Eating Disorders and the Media Essay -- Female Body Image Weight Healt

Eating Disorders and the Media What if you were surrounded by media messages telling you that, â€Å"people will like you more if you have the perfect body† or â€Å"being perfect makes people like you† ? How do you think young female teenagers would interpret these messages that the media are portraying? 81% of ten year old girls are afraid of being fat, of being considered ugly. Why do you think ten year olds would ever care about how they look? It’s because of the media implying that being slim is beauty. Due to the media’s brainwashing, poor self-image is one of the main causes of eating disorders in adolescent girls. The media sells products, not opinions nor facts. They will sell you anything, telling you that it will make you slimmer and that being skinny is the way to go. When we see models and celebrities on commercials and in movies, we often wish that that was us in that body, because the media has made everyone so obsessed with their own bodies. The media makes young female teenagers feel guilty if they are slightly overweight. Models are beautiful, skinny, they have the right size thighs, hips, and butt. They are models but they are not role models. They are everything teenagers want to be, because of the television they watch and the magazines that they read. The media are always telling them that being thin is considered beautiful. This sends a wrath between females and their impression of what beauty really is. Some females will go to any length to try to be that perfect body weight person. Such a person doesn’t even exist. For there is no perfect weight for which females should strive to achieve. Although there are many young females who will restrict what they are allowed to eat & when they are allowed to eat it. They will exercise compulsively and self effectuate vomiting. Eating disorders such as anorexia, bulimia, and compulsive overeating are three of the major eating disorders that infatuate young minds. Female teenagers see bingeing, dieting and vomiting, a way out of actually doing a workout and getting into shape. There is a widening gap between girl’s self-image and society’s messages about what girls should be like. The media uses television, magazines and subliminal messages to attract people. They have playboy models advertising for cars, boats and body lotion. They use a women’s body to advertise for their products. The media doe... ... they need to resolve, like the depression of not being happy with themselves. Of going through many procedures to make them look â€Å"thin† or â€Å"ordinary† because they can no longer be happy with themselves because of the media’s interference with adolescent girls images. Anorexia and bulimia are one of the main causes along with the media as to why adolescent girls are always slightly underweight and devastating skinny. If the media didn’t interfere with adolescent perceptions, maybe one half of fourth grade girls wouldn’t be on a diet. Intense fear of becoming fat and distorted body images aren’t the kinds of thing we want our adolescents girls to become. To think about their appearance and weight 24/7 isn’t right. The media should stop publicizing young female bodies and telling them what beauty is perceived to them. They should think of all those adolescents girls that they send into depression or force to become bulimic, just because they wish to make money. The media brainwashes too many of adolescent girls, making them think about their body in relation to models who have unmistakably the â€Å"perfect body†. Making them think that you have to be thin in order to be beautiful.