People use media in many different ways. Some use media to get their news, some use media to make entertaining content, but what we don't realize is how what's shown to us in the media truly affects us. Regardless of where any of us look, we are constantly surrounded by advertisements trying to tell us that there are things about our bodies and personalities we should not like. Anonymous commenting, feeling beautiful in a world with models who control magazines, TV shows, commercials can be tough. In the eyes of society, women like Kylie Jenner and Beyoncé are the epitome of the perfect body. The media presents society with unrealistic body types encouraging people, especially women to look like them. The media requires this unrealistic body type that women want to mimic, which eventually leads them to think negatively about themselves. The feeling of depression from the unlikelihood in being able to emulate the look that the media places on beauty is causing low self-esteem in both teenage girls and adult women. Women start to feel insecure about their bodies and often fall prey to eating disorders.
Teenage girls and women get the idea of having the perfect body from how it is portrayed throughout all the social media platforms. For example, Instagram which happens to be one of the most visited social medias plays a key role in the decline of self-esteem, depression and eating disorders. It allows you to alter your appearance to gain likes, followers and comments. The concept of having the freedom to alter online appearances, makes it easier for teenage girls and women to compare themselves to others. There are several pages on Instagram that promote beauty products to enhance beauty, such voluminous mascara to give the eyelashes a longer and fuller look. These beauty pages among others encourage others to change their appearance to satisfy the media’s ideal look
This ideal body image also plays a major role in modern relationships. Men see a specific body surface through all the media platforms and they chase girls who embody this image. The notion of being thick however not too thick or being skinny or not too skinny is out of control. This is mainly in the older women, they classify being thick as beautiful, but the moment their thighs are little thicker, it falls under the category of being fat. Likewise, with being thin, but being excessively thin can be mistaken for being unhealthy. Believe it or not, but this ties back to teenage girls, when an older woman see a thick teenage girl, they advise them to lose weight, but if they’re thin, they need to eat more. There are a lot of diet advertisements that sponsor getting rid of the ‘extra’ weight and attaining a slim toned body.
Although this side of social media can subconsciously toxic, there are so many body positive campaigns and movements that are trying to dispel the thought of, "you have to look a certain way to be beautiful". Models, influencers, and public figures such as Ashley Graham, Chrissy Teigen, and Demi Lovato use their social media platforms to protest the unrealistic body types women today aspire to have, and despite your cellulite, you are beautiful and you should love yourself no matter what.
Here are 10 Body Positive Campaigns That'll Make You Love Yourself:
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