Thanks for joining me!

In my series of seven blog posts, I will analyze all aspects of women’s beauty standards.

I hope you enjoy!

Hey everybody! In the first of my 7 total blog posts, I will be talking about Meghan Trainor’s hit single “All About that Bass” and the positive aspects of the song’s message (Don’t worry, I’ll talk about the negatives in my next blog post).

For those unaware, Trainor’s single gives a message for women who feel ashamed of their weight to be comfortable with their size and embrace it. I undoubtedly believe that Trainor’s intentions with her song are entirely positive; thus, I think she deserves some credit for seeking to bring peace to women who feel ashamed about their weight.

It is a far too common issue in today’s society for women to feel measured in worth by their physical appearance. We see it in almost every aspect of life, but none more so than professional environments. Women are constantly being degraded to objects in professional settings which leads to sever inequality. How can a woman rise to a position of economic power in today’s society if she is constantly reduced to only her appearance?

All of the weight put on women’s appearances due to these extreme consequences can understandably lead to significant stress. When society wrongly tells a woman that all that matters about her is her looks, of course she will begin to feel self-conscious about her weight. That’s why Meghan Trainor’s video has extreme positives to be applauded.

As Trainor parades about, saying, “I’m all about that bass”, listeners can hear her pride for not fitting the mold of a “supermodel” type body. Trainor attempts to shift societal standards to where women of larger sizes can feel pride for who they are.

These are the positives of Trainor’s video. However, there are plenty of negatives where Trainor actually harms the beauty standards of society today. Read my next blog post to find out what!

As I focused on in my last blog post, Meghan Trainor’s all about that bass does seek to help make women of larger sizes feel comfortable with their bodies, which is positive. However, there are quite a few negatives with Trainor’s hit single.

http://feministing.com/2014/08/06/why-meghan-trainors-body-acceptance-anthem-all-about-that-bass-is-disappointing/

This article by Chloe Angyal wonderfully picks apart the issues with Meghan Trainor’s song. From problems with the video imagery to the lyrics, Angyal explains everything wrong with the at first seemingly positive song.

First, Angyal mentions that while Trainor is doing a good job of not conforming to the industry imposed beauty standards, her lyric “Cause I got that boom boom that all the boys chase. And all the right junk in all the right places” just demonstrates that she is following the beauty standards imposed by boys instead. This creates a troubling scenario where women are still subjected to harmful standards imposed by others.

Next, Angyal continues to point out how a lot of the lyrics show that Trainor justifies her body based on boys opinions of it. This practice creates some pretty flimsy self-worth as it is reliant on only what others think of your body. It is much more valuable and correct to base your self-worth on your inherent value and beauty simply as a human. 

Finally, Trainor’s song struggles through its particular emphasis on “boom boom”, or only girls of plus-size. It almost comes across like Trainor is saying that only girls who are of greater size are beautiful. If so, this is an entirely hypocritical message for the meaning of her song. Lyrics such as, “She says, boys like a little more booty to hold at night” and “Go ahead and tell them skinny bitches” only serve to prove this point.

Overall, despite Trainor’s positive intentions and few positive outcomes, “All About that Bass” proves to be a pretty troubling song for women in today’s society. After examining the song closely, it becomes clear that the song ends up contradicting the very message it seeks to promote.

Hi everybody, today I will be talking about how Victoria Secret’s damaging effect on women today.

https://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/victorias-secret-has-a-body-image-problem-20141119-11pyqh.html

This article, written by Nicole Elphick, explores how Victoria secret has created harmful beauty standards. Elphick wonderfully shows how the actions of Victoria Secret as a company have become damaging to society. My blog post today will mirror the focus of this article.

Elphick begins by stating the simple fact that Victoria secret does not do a good job of promoting all types of bodies for women. She writes, “For a company that has built its fortune from hoisting up breasts and covering derrieres, Victoria’s Secret seems to not be very keen on the actual bodies of the majority of women.” This quote demonstrates how Victoria Secret’s motivation has never been to promote women and their images, rather, they have been driven by money and profits.

Next, Elphick references the Victoria Secret Angels — agents of destruction for women’s self confidence. These idyllic models who trot around with unreachable standards leave many women feeling supremely inadequate. Victoria Secret hopes to stir this inadequacy and then attempt to make women feel less inadequate only if they buy the products from Victoria Secret to make themselves more like these goddesses. It is a horrible practice and entirely immoral.

Later, Elphick mentions Victoria Secret’s “Perfect Body” campaign. This campaign featured only the same type of “Angel” model — supremely tall, busty, and extraordinarily skinny. Elphick explains the horrendous effects of this campaign saying, “No attempts at body diversity were made in the image and worse still the clear suggestion was that the models were what should be seen as ‘perfect’ bodies. Given that those models’ bodies are the result of a difficult-to-achieve combination of good genes and hard work, it seemed a little insulting to imply that women who didn’t share their exact measurements somehow have ‘imperfect’ bodies.”

After receiving abundant backlash for the campaign, Victoria Secret released a halfhearted apology video. In the video, a model explains that even she feels inadequate about her body. This video comes across as extremely tone deaf. What Victoria Secret should have learned is that every woman is beautiful in their own way — not everyone has to look like Amazonian goddesses. However, Victoria Secret chose to call everyone inadequate in a ploy to keep women feeling required to buy Victoria Secret to be less inadequate.

