She opens the magazine, knowing already the feelings of want and desire to fit in that they they always bring to her. Beautiful faces stare back, as she reflects to herself why she isn't that way. Don't we all wonder why we're different than these gorgeous models in magazines? Dont We feel our self esteem hit rock bottom when magazines say that super skinny is the ONLY beautiful? How do we manage to match these "norms?" How much are we going to have to question and alter ourselves and our lifestyle to fit into the image that magazines portray as "beautiful?" And the problem is, they seem to be everywhere!Everywhere you look are magazines, advertisements, all rubbing in the fact that there are a lucky few who have scored big in the gene pool, and that most humans will never be that "beautiful." But, what is beauty? Is it artificial on the surface like these advertisements and magazines portray? Or is beauty from within, from being unique and different?
I barely pick up a magazine now a days. Ive experience this in my life too much. To pick up a magazine, see these gorgeous girls, and feel like I could never even compare. Call me jealous, envious, whatever you want. Because, I cant help it. Everyone wants to be beautiful, especially in their adolescence. And when I see these models, honestly, I envy them. And I despise the fact that these industries do this on purpose. It's intentional in their part making readers feel envy and seek to be like the people in these pictures. Im sure there are many who have given up reading magazines because they've become so intimidated by the images and the demands that those women are what is truly beautiful. I may only be one "ex" magazine reader, but I know I am not the only who has had my concience weighed down, calling myself fat, finding all the imperfections in myself because these models intimidated me into looking PERFECT all the time. They haunt us everywhere we go, they've become a normal part of everyday life, so why can't they be ordinary, normal people?
Fashion and advertisement industries need to get real. They need to use real sized models: everyday women and men who are averages, not extremely attractive, but who can showcase their inner beauty, something that everyone has. Instead of being surrounded by these unrealistically beautiful models,we should be surrounded by average people. Who says a working mom of 4 cant be beautiful? A low class single mom, who cant put on a pair of $700 and totally throw the othere out of the running? Who says an average man working as a carpenter or a staybat home dad cant showcase a new style of jeans for a famous brand? I can almost guarantee that the majority of people would be more comfortable seeing average people, like themselves, in advertisements and magazines. The feeling of belittlment and of intimidation because you are not what society and influencing industries set as the "norms," is really terrible. They should notice what they are doing to young girls and basically almost everyone in society. How they are influencing them to run out and get surgeries or drastically change their lifestyles to fit these "beauty" standards. Industries who use these unrealistically beautiful models , have no heart, or concience, obviously. Because even if they know how it hurts not to fit in, they still go for the perfect models, and we, the normal people, have to shrink under their beautiful, photoshopped gaze.
Hi, Brisa! Some good ideas here, however I don’t see where you would be going with a social change project. Changing what magazines can portray as beautiful is a noble cause, but not really achievable. I would like to see you narrow this into an achievable change. As for the assignment requirements- I see you’re using varied sentence structures (which is good), so keep experimenting with that to see what works for your writing style. Also, you did use pathos, but didn’t have much of a variety. I would have liked to see you use guilt as a device maybe aimed against the people who are putting these false ideals of beauty in the magazines, or maybe more how young girls grow up seeing themselves as unworthy or unbeautiful, and how debilitating and damaging that is.
ReplyDeleteAlso, after the first or second paragraph it got a little redundant and jumbled. This would have been more powerful had it been more to the point.
Overall, good writing. Keep working at it and this will be a great idea. I cant wait to see what social change will come of this big idea!
Hey Brisa, I really liked the topic you chose to write about. Now a days teenagers, especially girls, strive to be beautiful and skinny because that is all they see in magazines and television. Maybe that is the cause of most teenagers depression. To make your claim even stronger, I belive you could add some statistics in there. Remember audiences want to gain your trust so you have to make sure you throw in some facts to show you really know what you're talking about. Your use of pathos was really good. It was pretty clear that you wanted to provoke sympathy from the audience. Also watch out for those grammatical mistakes. I sort of got lost in your writing somethimes because you repeated a word that wasn't suppose to be there or you left out a word all together. Don't rush your work, just take it slow. Keep up the good work.
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