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Thesis statement about body shaming
Thesis statement about body shaming
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More handpicked essays just for you.
Thesis statement about body shaming
Thesis statement about body shaming
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Recommended: Thesis statement about body shaming
Women constantly face the battle of learning to love themselves in a society where natural beauty is not considered true beauty, to the point where women fight amongst each other over issues that patriarchy has instilled. For example, “body shaming is defined as inappropriate, negative statements and attitudes toward another person’s weight or size” (how is body shaming defined?). In the poem “when the Fat Girl Gets Skinny” the usage of extended metaphors about social constructs, Baird showcases how body shaming caused her to resort to having an eating disorder. In her poem, Baird states “as a child, “fat was the first word people used to describe me/ which didn’t offend me until I found out it was supposed to.”
(Pigott, 2). Likewise, Catherine altered her body size to meet their gender expectations and various cultural beauty standards. By applying the gender lens to this, we can better understand how gender expectations and cultural beauty standards intersect to shape women’s experiences of their body. It emphasizes how cultural beauty standards can have a significant impact on women's body image, self-esteem, and confidence. Women often feel the pressure to comply with the cultural ideal of beauty, which can lead to feelings of inadequacy, and shame if they do not fit the mold.
Most girls, if not all girls, have gone through one particular phase in life: finding self-confidence. Despite the fact they may say or act otherwise, most girls have gone through a phase where they feel uncomfortable in their own skin. I would like to say that I am comfortable in my own skin and come across that way (I also eat a lot), but I am just like any other girl and have gone through the phase myself (and when boys call me cute, I tend to turn into a strawberry and deny it vehemently). Over the centuries, American focus has shifted from judging a girl based on her personality to judging a girl based on her body image and sexuality, and in The Body Project, Joan Jacobs Brumberg goes into detail about how the United States have shifted in their views of girls’ bodies.
Scrutinizing celebrities by the media hearts young women the most. “The message that girls are not pretty unless they 're incredibly thin, that they 're not worthy of our attention unless they look like a supermodel or an actress on the cover of a magazine… is something girls then carry into womanhood” (Anniston). On the covers of a lot of magazines also on a lot of programs on tv that use the life of celebrities as a major source of information to attract viewers and audiences. Some magazines choose to put on their covers pictures of naked celebrities then start examining how their bodies look which is an indirect message to the readers and viewers telling them this is the body you need to have. This is the standard of beauty to follow.”
Everyday females are exposed to how media views the female body, whether in a work place, television ads, and magazines. Women tend to judge themselves on how they look just to make sure there keeping up with what society see as an idyllic women, when women are exposed to this idea that they have to keep a perfect image just to keep up with media, it teaches women that they do not have the right look because they feel as if they don’t add up to societies expectations of what women should look like, it makes them thing there not acceptable to society. This can cause huge impacts on a women self-appearance and self-respect dramatically. Women who become obsessed about their body image can be at high risk of developing anorexia or already have
These expectations can cause insecurities in adults, teens, and even children who normally have little to no insecurities. Young children should not have to worry about the way they look or what they are wearing. Therefore, society needs to address the problem of creating negative body images. It can start by recognizing that unreal and unnatural body image can cause eating disorders and mental disorders. “50% of teenage girls and 30% of
According to a survey done by Jesse Fox, Ph.D., 80% of women feel bad about themselves just by looking in the mirror (Dreisbach). This has happened because of social media being changed to make girls feel like they need to have a certain body shape. Models and celebrities in magazines and media show unrealistic beauty and it contributes to eating disorders, depression, anxiety, and much more (Seventeen magazine). Media has put lots of stress on women throughout history with changing body shapes. A survey done by Dove found results that 9 out of 10 women want to change at least one aspect of their physical appearance.
According to dosomething.org about 91% of women are unhappy with their bodies in the world today. In the world today many people struggle with the way their body looks, and bullies that often degrade people for the way they look. Being bullied, or having a negative body image can effect a persons life in many ways. Many people have a negative body image, even girls that appear to be "pretty and popular". Physical effects of bullying, and a negative body image could include anorexia, cutting, or purging.
Marilyn Monroe once said, “To all the girls that think you are fat because you are not a size zero, you’re the beautiful one, it’s society that is ugly.” Marilyn was a famous sex symbol in the 1950’s. Her body wasn’t like the bodies of girls we see in the media today. But to her, it didn’t matter. She knew she was beautiful and that was all that mattered.
Men and women nowadays are starting to lose self-confidence in themselves and their body shape, which is negatively impacting the definition of how beauty and body shape are portrayed. “...97% of all women who had participated in a recent poll by Glamour magazine were self-deprecating about their body image at least once during their lives”(Lin 102). Studies have shown that women who occupy most of their time worrying about body image tend to have an eating disorder and distress which impairs the quality of life. Body image issues have recently started to become a problem in today’s society because of social media, magazines, and television.
Most of the time, idealized bodies in the media are an unrealistic perception of the average body. Yet the audience is unable to recognize the difference between tangible and fabricated. As a consequence, body dysmorphia can become self-destructive for those with focusing on the ideal body. These individuals obsessively focus on their imperfections in an attempt to conform to an idealistic identity. Teens and young adults have a higher tendency to become more affected by the consequences of body dysmorphia due to selfies, because of increased emphasis that media has placed on the body and appearance.
So when people look and see that they don’t look like they’re favorite super-model it can put a downer on their self-confidence. This causes many girls feeling that they aren’t good enough in society, society won’t accept them because they aren’t perfect and they start to not like their body. When for many females they can’t lose as much weight as their friend can just because of their genes and how they were born. “The lack of connection between the real and ideal perception of their own body and firm willingness to modify their own body and shape so as to standardize them to social concept of thinness…” (Dixit 1), being focused on unrealistic expectations can cause women to lose themselves and change their attitude on how they view their body, and not for the better.
Meaghan Ramsey's TED Talk "Why thinking you're ugly is bad for you" is a powerful speech about low body confidence. Ramsey talks about how society's pressure to be perfect is one of the main reason for young girls' (and boys') low body confidence and how these feelings of low esteem can impact their lives and futures. I chose to analyze this speech because I have experienced low body confidence and I have felt those feelings of low self-esteem. In Meaghan Ramsey's speech "Why thinking you're ugly is bad for you", she discusses how low body confidence is undermining academic achievement, damaging health, and limiting the economic potential of today's youth who are growing up in a world of social media. Ramsey has a strong start to her speech, using a photo and a story about her niece to gain the attention of the audience.
Body shaming is one of the biggest problems in today’s generation. It is the practice of making critical, potentially humiliating comments about a person’s body, size or weight. It is obvious that all of us come in different shapes and sizes but society and the media puts a lot of pressure on us with beauty stereotypes and standards to deem some as healthy and some not. Recently, there has been a lot of controversy recently about body image and body shaming, especially among teenagers. Body shaming is an extremely personal concept and can take a negative toll on a person.
Popular models such as Kendall Jenner and Alexis Ren is known for their ‘perfect’ bodies. They post daily of their ‘fitspo’ images, gaining millions of likes and compliments. These compliments about their appearance support the importance of body image in how you are judged as a person. These images, send a destructive message about their appearance as well. Ms Morgan stated that ‘appearance-based talk and body comparison can be unremitting, with little understanding of how detrimental it is for self-esteem and mental-health’.