In conclusion, Victoria Secret needs to seriously reconsider their advertisement strategy. Their company has taken a completely immoral approach and should change as soon as possible in order to stop the damage the are causing. Hopefully, society can come together as a whole and show women that they all have beauty and should not need to chase stupid standards.

Hi all, today I will be talking about the recent Aerie model campaign which has greatly helped to boost body image standards by having models of all shapes and sizes.

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/22/aerie-is-a-standout-with-body-positive-ads-and-real-models.html

The primary focus of their new advertisement campaign is to use models of all shapes and sizes. The positive effects of this decision can not be overstated. This enforces the positive truth that women do actually come in all shapes and sizes; it is not only the super slim, tall, models that should feel happy with their body.

Women today have constantly been taught by these profit-seeking companies that they should feel obliged to strive towards media created “perfection”. Beauty product companies want to create a constant, never-ending chase for this unrealistic “ideal” that they have created. The main reason for this is that the long chase just means more and more money for these companies. The companies do not worry about the damaging effect that their profit-seeking tactics have on their consumer base of women.

That is why its so refreshing to see this new focused campaign by Aerie. Hopefully this campaign was created with true, honest intentions rather than just a ploy to increase profits, though. Either way, the effects are still positive and I believe that we should praise Aerie for their progressive decision because it helps to get rid of damaging unrealistic beauty standards.

Hello everybody, today I will be writing about the negative effects the Kardashian family has had on women today, especially in relation to beauty standards.

https://www.thetalko.com/8-bad-lessons-the-kardashians-have-taught-us-and-7-good-ones/

This article, written by Alexandra Sakellariou, examines the positives and negatives of the Kardishians much more in depth than my blog post today will. However, I have used the information in this article to help build my opinion and have this blog post be more informed. 

The first, and perhaps most damaging, negative effect of the Kardashian family on women today us the impossibly unrealistic beauty standards they set. These women are undoubtedly gorgeous, even not taking into account all of the money they have spent on their bodies. Additionally, they are at the proverbial “top” of society, meaning that women everywhere constantly encounter them, whether it be on social media, television, or magazines.

This is where the real damage comes in for women looking up to the Kardashians. No matter who you are, it is highly likely that if you look at any of the Kardashians, you will feel inferior about your own body. When you constantly have to look at these goddesses of women, you will inevitably compare your body against them and feel upset.

The thing that the Kardashians do not show in their TV show or anything else, though, is the amount of money as well as effort that goes in to making them look the way the do. Furthermore, most of the work on their looks isn’t even done by themselves, its actually done by paid professionals. When you take into consideration all of these aspects, it is essentially impossible for a typical woman to try and look to the Kardashians.

Now, as I wrap this up, I do just want to clarify that I believe that the Kardashains have had some positive effects on women in society today. Primarily, I think that the Kardashians have demonstrated great examples of power and independence for women everywhere to admire. Thus, they have not done only damage do women, they have also helped. Either way, it is harmful for women to constantly have to look up to the Kardashian family in regards to beauty standards.

Hey everybody, today I’m going to be analyzing a racist ad that dove put out. This ad contributes to the horrific beauty industry standard which some companies promote that says that having whiter skin is more beautiful.

As you can see, this ad immediately sparks a bad standard. Whether intentional or not, the ad does damage to black women who will begin to feel unsatisfied with their bodies. Even if Dove did not intend to deliver this message (hopefully they did not), their carelessness would still be inexcusable as the damage will be done to black women anyway.

The gradient across the three women aligned with the before and after demonstrations of the product above are the cause of the problem. As the women go from black to white, the ad gives the appearance that the lighter, white skin is somehow more beautiful than the black woman’s skin. The company attempts to convince consumers that its product will help them get the “better” white skin.

This abhorrent standard has become an issue across the entire industry. Black women everywhere have learned to feel somehow inadequate or inferior because they do not have the skin color that the beauty industry promotes. Hopefully, companies in the industry will begin to take a stand against this horrible issue and make things right.

Hey everybody, today I will be talking about an interview with Ellen in which she talks about Body Image.

Throughout her show in general, Ellen has always been a proponent of improving the beauty standards for women. She has often made body image a focal point of her show. Additionally, she has always advocated for women to feel comfortable in their body no matter what, as evidenced by her work with CoverGirl.

Throughout her interview, Ellen gives an extremely valuable take on the issues we have as a society today with body image. She initiates her discussion by mentioning the double standards women face. When a man and a women are in a relationship, people almost always only talk about the attractiveness or beauty of the woman, not the man. People will make comments about if she is or isn’t attractive enough. Ellen points out how this is a horrible practice — it essentially reduces women to purely their looks.

Ellen continues her discussion to mention that women have an unfair societal expectation to constantly have to maintain themselves. If a woman does not care about her appearance and does not embark in the rat race of the pursuit for beauty, she will be judged by a large portion of society. Ellen is condemning this reality and she has worked throughout her life to try and change it.

Finally, Ellen refers to the constant setting of unrealistic expectations by magazines. I talk about this topic a lot throughout my blog because it is one of the most relevant issues for women in society today. Ellen points out how magazines just force women to feel like they need these products to cure their inadequacy.

In conclusion, Ellen has done a wonderful job at attempting to end the harmful beauty standards of today’s society. This interview shows the work she has put in to try and initiate the change. Hopefully, more people will follow suit and soon we as a society will conquer the standards of beauty back from profit-driven corporations.