What is it with all this LOW SELF-ESTEEM?

What do you think about this?

Magazines are mostly targeted towards teenage girls that feature 閳ユΕormal real life people.閳?They all have the perfect hair, perfect make-up, perfect skin, and basically perfect everything. Since mostly all the girls see that this is 閳ユΕormal閳?they start to feel that they aren閳ユ獩 good enough when they really are normal and this causes low self-esteem.

What they don閳ユ獩 know is that almost every person they see on a magazine cover is wearing a ton of make-up and is re-touched on a computer to make ever face you see grazing every magazine cover 閳ユΙerfect.閳?br>

Beauty magazines are all full of tips on how to look your best and they are full of tips on how to make yourself over. They tell you where to get your clothes, how to get that hairdo like that celebrity you saw on last weeks cover, what shoes go with what, etc. The magazine is basically giving you a message that tells you that 閳ユΟhere is something wrong with you閳?and you need to change.

What is it with all this LOW SELF-ESTEEM?

There are a million shades of grey in this topic, every point above is true.

No matter what girls look at they're being pressured to be something. When I was in high school a couple years ago the idea was that every girl had to be the realistic girl. That real girl that they showed in the movies who the stereotypical girls hated and who shocked the boys with athletic abilities and bravery. The "real girl" was medium hight, smart (but not too smart), a B cup, very athletic, not shy and had exactly one off (but not too far off) feature on her face. Another stereotype, and I was the thin feminin girl who couldn't get the basket ball through the hoop because my arms are sticks(although I never really read those magazines myself). That made me the enemy in all these movies! The fact is some people really do look like the people in the magazines. So what do you do, say pretty person can appear in a magazine because it makes other people feel bad, that's like me saying no athletic person can ever play sports because they make me look bad! And not every thin person is anorexic/bulemic (I used to get weird looks every time I went to the bathroom during lunchtime!).

I guess ideally the magazines would have a mixture and treat everyone as beatiful, because they are. Girls that age need to find something to fit themselves in because they don't know who they are. Although surprisingly most girls realize, eventually that they have to look at the everything around them, they do see all types of people in school and other places. They know that those girls have ton's of makeup on, that's why there's makeup tips. And the magazines are getting better, we see alot more Hillary Duff's these days and alot less Kate Moss's. Not to mention that Babies chest size is ALOT smaller than it was when I was a kid.

What is it with all this LOW SELF-ESTEEM?

I think this is exactly right, society wants a cookie cutter society, where all women are tall, thin, and blonde. You aren't allowed to be yourself, you "have to" be beautiful. Same thing for guys, tall, dark, handsome, muscular. It's really sad, and it's no wonder there is so many messed up people out there.

What is it with all this LOW SELF-ESTEEM?

the word is PRESSURE....peer pressure, advertising pressure,

pressure on the streets, pressure when you go out!!!

What is it with all this LOW SELF-ESTEEM?

Competition. Girls dress for other girls.

What is it with all this LOW SELF-ESTEEM?

I was having a real problem with low self-esteem, not only from magazines, but from the people around me who just seem so perfect. Then I realized that there are people out there who have to eat food that we would never even think of, if any food at all, and have to live in tents or don't have a home, and the last thing on their minds is "Am I in style?" or "Am I too fat?" Then there are billions of people who put themselves down and ruin their lives for the sake of vanity. Doesn't this seem stupid too you that some people would kill for an average education, but lots of people dumb themselves down, just so they can "fit in with the popular crowd"? I realized this, and now, I don't want to waste my time thinking about such petty things, when there are so many people who would dream of what I have. I'm not saying that beauty and popularity aren't important to a degree, but they should not be the focal point of today's society! Wow! This is a long answer!

What is it with all this LOW SELF-ESTEEM?

I totally agree with you I wish someone would publish a magazine that show "real-life" people instead of perfect people. I for one can't stand for my daughters to read magazines because they always come back with a list of things they want to change about them selves, theri friends, or a family member. IWhen asked when they could start wearing make-up and stuff like that I told them they were old enough when they were happy with the way God made them and learn that make-up is to inhance the beauty God gave us not to cover it up.

