Figure A Figure B
Figure CGuns don’t kill people. People kill people.
This mentality often has to be adopted when reviewing Photoshop. The program itself isn’t evil. Its creators did not have a long-term plan that Photoshop would be used as a political and social weapon on multiple levels. The marketers and advertisers who utilize what the program has to offer aren’t inherently evil either. Unfortunately, the desire to sell an idea or a product can be so overwhelming that the byproducts of the effort can be deleterious. Photoshop in the advertising world has become an overall “perfecter” of humanity, presenting inhumanly perfect models that then incite the masses to strive towards an unachievable goal. “Maybe she’s born with it?” (Maybelline.com). Sadly, in this day and age…it’s probably Photoshop. Though begun as a useful tool for editing images, Photoshop is now used to misguide consumers by over-editing models to unhealthy limits, thereby lowering the self-esteem of girls everywhere who try to imitate impossible canons of falsified advertisements. Governments recently have begun to act on the overwhelming data that proves the destructive effects of these images, but progress has been slow.
The halting progress of bills to prevent misleading advertising stems from the cyclical fact that the “cultural norms” of the United States place “dictate the importance of being physically attractive” (Martin, 20). Magazines are happy to cater to this desperately narcissistic society using “difficult-to-attain models of physical attractiveness” (Martin, 19).
The slow reaction of the government is not for lack of concerned parties arguing and lobbying for proper lawmaking. In July of 2011, The BBC reported on a case regarding Photoshop and its usage in misleading advertising. Britain’s Advertising Standards Association (ASA) was approached with a L’Oreal advertisement featuring Julia Roberts that British Liberal Democrat MP Jo Swinson claimed was “not representative of the results the products could achieve.” The ASA agreed with the claims, determining that the advertisement was a breach of conduct. This case represented not only the danger of false advertising but also of misrepresenting the perfect body for young girls (BBC.com).
The L’Oreal debacle was not the first time that the use of Photoshop has been criticized by a government. In France in 2009, lobbying occurred for a health warning on edited photographs: “Photograph retouched to modify the physical appearance of a person.” French Parliamentarian Valerie Boyer commented on the proposed law, stating that edited advertisements “can make people believe in a reality that often does not exist” (CBSnews.com). In 2011 in the US, there was a push for “The Self Esteem Act,” which would require edited advertisements to have a disclaimer stating that they did not realistically represent the model. Mrs. Matlins, the main promoter of The Self Esteem Act, stated that, “our beauty culture is having wildly negative effects on girls and women” (CBSnews.com).
These wildly negative effects are not just supposition; there is extensive data confirming that girls are negatively affected by unrealistic body images in advertising. According to a study done by Girlguiding UK, “over half of 16- to 25-year-olds said the media made them feel that ‘being pretty and thin’ was the ‘most important thing’” (Bawdon, 28). A study by the Dove Self Esteem Fund found that 7 out of 10 girls felt that “they do not measure up in some way including their looks, performance in school and relationships” (Dove Self Esteem Fund Press Release). The Dove Self Esteem Fund was established in 2008 as “an agent of change to inspire and educate girls and young women about a wider definition of beauty” (Dove Self Esteem Fund Key Points). Sadly, even this company is not above idealistic advertising; according to CBS News, in Dove’s Real Beauty Campaign the models were digitally edited (CBSnews.com).
Girls in studies like these are not just insecure about their bodies—they are actively fighting them in order to achieve the perfect body. A study entitled Sex, Drugs, Alcohol and Young People, conducted done by the Independent Advisory Group on Sexual Health and HIV, showed that 30% of girls as young as 11 years old “expressed dissatisfaction with their body weight,” and 10% were dieting. The statistics only got worse as girls got older; at 15, 46% were unhappy with their weight and 25% of them were dieting (Bawdon, 28). According to R. Peterson of the Journal of Business Ethics, 20% percent of 17-20 year olds suffer from the effects of an eating disorder (Peterson, 195). Overall, eight million Americans are thought to have eating disorders; seven million of these are women (eatingdisordersfacts.com).
