Thursday, July 12th, 2012
I don’t usually write articles on my blog unless I feel very strongly about an issue. As you’ve heard, there was a campaign staged by a 14 year old Julia Bluhm, who protested outside of Seventeen’s Magazine Offices. Bluhm wanted the magazine to feature at least “one un-airbrushed photo spread a month” and started a petition on change.org where she collected over 25,000 signatures. This is what she said “These pictures [in the magazine] look too perfect to be like anyone I know. You look around and most people you see on the streets or at school don’t really look like this”. Wow. Do you know how dumb that sounds?
Anyone who has a working brain and some common sense in them will not expect anyone on the street to look like the fashion models in the magazines. If you look at Vogue or any other fashion magazine and feel like you need to look like one of those models or you’ll feel worthless, you have a lot of self-esteem issues to work on. I don’t have a problem seeing beautiful girls in fashion spreads who have perfect bodies. I enjoy looking at them and they’re pleasing to the eyes. But if I were to look at these images and tell myself “My God, those long legs, that perfect butt with no cellulite, that gorgeous face with no pores, why can’t I look like them? Wah, Wah, Wah….”. Then I’m developing a problem based on something I know as a fact wasn’t real. Fashion Magazines should not feel pressured or forced to change the way they do their business just because some insecure women out there feel bad about themselves. Also, models don’t need to gain weight or eat more just so that some overweight Plain Janes out there will feel better about themselves. It’s like asking rich people to be modest because they’re making the poor people feel bad. Or asking professional wrestlers to stay at home and not work out because you know, their big muscles are making the skinny guys look bad.
One of my biggest pet peeves in life is when someone doesn’t want to take responsibility for themselves and be truly honest. I hate it when people knock the models down for being skinny or blame the fashion industry for promoting a narrow body image. Those people don’t want to take control over their own bodies, they want to find the reason to pass the blame and they are essentially saying “I’m powerless to change my body and as long as fashion magazines are flaunting skinny girls, I will never feel good about myself”. Their mentality at first is to place a blame and that’s never a good thing. I know that young teenage girls can be influenced by what they see in the media and from the magazines but they also need to learn to use their heads more. They can read fashion magazines and see the pictures as an inspiration and admire the beauty in others. If they’re going to blame fashion magazines for lowering their self-confidence, they can also blame their parents, the teachers, the community that they live in, Hollywood and the society. Heck, why not blame everybody? You can’t single out the fashion magazines as if it’s all their fault. As much as I think the teenagers who filed this petition are stupid, I feel that there are plenty more teenagers who are level-headed and smart enough to know that fashion magazines are not the problem for eating disorders or distorted body image issues but the individual’s refusal to take charge of their own personal life.
Why the hell do I want to see average looking people in the fashion magazines when I can see them on daily basis in my REAL LIFE? When I open a fashion magazine, I want to see a PERFECT 10. I want to see the most beautiful people and the most beautiful clothes. Fashion Editors don’t need to cater to people who don’t understand fashion. It’s a waste of time and energy. I want them to continue featuring the most beautiful models and do their business as usual without listening to those idiotic teenagers.
What about you? How do you feel?
