Since the dawn of time men and woman were meant to look a certain way but now a days that image is the enemy to many bodily insecure people all over the world and why? Because of how the media portray models in catalogues or on runways.
But where does this idea that being slim is perfect come from? The answer to that question is that it is hypodermic, meaning that from a young age we are all injected with this idea that being thin is better than being fat. These ideas have come from things such Barbie dolls, films/ TV programs, music, and books.
Barbie is the “perfect” blonde doll that every girl grew up having always wanting to be just like her. Barbie was created March 9th 1959 and was originally a brunette as well as a blonde but further down the factory line the brunette Barbie didn’t fit the doll’s house and was changed to blonde like the other dolls. Mattel Inc. the company that created Barbie has been the subject of numerous controversies and lawsuits, often involving parody of the doll and her lifestyle. It has also created a syndrome called "Barbie Syndrome”. This term has been used to depict the desire to have a physical appearance and lifestyle representative of the Barbie doll. It is most often associated with pre-teenage and adolescent females but is applicable to any age group. A person with Barbie syndrome attempts to emulate the doll's physical appearance, even though the doll has unattainable body proportions.
Valeria lukyanova aged 29 is a Moldovan-Ukrainian model and is the real life Barbie. Her figure and Barbie’s are identical, Valeria claims to only ever have had a breast enlargement and no other surgery. She say the way she keeps her Barbie like figure is “an all liquid diet and mountain climbing” but what is Barbie without her Ken, Justin Jedlica aged 34 is a Slovak American businessperson and model. He is known for undergoing over 100 surgical procedures to look like the Ken doll. Valeria and Justin are only two people of the many people that are affected by Barbie syndrome.
Dying to be Barbie (http://www.rehabs.com/explore/dying-to-be-barbie/#.VT9J9CH4-Uk) is a website that talks about how many girls from the ages of five up try to be thin by making diet lists to follow. It also shows the number of preteens affected by this and how the number of teens with eating disorders is rising. Also 42% of children aged 6-10 wish they were thinner, the future generations risks of health problems is rising.
Have you ever noticed that in many books and films such as Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella and the little mermaid are all thin and pretty? And they all get a happy ending, films like this brainwash young girls into thinking and being thin, pretty and depending will give you a happily ever. Because children’s minds are vulnerable at a young age this message stays in the mind causing them to want to be like a Disney princess. Even though frozen’s message to young girls shows then that you don’t fall in love with the first man you see but both main female characters are still thin and pretty. The same with TV programmes for children 12 and up, Shake it Up was a Disney channel program about two teenagers on a dance show. All twelve cast members not including extras were all slim and none of them seemed to be overweight, this is the same with Wizards of Waverly place the main character played by Selena Gomez was slim, beautiful and got any boy she wanted but her best friend played by Jennifer Stone was the opposite, she wasn’t slim and she played a socially awkward girl that people made fun of, this can show young girls that if you don’t look a certain way it can affect how you are treated in a public place. This can affects the self-esteem of the audience. This also shows the audience that producers look for a certain type of person so the cast will be smaller.
Books: everybody reads them or has had a story book read to them as a child. This is the starting point in life where the mind is vulnerable to everything from words children hear to actions that they see. This is where the idea that looking like characters in story books sinks into their minds and as they grow older the same stories told in different ways makes it worse or they give children false hope such as Disney books about princesses finding a prince and living happily ever after. That doesn’t happen in the real world even though we like to pretend it does, it also teaches young girls that they need a man to be happy. There is a book called Eleanor and Park which is about a full-figured fifteen year old girl with big red hair, and a half-Korean fifteen year old boy who meet on a school bus on Eleanor's first day at her new school, and through a connection of comic books and mix tapes of 80's rock music, they create a spark that ignites a love story. Though this story is a fictional alternative it still makes an impossible love story. The book makes the main character different from your average petite lost for love character it still isn’t a real life story line. If I was to sit next to the same person on the train everyday (even though in London you never see the same person on a train twice) and read over their shoulder I’d get a few rude words thrown my way, as great as it is having a sense of hope that one day we can have a happy ending it almost all the time never ends well. It may be a refreshing to have an alternative love story but it still give us a false hope at love, I mean yeah it’s great that Eleanor it different but we won’t always meet out prince charming and live happily ever after. Just like Romeo and Juliet love will end or something will tear it apart.
In conclusion the media and publishing sectors of society have brainwashed us from a young age to believe that being thin and pretty get you everything you want and a happy ending in life when in reality it’s a big fat lie and causes us to make ourselves insecure about the we look and try to change us through hypodermic techniques.