These results hit close to home as well; the girls in these studies could be those at Emma Willard. An informal poll of 100 students in the Emma Willard community showed that 40% of them were unhappy with their bodies. 27 students were then shown a Photoshopped model (Figure A); 60% of students said that, at their best, they would still feel inadequate compared to her. 28 different students were shown the model not Photoshopped (Figure B), and this time only 24% of the girls questioned felt inadequate compared to her. Some members of the community carry the burden of self-esteem more heavily than others; for Proctors, the responsibility of encouraging others to be comfortable with their bodies is additional to concerns about their own bodies. One proctor worries about her freshmen and how “susceptible they are to the inaccurate portrayals of bodies that the media throws at them every day.”
Young girls are not the only group affected by the harmful effects of advertisers and their misuse of Photoshop. In fact, female consumers in general are not the only audience suffering from marketers’ lack of morals. In April of 2009, CBS News reported on the release of a model from her Ralph Lauren Contract. Officials at Ralph Lauren stated that she was “[unable] to meet the obligations of her contract with us [Ralph Lauren].” Model Fillipa Hamilton stated that it was because she was “overweight.” As a 120, 5’8” pound woman this excuse seems mystifying but her argument was understood when Ralph Lauren marketers Photoshopped her to appear skeletal their advertising campaign (Figure C) (CBSnews.com). In 2006, Uruguayan model Luisel Ramos died after walking down the catwalk during fashion week. She had been on a “greens and diet coke” diet for three months in order to lose a significant amount of weight, after being told that magazines would pay more to have her model if she “needed less retouching” (dailymail.co.uk). Those in the fashion industry are aware of the unhealthy standard. Steve Bloomfield, a spokesman for the Eating Disorders Association, said "We do think legislation is needed.” He later mentioned protecting not only those who work in the fashion industry, but also “those who are at risk of an eating disorder and can be influenced by the pictures that they see” (thisislondon.co.uk).
As Ms. Swinson , a representative in the L’Oreal case said, “There's a problem out there with body image and confidence. The way excessive retouching has become pervasive in our society is contributing to that problem (BBC.com).” R. Peterson, in the Journal of Business Ethics claims that it is “overwhelming” how much a picture is allowed to be edited (Peterson, 497). According to Fiona Bawdon of New Statesman, professionals are “convinced that the number of teenage girls with an eating disorder is going up, and that sufferers are getting younger” (Bawdon, 28).
So what will happen? Governments are slow to take action, and marketers fight with tooth and nail to prevent legislation for a disclaimer to mar their advertisements. Emma Willard students are not divided on the issue of unrealistic media standards. One student, when asked if the Figure B model made her feel “inadequate” stated, “Of course she does! If I wanted to look like her I’d have to wear a mask. And if I wanted a body like hers, I’d have to starve myself. It’s amazing to me that anyone would be affected enough by this that they would change their diets, but after looking at this picture I know that I’ll have a salad for lunch and I’ll exercise a little longer tonight. That’s how it starts, I guess.” She shrugged, but she perfectly encapsulated the concerns of all scientists and doctors: girls get the wrong idea of beauty from everything they see. Everywhere young girls and women look, there’s another misleading photograph featuring someone who, in real life, has all of the same insecurities as the viewer has. Photoshop has, in essence, erased the root of these insecurities for the celebrity, but only worked to exacerbate them in the young girl looking at the advertisement. The abusers of Photoshop may never come to justice, so a new message must be spread to the down trodden girls and women who have suffered at the hands of these immoral advertisers; no matter who you are or how you look in photographs, when you look in the mirror, you should unequivocally see “The Fairest One of All.”
Guns don’t kill people. People kill people.
This mentality often has to be adopted when reviewing Photoshop. The program itself isn’t evil. Its creators did not have a long-term plan that Photoshop would be used as a political and social weapon on multiple levels. The marketers and advertisers who utilize what the program has to offer aren’t inherently evil either. Unfortunately, the desire to sell an idea or a product can be so overwhelming that the byproducts of the effort can be deleterious. Photoshop in the advertising world has become an overall “perfecter” of humanity, presenting inhumanly perfect models that then incite the masses to strive towards an unachievable goal. “Maybe she’s born with it?” (Maybelline.com). Sadly, in this day and age…it’s probably Photoshop. Though begun as a useful tool for editing images, Photoshop is now used to misguide consumers by over-editing models to unhealthy limits, thereby lowering the self-esteem of girls everywhere who try to imitate impossible canons of falsified advertisements. Governments recently have begun to act on the overwhelming data that proves the destructive effects of these images, but progress has been slow.
