Poor female self-image caused by?

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  • BeeElMarvin
    BeeElMarvin Posts: 2,086 Member
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    Point being, that many, if not most men, do not prefer extremes - either extremely thin or extremely heavy. Men do not control the modeling / fashion industry - if we did, they would have bigger, lusher boobs (oops, can I say that word?) and butts (oops, can I say that word?).
  • darsh11
    darsh11 Posts: 98
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    Poor Self image is caused by many things. The first is not having enough confidence in yourself no matter what your size. I have always seen myself as fat compared to other people that I was hanging out with, but they always saw themselves as fat as well. I am now realizing that the media and "thin is in" mentality only seems to make peoples self confidence worse. Women always feel like they have to live up to higher expectations than men. We feel we are judged first on our looks, then on our intelligence, and if we are not all super models then we are not perfect in our eyes. After talking to many men about what they find attractive in a woman, they say they like a woman with curves, but more than anything confidence. If they are confident then their size matters less to them. I think the focus should be on a healthy, active lifestyle and a toned body not being rail thin. I have a 4 year old daughter and I want her to see her mom has healthy, active, and fit. I would rather have an athletic body that has great muscle tone than a very thin body that looks weak.
  • quara
    quara Posts: 255 Member
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    i was having this argument with this friend of mine... she believes that men are the reason for girls having eating disorders and overall poor self image because we all want girls to look like models... i, on the other hand, believe that it was the women and gay guys who control the fashion industry that started this trend only recently... and by recently i mean that for thousands of years guys have liked girls with larger features because they are able to have more babies... even up to marilyn monroe who had a healthy amount of chunk on her... I for one like a little meat on a woman's bones, nothing is more unattractive that a stick figure.

    now girls today sees this female run fashion industry with coke *kitten* models and think thats what theyre supposed to look like... guys may be watching this too and think thats what theyre supposed to think is hot, but it is an effect rather than a cause

    I don't know if you know about this, but have you heard of the model Andrej Pejic? (http://models.com/models/andrej-pejic) He is an androgynous fashion model who works as both a male and female. While I think that is pretty cool in it's own way, it's kind of sad that a male's form is the ideal woman's body (at least by fashion standards).
  • grassette
    grassette Posts: 976 Member
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    There are two issues here: one is the body image and lifestyle promoted by magazines, which is essentially anti-female. The other is the obesity epidemic, where we eat too much of the wrong things. Both are industries: industrial food on one hand; pharmaceuticals, fashion, and the weight loss industry on the other. We also have jobs that break down our bodies because they do not have us move enough, and entertainment (TV, Computer) which prolong sitting, which is very unhealthy.

    The solution? Clean living. A healthy spirituality. And a rejection of gluttony and sloth as components of our lifestyle. Living consciously and with intent.
  • rml_16
    rml_16 Posts: 16,414 Member
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    I think it's a people thing, not a gender thing. Men have as much pressure to look like Hollywood as women do. It's just that men fill a role that is not supposed to complain about it.

    I won't lie. One of my main motivators in losing weight and working out is to be attractive to the opposite sex. I was married and ended up divorced because of my weight, and it's hard to find a date when you are overweight and I'm at a point in my life where I'd like a chance too, but I realized I had to work on myself first before that could happen.

    Physical image is what western culture fixates on. It is, in my opinion, the single most important facet in your life when it comes to socializing as it represents what people can tangibly see.

    So I'd say poor female self image is caused by the same things as poor male self image... we are bombarded with images of what people are "supposed to look like" on tv and in the movies and on magazines, so that if you fall short of that (which 95% of us do) you feel that you are not worth as much, and to be fair society as a whole tends to dispose of people that are "less" on a regular basis so that contributes as well.

    Not just Western culture. It's pretty much universal. It's just that different cultures have different physical ideals.
  • Phatdaddymike
    Phatdaddymike Posts: 74
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    Then i guess some people should have more brain cells in their head...but dont take it personal....i mean nothing by it.......
  • Phatdaddymike
    Phatdaddymike Posts: 74
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    if anyone basis any part of their life on Hollywood then they need to get a life..thank God i dont watch or read the trash that comes out of there
  • babyblake11
    babyblake11 Posts: 1,107 Member
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    you know what i think everyone should be like? as fit and as healthy as they can be.
  • Brandicaloriecountess
    Brandicaloriecountess Posts: 2,126 Member
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    Advertising Industry gets my vote. And you're right fashion also.
  • fbmandy55
    fbmandy55 Posts: 5,263 Member
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    There are many factors. An over-bearing mother that nags at a daughter about her weight, an abusive partner, hollywood, disease, mental illness..

    For me it was first my mother, who worked out with a trainer most of my teen years and when her body didn't cooperate she had plastic surgery. She brought up my weight weekly and that just made me want to rebel more. She is more or less Celia from Weeds. :laugh: Then after I graduated from high school, I did end up losing a significant amount of weight, it was not healthy. I lived off of cheese, crackers and yogurt and would eat maybe once a day. I gained around 50lbs with my pregnancy and my ex did not like it. That turned into a couple years of all kinds of abuse. I had zero self esteem because I believed everything he said to me, I didn't care what I looked like and I ate for comfort. It took me ditching him, focusing on my job, child and self to get here.
  • Iamfit4life
    Iamfit4life Posts: 3,095 Member
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    if anyone basis any part of their life on Hollywood then they need to get a life..thank God i dont watch or read the trash that comes out of there
    I honestly think it's more a problem with very young girls.

