SOCIAL MEDIA HAS DESTROYED WOMEN’S PERCEPTIONS OF BEAUTY STANDARDS

ByLiyanaAslani,StaffWriter

Over the years, social media has surely contributed to many successes However, as with all things, there is a brutal downside The internet and the rise of influencers have bred an obsession with physical looks, directly correlating them to value and worth. This negative association, coupled with the unrealistic promotion of perfect and supposedly “unfiltered” bodies, has destroyed the way women and young girls view the beauty standard andtheirself-worth.

AccordingtoresearchleakedtotheWallStreetJournal, Instagram is responsible for making body image issues worseforoneinthreegirls.When97%ofteensactivelyuse social media, this becomes an issue. Instagram feeds refresh daily to expose impressionable young women to heavily edited photos from their favorite influencers, whetherornottheyrealizejusthowfilteredtheyare

On TikTok especially, it is hard to stumble upon an influencer who does not use some type of beauty enhancing filter Whether this be the airbrushing beauty effect or one of the thousands of filters that alter appearance, it is not real. In fact, the app recently faced backlash for one of its newest beauty filters : Bold Glamour.

This particular filter completely transforms a user's appearance. It led many users to question if technology had gone too far to drastically enhance beauty and support an unrealistic standard. Using these filters on accounts that promote unachievable beauty is very detrimentalfortheyoungerfemalefollowing.

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Infact,accordingtoastudyonfilteredphotos,girlsaged 14-18 felt that retouched photos of themselves looked better than the original, leaving them less satisfied with their bodies afterward TikTok and Instagram’s beauty filters have the same effect, leaving young women questioning their own worth and beauty based on idealisticyetunrealbeautyenhancements.

Society’s fetishization of beauty and its association with being more intelligent and likable is only fueled by platformslikethese.Itbecomesimpossibleforanyoneto attain these standards of unrealistic perfection, which are inaccurately associated with happiness. They foster self-hatredandalackofconfidence.

Although some argue that those who struggle with these “perfect” standards are naive, the obsession with body image cannot be escaped on any social media platform Whatmakesitworseisthefactthatinfluencers consistently use filters and share products that are part ofabranddeal,notproductstheygenuinelyuse

In the culture of wellness influencers, the unrealistic “What I Eat in a Day'' videos promote unhealthy and unrealistic eating habits. These edited, impractical videos and ingenuine promotions are what young girls compare themselves to daily. According to Psychology Today, these videos “can bring about an increase in urges to diet, binge eat, cut out foods or food groups, overexercise, or engage in other unhealthy eating behaviors.”

Platformspromotingunhealthydietculture,unrealistic body images, and filtered photos have truly destroyed how young girls and women view themselves. It holds women up to a pedestal of perfection that is simply unachievable, and yet social media has made this a conceptdifficulttograsp