What is it with all this LOW SELF-ESTEEM?

The world is more obsessed with celebrities than ever before and this is one of the reasons so many young and old women have problems with their appearance.

We all know about airbrushing and make-up, but when you look at the picture in the magazine, you cant help but want to look like that too.

Less focus on celebrities and actors/actresses that don't work hard enough for their money (c'mon, 6 months work for $1m or $2m? How hard.). Let's focus on the people that do amazing things, like find cures for diseases and save lives.

What is it with all this LOW SELF-ESTEEM?

I don't care what anybody beyond my parents and the man who signs my paycheck think of me. As soon as you dumb kids get it through your thick heads that other people don't care that you're wearing Versace or that you are "with it" with regards to the latest fragrance hawked by some loudmouth rapper, the better off you will be. Be your own person and to hell with these snake oil salesmen who tell you that you must wear this or drive this or live here to be anybody. Be who you truly are and you'll find all the self-esteem you could ever want.

What is it with all this LOW SELF-ESTEEM?

i can blame and you and you can blame.I have an overweight daughter and I was overweight still somewhat not as bad though,I'm happy somewhat. My mom always had a belly though otherwise she was never big. Though what I'm saying is we blame everyone but parenting needs to be stronger. We cannot ask someone else to raise our kids. A community yeah we can all join in to help but to be realistic it's a parents job to instill values and self esteem and strength. Thats why we also have to teach our kids that its so important to really be a kid cuz you have to give up so much of yourself to become a parent your time your almost everything is comprimised for your child. If you can't do that don't have kids cuz they grow up to have low selfesteem and eating disorders just to name a few. This is something that would also be valued in the school system,for parents as many as there are who were never taught to think highly of yourself to look at yourself and love your skin color and and your long legs.To love your you no matter how much you weigh!!!!!!!!!YOU are beautiful I believe if they had a class that gave students belief in thierselves grades would go up, pregancy down,suicide down.All the things that guys and girls do and (I don't want to say without being stereo typical )all boys and girls need a chance don't ya think,it's to bad they'll never put enough money toward the sake of our future!

What is it with all this LOW SELF-ESTEEM?

People are probably going to bite my head off for this, but whatever. While the magazines certainly aren't helping, they're doing what they do because they want to please their customers. It's not uncommon for a girl to flip through a magazine and go, "Ew, SHE'S a model?"

A lot of articles in the magazines are on the girl-empowering side, when given a chance. The mainstream ones run articles educating teenage girls on safer sex, and many would condone a girl drop a boyfriend before dropping a best friend. Seventeen encourages girls to have a healthy lifestyle of exercise and a healthy amount of food.

It's not fair to blame magazines for eating disorders. Eating disorders are most prevalent amond the sexually abused, and are a coping mechanism. People with genuine eating disorders don't want to look pretty, they want to disappear, they want their outside to match the turmoil going on inside. Many want to look unattractive or sick, especially after being sexually abused. Eating disorders date back to the Victoria Era, when ballerinas were actually pleasantly plump and considered "womanly" for being so.

A magazine that features an average looking person, completely unairbrushed, that has headliners like "How to Look Your Greatest!" isn't going to make any money next to a magazine with an airbrushed model on the cover. It's not just the media, but the audience that has to send a message as well, instead of accepting it--and it's very easy to accept that beauty is everything considering the way beautiful people are treated versus plain/average people. Parents could do a better job of educating their children to value intelligence or compassion above looks. Sure, the Dove beauty ads are encouraging, but afterall, Dove is a product manufacturer--it's almost as if they're saying "It's okay to be overweight, but not overweight with saggy skin! Use our lotion to firm up! Be proud of your body!" (hypocrisy, anyone?) It's going to take more than just magazines to change centuries of evolutionary instincts.