    I plan on seeing to it that my daughter has much better women to look up to. I don't think parents these days do that all the time.
    And this whole head game.....it starts very young.
  • MzMiller1215
    MzMiller1215 Posts: 633 Member
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    I believe that women are the reason that women have eating disorders. Women dress to impress other women and some almost kill themselves so they can be skinnier than other women. Although there are some men out there who like the skin and bones females, I have met many more who prefer curvier women. Who cares if your man comments about "hot" celebrities. We do the same; we may not say it in front of our significant other but, we definitely appreciate the hard abs and muscular built celebrities. :tongue:
  • Qarol
    Qarol Posts: 6,171 Member
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    All I know is my self image in my 30s is so vastly improved over where it was in my 20s, it's like night and day! But once I start getting wrinkles, I dunno how well that trajectory will sustain itself.
  • ketrell
    ketrell Posts: 55 Member
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    I believe a lot of times it start within the family when she/he is a child. If a child is a little chunky someone in the family may make comments about their weight. Then that child looks in the fashion magazines and see what they perceive as beautiful. They begin to believe that something must be wrong with them. Not only with weight but maybe it can be with body type.
  • LorinaLynn
    LorinaLynn Posts: 13,247 Member
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    Photoshop.

    No, really. Photoshop.

    Every ad, every billboard, every magazine has been heavily 'shopped. It's not obvious (most of the time), so one is lead to believe that those people actually do look like that. Celebrities and other people in the media are used by society as a marker of what one should aspire to be. Men have Calvin Cline models with their millions of abs. That is attainable. Pretty much anybody can get a 6-pack through work and dedication.

    Women, otoh, have impossible goals to reach. There are a select number of women who can naturally reach the pedestal. The overwhelming majority of women will find it physically impossible to look like someone off of a magazine cover. Those women on the magazines don't even look like the picture. Far too much Photoshop has morphed women into inhuman things.

    When you set physically unattainable goals, which is essentially what society has done through media outlets, then you're just going to fail over and over. Then you're a failure. Then you hate your body because you're not perfect like women in magazines.

    While I think you have a bit of a point on who is controlling the fashion industry, I think that runs secondary to the media's role in setting unattainable goals of beauty for women.

    Absolutely!!!

    They're stretched and snipped and airbrushed and blurred to completely unrealistic textures and proportions, and that's after the perfect lighting, fantastic photographer, the contouring makeup, the hair extensions, the capped and bleached teeth, the clothes tailored or pinned to fit perfectly...

    And when most of us see ourselves, it's in a mirror, straight on, with harsh overhead lighting. I can stand in the dressing room at Kohls and feel like the Michelin Man. On the other hand, I can take a picture with my camera on a tripod with the natural light coming through my living room windows at a good angle, and have great abs. With some tweaking in Photoshop, I could probably look like I belong on a magazine cover, but then I'd feel depressed that I don't look like that all the time. :laugh:

    Most guys aren't going to be a Ryan Reynolds or Gerard Butler, either, but there's a greater variety among top actors and top actresses. Even among newscasters. I don't think I've never seen a plus-sized female anchor.
  • _beachgirl_
    _beachgirl_ Posts: 3,865 Member
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    I think that there are many reasons woman have poor self-images. I think that TV/Movies/Magazines are a major contributor. It gives us something to compare ourselves to, and most of us fail miserably, or so we think. It seems to me to be much tougher on women than men. If you look on the news, on a TV show, or watch a movie, the men are short, grey, old, homely. and overweight. Yes, there are buff, handsome and tall men too. But look at the women? Not so much of a variety. Most are tall, thin, and gorgeous, or short, thin and gorgeous. Why is it more accepted for men to not fit into a certain mold than women?

    I know what I struggled with growing up and what I still struggle with today. I hope by the changes I am making to myself that it helps my daughter be more accepting of herself for who she is and not how she looks or compares to someone on the cover of a magazine.
  • Execnpar
    Execnpar Posts: 1
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    I agree with you "Fit4life" because if you go to other parts of the world say (Brazil) Women feel the need to be "thick" with big booties and what not. So it is all mental, Everyone trys to live up to whatever they believe is "sexy".Here in the states being a stick figure is considered sexy by the Media and the fashion industry. So hence why women try to be that. And actually I have heard some designer say that they want the women skinny because if she is "full figured" It would distract from the clothing.
  • ilookthetype
    ilookthetype Posts: 3,021 Member
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    There was a study done a few months back (I heard about it from the Dan Savage Podcast) about what kind of porn guys will watch, specifically an underweight/low healthy BMI to high healthy BMI/overweight, guys watch porn with bigger women, hands down was the end conclusion.

    The other thing to consider though, a lot of those guys are watching porn about bigger girls but not dating them, guys are also feeling pressure from friends to date thin girls.

    What really bothered me about this post, no offense to the OP, but the assumption that eating disorders are to make a person's body appealing to OTHER people. Eating disorders often stem from trauma, and skewed vision of what one looks like, it has very little, at least my eating disorder, had very little to do with society.
  • macpatti
    macpatti Posts: 4,280 Member
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    I blame myself. I remember when I was little looking at "pretty people" and wanting their hair color or skin type. I had freckles and soooo didn't want freckles. Then as I became a teen, I wanted the perfect figure, and wanted to wear all the post popular brand names. In my 20's I became even worse. I ate very little so I could stay tiny, and I spent money on clothes/purses I really couldn't afford. I don't know that it was so much me looking at Hollywood figures, magazines, or media as much as it was just looking at different people and wishing I could look like them.
  • PanteraGirl
    PanteraGirl Posts: 566 Member
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    Well said David......and this is why you are my friend ;)
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