Recently whilst trawling through facebook I noticed that one of my friends
had very un-natural looking pictures of herself -and by unnatural I mean
perfectly flawless pictures where she has no evident freckles on her face. Upon
closer inspection they looked airbrushed. I commented on the pictures stating that the
pictures looked flawless to which she replied that she had used a new software
on them to give them that airbrushed look. She exclaimed that this is something
that a lot of her friends are doing as they don’t like how they look in their
pictures and this way they can air out any signs of imperfections-in my friends
case her freckles [which I actually think are lovely and are unique to her]. I was
astonished to find that these pictures had actually received loads more complements
from others compared to her regular picture postings.
This really got me thinking; are we a nation so obsessed with how we look that
we will attempt to attain the impossible by trying to look or at least fool
others into thinking we look as perfect as those on magazine covers. When we
all know deep down that those in magazines look nothing like their pictures in
real life. This made me reflect on my feelings from watching a documentary back
in 2008 on the subject of airbrushing. From watching Alesha Dixon’s ‘Look But Don't Touch’ documentary when
it first aired back in 2008 [can be watched here] I never thought I was really
influenced by the images surrounding me every day. I just thought that I saw these images an
admired them but knew they weren’t real and that was that. Watching Alesha’s
documentary got me thinking and sadly I was wrong, these images had made more
of an impression on me and how I viewed my body than I initially thought.
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| Airbrushed photos of Jessica Alba and Sarah Jessica Parker |
When thinking about it and being truly honest with myself I subconsciously compared
myself to these images and have done so since I first started buying magazines
at the tender age of 13. I am a small size
12 at 5foot 6.5inches, and I've always felt that I should be smaller in both
clothes size and height. I have small boobs yet I have hips which to me seemed
out of proportion. I have poker straight hair that I always felt should be voluminous,
after all that all I ever see in advertisements. I have cellulite on my bum and
thighs and visible veins on my legs which I always felt were grotesque and
unnatural. I don't have high cheekbones;
I've always felt that I should. I don’t have a perfect petite straight nose,
hell I even have one eye bigger than the other, in my eyes I was far from beautiful
as I looked so different from the images that were being presented to me. The documentary
made me question whether it is out personal preference that I want bigger
boobs, smaller thighs, voluminous hair etc or is it because I’ve grown up
surrounded by pictures of perfection that has influenced me into wanting to
look a certain way.
As a tall[ish], small chested girl I admired the likes of Sienna Miller and
Kiera Knightly as they are known for their small chests but are still
considered beautiful. This is why pictures like those below really bother me,
why is there a need to digitally enhance their busts. Are they trying to give
us the message that there is something unattractive about smaller boobs? No wonder
I had major body issues growing up.
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| Kiera Knightly Bust Enhanced |
Women and young
girls are forever comparing themselves to women in the media. Today, we can’t
go anywhere without seeing images of perfection plastered everywhere, telling
us what we should be, how we should look etc. TBH I’m sick of it. Women and
young girls just like me strive to gain these unattainable bodies and unfortunately
too often when these images are not achieved through healthy forms of exercise
etc some people start to take alternative measures often resulting in people taking
drastic measures thus putting their health at risk. Just take Hedi Montag for
example she underwent 10 procedures in one day putting her life in jeopardy-yet
she is still open to having more surgery until she feels she has reached ‘perfection.’
 |
| Hedi Montag before and after. |
It's honestly no surprise that many young girls/women [and
boys/men may I add] these days are already considering plastic surgery, I was horrified
to hear that Sarah Burge gave her young daughter Poppy £8,000 worth of vouchers
to spend on plastic surgery for her EIGTH
birthday!!! You can see her interview on this morning below;
Research has
shown that exposure to false, airbrushed pictures of celebrities is linked to
depression, low self-esteem, and the development of eating disorders. It is
believed that one in every one hundred teenage girls may develop an eating
disorder. This is an alarmingly high number. I was quite frankly relieved when
I saw that the likes of Britney Spears, Anne Lynn McCord and Kim Kardashian had
released untouched pictures of themselves. I felt nothing but pure admiration
for these girls and I just wish that more of those in the media lime light
would do so.
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| [L-R] Britney Spears before and after, Anne Lynn McCord touched photo and no makeup photo, Kim Kardashian before and after, Kin Kardashian psoriasis picture.Note to self they all look beautiful with their imperfections!!! |
It’s sad to
say that 100% of fashion magazines today use digitally retouched pictures. Yes I am aware that there's a difference between fashion
magazines such as Vogue and beauty companies such as Dove. Setting aside the
fact that they are different products, they are both aimed at very different audiences.
Realistically would there even be high
end fashion magazines like Vogue anymore if they used natural pictures? Now I’m
not totally against all airbrushing but I feel that magazines have gone
overboard. I personally would find it refreshing to buy a magazine that
showcased people’s imperfections, after all models are just like us-they do
have bad hair and skin days. So why not show us that we are more like them than
we think? Take Dove’s advertisement campaign where real woman are used-has it
hindered me from buying their product? Hell no, in fact it has probably encouraged
me to try more of their products. I just wish more companies would follow in
their direction.
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| Dove Real Women Campaign |
However I Honestly don’t see airbrushing going anywhere in the near future
so instead I think it would be nice to look at adverts’ and
see "this picture has been
retouched" at the bottom just like they now do with mascara adverts
where they have to say if the eyelashes have been digitally enhanced or lash
inserts used- It would be a nice little reminder for all of us out there
looking at these images and would hopefully hone home that these pictures are
not ‘real’.
Always remember that “To wish you were someone else
is to waste the person you are.”-
Unknown.
Thanks
for reading,
xKx
