Leah Haywood
OUIL501 COP
Studio Brief 1
How does the objectification of women in advertising and media affect women in society? The promotion and internalization of the thin ideal leads a woman to self-objectify herself and in turn has drastic consequences upon both her physical and mental wellbeing. This essay aims to examine and explore the profound effect that the objectification of women in advertising has upon society, in particular, girls and women. This essay will start by looking at a general overview of objectification in the media and follow up on this by looking into objectification theory, the thin ideal and the re-percussions of this upon women. From a young age, girls and women are taught that the most important thing is their appearance. Girls are taught that what matters is how they look and equally boys are taught that this is what is most important about a girl. Moving on from childhood into adolescence, teens and young women are bombarded with the message that to be a woman means to be constantly striving for an unattainable level of perfection and beauty. A study taken by the ‘MissRepresentation’ campaign and documentary that explores the effect of media on young women says that ‘53% of 13 year old girls are unhappy with their bodies’ and that this number ‘increases to 78% by the time the girls reach 17’. It is clear to see from statistics such as this that advertising has a powerful effect on women, even when they are so young and are more susceptible to the messages that media feeds to them. There is a multitude of ways in which women’s’ bodies and physical appearance are objectified, whether this be sexual objectification, the cropping of specific parts of the body, or the presentation of women in overly sexual or violent situations. The problem goes further than this. With the invention of Photoshop came along the editing and re-touching of imagery and the manipulation of women’s bodies. Society is presented with an image of a women with flawless skin, long longs, ample breasts and buttocks, a small waist and an exceptionally slim figure, an unrealistic beauty ideal. The woman society see’s is not real and is for the most part anatomically impossible, but she is everywhere we look and then effect that exposure to this image can have on women is detrimental to their mental and physical wellbeing. When looking at the manipulation and editing of women’s bodies in advertising, the biggest issue is the slimming down of the female form, the ‘Thin Ideal’. The Thin Ideal is the idea of an especially thin female body, a slender feminine build with a small waist and mostly no body fat. The problem with the Thin Ideal is that it is anatomically incorrect and that it is rapidly decreasing. The size of the Thin Ideal is continuously shrinking, whilst female obesity is on the rise. This creates an ever-growing gap between the actual appearance of the average female body and what the female body is expected to look like. This over-editing and manipulating of the female body has created what