The halting progress of bills to prevent misleading advertising stems from the cyclical fact that the “cultural norms” of the United States place “dictate the importance of being physically attractive” (Martin, 20). Magazines are happy to cater to this desperately narcissistic society using “difficult-to-attain models of physical attractiveness” (Martin, 19).
The slow reaction of the government is not for lack of concerned parties arguing and lobbying for proper lawmaking. In July of 2011, The BBC reported on a case regarding Photoshop and its usage in misleading advertising. Britain’s Advertising Standards Association (ASA) was approached with a L’Oreal advertisement featuring Julia Roberts that British Liberal Democrat MP Jo Swinson claimed was “not representative of the results the products could achieve.” The ASA agreed with the claims, determining that the advertisement was a breach of conduct. This case represented not only the danger of false advertising but also of misrepresenting the perfect body for young girls (BBC.com).
The L’Oreal debacle was not the first time that the use of Photoshop has been criticized by a government. In France in 2009, lobbying occurred for a health warning on edited photographs: “Photograph retouched to modify the physical appearance of a person.” French Parliamentarian Valerie Boyer commented on the proposed law, stating that edited advertisements “can make people believe in a reality that often does not exist” (CBSnews.com). In 2011 in the US, there was a push for “The Self Esteem Act,” which would require edited advertisements to have a disclaimer stating that they did not realistically represent the model. Mrs. Matlins, the main promoter of The Self Esteem Act, stated that, “our beauty culture is having wildly negative effects on girls and women” (CBSnews.com).
These wildly negative effects are not just supposition; there is extensive data confirming that girls are negatively affected by unrealistic body images in advertising. According to a study done by Girlguiding UK, “over half of 16- to 25-year-olds said the media made them feel that ‘being pretty and thin’ was the ‘most important thing’” (Bawdon, 28). A study by the Dove Self Esteem Fund found that 7 out of 10 girls felt that “they do not measure up in some way including their looks, performance in school and relationships” (Dove Self Esteem Fund Press Release). The Dove Self Esteem Fund was established in 2008 as “an agent of change to inspire and educate girls and young women about a wider definition of beauty” (Dove Self Esteem Fund Key Points). Sadly, even this company is not above idealistic advertising; according to CBS News, in Dove’s Real Beauty Campaign the models were digitally edited (CBSnews.com).
Girls in studies like these are not just insecure about their bodies—they are actively fighting them in order to achieve the perfect body. A study entitled Sex, Drugs, Alcohol and Young People, conducted done by the Independent Advisory Group on Sexual Health and HIV, showed that 30% of girls as young as 11 years old “expressed dissatisfaction with their body weight,” and 10% were dieting. The statistics only got worse as girls got older; at 15, 46% were unhappy with their weight and 25% of them were dieting (Bawdon, 28). According to R. Peterson of the Journal of Business Ethics, 20% percent of 17-20 year olds suffer from the effects of an eating disorder (Peterson, 195). Overall, eight million Americans are thought to have eating disorders; seven million of these are women (eatingdisordersfacts.com).
These results hit close to home as well; the girls in these studies could be those at Emma Willard. An informal poll of 100 students in the Emma Willard community showed that 40% of them were unhappy with their bodies. 27 students were then shown a Photoshopped model (Figure A); 60% of students said that, at their best, they would still feel inadequate compared to her. 28 different students were shown the model not Photoshopped (Figure B), and this time only 24% of the girls questioned felt inadequate compared to her. Some members of the community carry the burden of self-esteem more heavily than others; for Proctors, the responsibility of encouraging others to be comfortable with their bodies is additional to concerns about their own bodies. One proctor worries about her freshmen and how “susceptible they are to the inaccurate portrayals of bodies that the media throws at them every day.”
