Whether it be wanting to have perfect skin or wanting to be a size two, women all around the world are faced with pressure to look a certain way. Many can argue that this pressure comes from the media because size zero women are often advertised as being immaculate, but many body image struggles come from women comparing themselves to one another.
They associate the word “healthy” with over exercising and eating very little. Little do women know, that “healthy” actually means to eat and exercise correctly to complement your body type.
20-year-old Madi Driscoll from Davidson College is one of the women who have struggled with a body image issue. Over the past six months, Driscoll developed an eating disorder that took away her ability to love herself again. She said she is now in recovery and is learning that every woman is different and has to accept herself for who they are.
“I think that society puts a lot of pressure of women to look particular ways,” Driscoll said. “We tend to fetishize the young and prepubescent body, which I don’t get why, but we love the boyish straightness. We have so much value on women in how much they look and everywhere you turn, women are being used as objects, pieces and parts of their bodies are seen as parts of their bodies – yet alone a person.”
Driscoll said that she thinks that this problem is a cult of healthiness that society has going on because everyone has a small definition of what healthy actually is and what needs to be done to be considered healthy.
“We’ve gotten so far away from defining health based on your personal feelings and connections to your body and all walk around like ‘oh there’s this perfect body somewhere in me and if I do all of these things, it will come out,’” she said.
Driscoll also said that women get stuck trying to get their bodies to cooperate to someone else’s standard and get so wrapped up in trying to look a certain way, that women don’t realize all of the amazing things that they can do by themselves.
“I think that comes from women feeling as though they have so little control in their daily lives and so they accept this idea that we have control over our bodies and we focus on that,” she said.
According to the Masako Uro, author of The Influence of Thin-Ideal Internalization on Women’s Body Image, Self-Esteem, and Appearance Avoidance: Covariance Structure Analysis, women’s bodies become like adult women and the intensity of media internalization increases.
“Young women become more susceptible to concerns related to physical appearance,” Uro said. “Hence, actively processing and interpreting information from the media is an essential source for subsequent harmful behaviors and self-evaluations, particularly among young women.”
That being said, Driscoll said that the media’s definition of perfection has become “healthy” and that it has become more dangerous than the stick thin models of the high fashion world.
“We are upholding this idea that only one type of body is healthy and right, and so many people believe that, and believe they know about healthy and other’s health,” Driscoll said. “So you either see the tiny women or you see ‘healthy women’ and there’s really no difference besides which article they’re in or how they’re being talked about. There’s nothing said about any other body types except shaming or using them in positions of humor, especially women.”
On the other hand, there are many publications that have been heavily promoting body empowerment over the past few years, such as Cosmopolitan.com. Editorial assistant Danielle Tullo said that she loves working at the Hearst Media’s publication because the company is so body positive and empowering.
“Here at Cosmopolitan.com, we really do celebrate that every person and every body is beautiful,” Tullo said. “That has opened my eyes to how the digital media industry is becoming much more welcoming and less harsh.”
She said that she also sees a huge difference in what is being promoted and that the online digital media community is becoming much more welcoming to diversity and all body types than the traditional editorial industry.
Tullo also believes that there is a lot of pressure for women to look a certain why and she doesn’t understand why it happens.
“It’s not a coincidence that the most liked Instagram photos are of these unrealistic looking models,” she said. “The most coveted clothes are worn by thin women walking down a runway. If you’ve ever scrolled through a model’s Instagram feed late at night coveting her body and looks, you have given in to the pressure. We all do.”