Unhealthy Images of the Female Body :: Psychology, Self-esteem

To some degree women in various cultures have always experienced the pressure to conform to specific ideals. The new phenomenon in horse opera society is telling women that beauty has requirements. That is, to be attractive you must be incredibly thing, firm, but not muscular and large breasted (Grogan 41). Unhealthy images of the distaff body are continuously displayed in almost all aspects of media, but television commercials are an incredibly strong influence. Although there are many authoritative commercials, the ad campaign by Victorias Secret, Love My Body, is particularly frightening. The television commercials star the typical stick thin and busty models (McDonell-Parry) parading around in their underwear, wind blowing through and through their hair, making comments such as I love my body, my body is sexy and my body is my favorite body. The idea of confidence is possibly severe to be portrayed here, but the company strongly reinforces the narrow image of beauty creat ed in Western society by choosing models that conform to Westernized beauty standards, indeed contradicting the theme of confidence (McDonell-Parry). This specific Victorias Secret commercial, along with many other commercials, are being viewed by thousands of women, both young and old. The portrayal of these women on TV sends a message to young womanlys that confidence is fun and sexy, but you can only have it if you are extremely thin, busty, and beautiful like the displayed women. The commercials for the new debate of bras could have easily been made to promote the love and appreciation of all women, despite their shape or size, but it chose to reinforce the unrealistic standards that the typical media stem holds. It is images and ads like these that create inward negative feelings in young women. Self-esteem is considered to be a positive or negative attitude toward the self (Clay 451). electronegative attitudes in young women can stem from a variety of internal or extern al forces. An accurate method to measure a young females self-esteem is through the interpretation of body dissatisfaction and what provokes it. Body dissatisfaction occurs due to three things, in the present day the desire to be thin, the dread of lading gain and the idea that weight and shape are essential to a females character (Levine 11). All of these determinants of body dissatisfaction are a dissolving agent of how media uses an unrealistic female body in virtually all of its aspects, thus creating a cultural norm that being thin is attractive (Levine 15).