Western Beauty Argument Analysis

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Over the past centuries, women and men have faced pressure through Western beauty ideals. From the sweater girls of the 1940 to the thin and curvy women of the 1990’s, Western ideals of women beauty vary, but there have been three constant factors in women beauty. First, the ideal body shapes never represent the majority of women. Only a small percentage of women can achieve an ideal body. The second factor is women invest immense amount of emotions, energy, and time in order to conform to the ideal standards. And finally, women and men inspect women's bodies to see if the woman follows the current standards of female beauty. Through the scrutinization of others, women relied on the opinion of others, to see if they have achieved the standards. Men are also pressured to fit a stereotype. Men are expected to have a certain body shape, act a certain way, and able to have a family. Often women and men do not meet the ideal standards and go through body disaffection. Despite the fact that people placed expectation for women and men, it is the media itself that placed expectation on women and men to be a certain way. It is the media it itself that is responsible for gender inequality. As technology continues to evolve, people are exposed to several different types of media. …show more content…
Technology is now revolving around many people lives.” The average consumer is exposed to 1,500 advertisements each day, and an average young woman will have received over 250,000 commercial messages through the media by the time she is 17” (Hoffmann 2). Women are often the target of manipulation by the media. Advertisement such as products to perfected an ideal beauty. Many advertisements portray on how one can perfected their bodies into an ideal body. For example, Victoria Secret ad, “The Perfect Body” campaign portrayed 10 different women with the same body types. The slogan has a picture of model thin women with the words, “The Perfect Body” under the picture (Stampler 2). To others, seeing model thin women, with the captions “The perfect body”, raises questions about their own selves. Women questions if they are the perfect body. If not, women will do anything to achieve the ideal body. This will lead to body disaffections and a lower self-esteem. The media have placed women in oppressive standards in which women are often since as inferior. For example, females have specific descriptive words that society uses to describe typical feminine traits. Some of these include the following: nurturing, passive, emotional, sexy, and seductive. Among these traits, women must also focus on they look to others. Marilyn Frye’s essay titled “Oppression”, explains how culture and values impact women, often having conflicted feelings on how a woman look and acts. For example, if she isn’t sexually active, she is considered to be prude, but if she is too sexually active, she is considered to be a whore. (Frye, 3). Frye stated, “Women face restrictions which, on-balance, are harmful to them, they are imposed by social structures and expectations, and even within the law; women face them because of their status as women; and men both impose these barriers and benefit from them” (Frye 2) Beauty standards have undermined women into believing they must act and look a certain way in order to be accepted in society. Masculinity As the world’s population continues to grow, culture’s view of masculinity might also change. American culture plays a role in assigning traits to both sexes. According to Shaw, masculinity has been constructed around personality traits, such as intelligence, courage, and honesty. The traits are centers on the machismo effect. The machismo effect can be described as breaking rules and regulations, misogyny, the …show more content…
The first category is called, “the no sissy stuff”, meaning not showing weakness, vulnerability, and weakness or face rejection of society. The next category “The Big Wheel” refers to the pursuit of a better life, such as fame, success, and wealth. The third category, “The Sturdy Oak” as it refer to it name, the sturdy oak mean someone who can you lean on; which involve traits such as stoicism, confidence and competence. Then, finally the fourth category, “give em hell”, which to the machismo effect, which displays the perception of

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