have been lifted. Since “Eighty percent of teen girls admit that they compare themselves with airbrushed images of celebrities” we can conclude that these altered images are constructing society’s form of beauty while disassociating with the concept of realistic beauty expectations (“Should” 2). The images that have been altered give an unattainable goal which the model herself, does not have the same features as. Likewise, “The media- magazines, TV, films, advertising, music videos- not only emphasize that female self-worth should be based on appearance, but present a powerful cultural ideal of female beauty that is becoming increasingly unattainable” (Clay 452). When females struggle to keep up with the constantly changing beauty standards that surround them, it causes them to become more hypercritical and displeased with their own

Focusing on a “real woman”, causes many females to compare themselves at a greater extent that results in having a lower self-esteem. Instead, “The most effective way to reduce the negative consequences of media exposure is relate to awareness of the artificial and deceptive nature or proposed images” (Rollero 200). This is due to the fact the viewers have reassurance that the model does not even look like the image herself. By blindly promoting unattainable beauty standards, young girls fail to realize that the images are altered which “…can lead to eating disorders, drug abuse, and suicidal thoughts” and many other health issues when trying to reach such standards (“Should”