Young girls are not the only group affected by the harmful effects of advertisers and their misuse of Photoshop. In fact, female consumers in general are not the only audience suffering from marketers’ lack of morals. In April of 2009, CBS News reported on the release of a model from her Ralph Lauren Contract. Officials at Ralph Lauren stated that she was “[unable] to meet the obligations of her contract with us [Ralph Lauren].” Model Fillipa Hamilton stated that it was because she was “overweight.” As a 120, 5’8” pound woman this excuse seems mystifying but her argument was understood when Ralph Lauren marketers Photoshopped her to appear skeletal their advertising campaign (Figure C) (CBSnews.com). In 2006, Uruguayan model Luisel Ramos died after walking down the catwalk during fashion week. She had been on a “greens and diet coke” diet for three months in order to lose a significant amount of weight, after being told that magazines would pay more to have her model if she “needed less retouching” (dailymail.co.uk). Those in the fashion industry are aware of the unhealthy standard. Steve Bloomfield, a spokesman for the Eating Disorders Association, said "We do think legislation is needed.” He later mentioned protecting not only those who work in the fashion industry, but also “those who are at risk of an eating disorder and can be influenced by the pictures that they see” (thisislondon.co.uk).
As Ms. Swinson , a representative in the L’Oreal case said, “There's a problem out there with body image and confidence. The way excessive retouching has become pervasive in our society is contributing to that problem (BBC.com).” R. Peterson, in the Journal of Business Ethics claims that it is “overwhelming” how much a picture is allowed to be edited (Peterson, 497). According to Fiona Bawdon of New Statesman, professionals are “convinced that the number of teenage girls with an eating disorder is going up, and that sufferers are getting younger” (Bawdon, 28).
So what will happen? Governments are slow to take action, and marketers fight with tooth and nail to prevent legislation for a disclaimer to mar their advertisements. Emma Willard students are not divided on the issue of unrealistic media standards. One student, when asked if the Figure B model made her feel “inadequate” stated, “Of course she does! If I wanted to look like her I’d have to wear a mask. And if I wanted a body like hers, I’d have to starve myself. It’s amazing to me that anyone would be affected enough by this that they would change their diets, but after looking at this picture I know that I’ll have a salad for lunch and I’ll exercise a little longer tonight. That’s how it starts, I guess.” She shrugged, but she perfectly encapsulated the concerns of all scientists and doctors: girls get the wrong idea of beauty from everything they see. Everywhere young girls and women look, there’s another misleading photograph featuring someone who, in real life, has all of the same insecurities as the viewer has. Photoshop has, in essence, erased the root of these insecurities for the celebrity, but only worked to exacerbate them in the young girl looking at the advertisement. The abusers of Photoshop may never come to justice, so a new message must be spread to the down trodden girls and women who have suffered at the hands of these immoral advertisers; no matter who you are or how you look in photographs, when you look in the mirror, you should unequivocally see “The Fairest One of All.”
Works Cited
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“Airbrushed Makeup Ads Banned for ‘Misleading.’” BBC.com. BBC, July 2011. Web. 11
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Bawdon, Fiona. “No model for girls: controversy over "size zero" models is no longer confined
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the media have a direct effect on the well-being of teenagers.” New Statesman, Vol. 136.
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“Eating Disorders Facts.” Eatingdisordersfacts.org. n.p., 2005. Web. 12 January 2012. Emma Willard Student. Personal Interview. 12 January, 2012.
Emma Willard Student. Personal Interview. 19 January, 2012.
Emma Willard Students (100). Informal Poll. 24 January-26 January, 2012.
“French Pols Want ‘Fashion Police’ to Ban Retouched Models in Ads.” CBSnews.com. CBS,
September 2009. Web. 20 January 2011.
Martin, Mary C., James W. Gentry. “Stuck in the Model Trap: The Effects of Beautiful Models
in Ads on Female Pre-Adolescents and Adolescents.” Journal of Advertising , Vol. 26.
No. 2 (1997): 19-34. Web.
Peterson, Robin T. “Bulimia and Anorexia in an Advertising Context.” Journal of Business
Ethics, Vol. 6. No. 6 (1987): 495-504. Web.
“Press and Official Links.” Rocketxl.com. Dove, 2008. Web. 20 January 2012.
“Pressure Mounts for ‘Ban’ on Size Zero Models.” Thisislondon.co.uk. London Evening
Standard, 2006. Web. 20 January 2012.
“The Self Esteem Act: Parents Push for Anti-Photoshop Law in U.S. to Protect Teens from
Unrealistic Body Image Ideals.” Dailymail.co.uk. Mail Online, October 2011. Web. 20
January 2012.
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