Everyone perceives the body differently. Because of this, how the mass media portrays body image is very controversial. The question is if the body image the mass media represents is positive or negative. Moreover, is the mass media truly at fault for these images or is there another factor that contributes to it? People will have different opinions to this, but as for me, I believe that the body image that the media depicts is negative, but they are not at fault in making it negative.
There are many ways the mass media can depict their version of what the body image should be. Video media is an ideal way for the mass media to show their representation of the ideal body image. When watching a movie or a TV show, how do the main characters usually look? They are often good looking and slender. Popular characters in movies such as Star Wars, the Godfather, Indiana Jones, or Kill Bill are fit and strong. You don 't see Luke Skywalker or Michael Corleone as "fat "or big people. Even in children’s’ films, the media shows that slender is better. MediaSmarts.ca states that “Movies – including those aimed at young children – fare no better in representing …show more content…
Advertisement can be found almost everywhere; in magazines, on television, on billboards, on buildings and on the radio. Nina Easton believes that “advertising has taught men contempt for women and women contempt for themselves.” In Eason’s article she notes “the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women concluded that ‘Advertising is the worst offender in perpetuating the image of women as sex symbols and inferior class of human being.’” Surely you have seen the Carl’s Jr. commercial where they advertise their burgers with a “sexy” girl, usually a model or celebrity, in minimal clothing. The girl is usually eating the messy burger in the most sexual and sensual way. Most advertisement will consist of thin, curvy, busty girl models. If these models look a certain way that has males (or females) drooling, why wouldn’t other girls want to be thin, curvy, and busty? Girls would think that those models are what the “perfect” girl would be. Girls would then be insecure about their bodies and they would go and starve themselves to make them thin like the bodies in the advertisements. Some girls would go have surgery to alter their appearance. But girls are not the only ones to be affected by the negative body image the media creates. In advertisements, men are often the ones who have washboard abs and a muscular body. They are the ones who are often making love