Discuss some issue of personal, local, national, or international concern and its importance to you.
250 word minimum
How often is it that a woman looks into a mirror and finds herself to be dissatisfied with what she sees? I would venture to say that this is a common occurrence in the lives of far too many American women, including myself. What a dreadful feeling it is for one to always yearn to be something better and to despise what one was innately given, whether that be regarding the woman's physical appearance or even her demeanor. But who is to blame for this abomination? The culprit could be none other than the mass media.
It is nearly impossible to flip through television channels or the pages of a magazine without encountering numerous examples of the media's objectification of woman, such as make-up advertisements or simply illustrations of promiscuous-looking women. It all seems harmless, but it leads women to build their lives around what Naomi Wolf once called the "beauty myth," or the idea that women are raised to believe that their appearances should be valued over most other things. Many reasonable Americans would scoff at the idea that their children are being raised to find more importance in their looks than their personalities, but how often do they remind them to dress nicely or have them wear their hair a certain way? How often do teenage girls see doctored images of "perfect" looking models, and how often are they pressured to cover up their blemishes, remove their bodily hair, or dress in low-cut tops? It is impossible to deny amount of effort we put into hoping we look nice.
As a feminist, I find these things to be a sort of demeaning attack upon the female sex. The belief that women should always appear flawless in order to be appealing to men is threatening to the progression of our entire gender. It causes a sort of superficiality in women, who, if they otherwise focused their attention, could achieve great things; and it forces men to prize women as dolls rather than human beings of an equal status.
Moreover, the viewing of women solely as physical objects leads to problems on an individual level as well as on a social one. When society raises women around images of an unreachable perfection, it can initiate a lifetime full of feelings of unworthiness. Women who believe the beauty myth can find themselves struggling with a negative self-image, depression, and even resort to eating disorders to get rid of the little amounts of fat left on their already underweight bodies. The pursuit of this fictional perfection can result in other extreme actions such as plastic surgery. This money given to plastic surgeons is used to promote aesthetic surgeries, which, in turn, too convinces women that beauty is only just out of their grasp.
Overall, the eradication of the objectification of females in media would be a significant step towards a true equality of the sexes. I personally support this because, as a woman, I know from experience that we are just as capable of accomplishing anything a man can accomplish, and it is truly unfair for women to encounter such obstacles as "glass ceilings" and condescension from males. Furthermore, females should be raised to appreciate themselves and each other for less superficial things, and be taught to be comfortable in their own skin rather than to always wish for something better.
250 word minimum
How often is it that a woman looks into a mirror and finds herself to be dissatisfied with what she sees? I would venture to say that this is a common occurrence in the lives of far too many American women, including myself. What a dreadful feeling it is for one to always yearn to be something better and to despise what one was innately given, whether that be regarding the woman's physical appearance or even her demeanor. But who is to blame for this abomination? The culprit could be none other than the mass media.
It is nearly impossible to flip through television channels or the pages of a magazine without encountering numerous examples of the media's objectification of woman, such as make-up advertisements or simply illustrations of promiscuous-looking women. It all seems harmless, but it leads women to build their lives around what Naomi Wolf once called the "beauty myth," or the idea that women are raised to believe that their appearances should be valued over most other things. Many reasonable Americans would scoff at the idea that their children are being raised to find more importance in their looks than their personalities, but how often do they remind them to dress nicely or have them wear their hair a certain way? How often do teenage girls see doctored images of "perfect" looking models, and how often are they pressured to cover up their blemishes, remove their bodily hair, or dress in low-cut tops? It is impossible to deny amount of effort we put into hoping we look nice.
As a feminist, I find these things to be a sort of demeaning attack upon the female sex. The belief that women should always appear flawless in order to be appealing to men is threatening to the progression of our entire gender. It causes a sort of superficiality in women, who, if they otherwise focused their attention, could achieve great things; and it forces men to prize women as dolls rather than human beings of an equal status.
Moreover, the viewing of women solely as physical objects leads to problems on an individual level as well as on a social one. When society raises women around images of an unreachable perfection, it can initiate a lifetime full of feelings of unworthiness. Women who believe the beauty myth can find themselves struggling with a negative self-image, depression, and even resort to eating disorders to get rid of the little amounts of fat left on their already underweight bodies. The pursuit of this fictional perfection can result in other extreme actions such as plastic surgery. This money given to plastic surgeons is used to promote aesthetic surgeries, which, in turn, too convinces women that beauty is only just out of their grasp.
Overall, the eradication of the objectification of females in media would be a significant step towards a true equality of the sexes. I personally support this because, as a woman, I know from experience that we are just as capable of accomplishing anything a man can accomplish, and it is truly unfair for women to encounter such obstacles as "glass ceilings" and condescension from males. Furthermore, females should be raised to appreciate themselves and each other for less superficial things, and be taught to be comfortable in their own skin rather than to always wish for something better.
