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Introduction
The popular culture influences the majority of people and particularly the youth who are attempting to build an identity. The media describes the pop culture in regards to what people should eat, wear, what kind of music they should be listening to, how they should behave, and how they should present themselves. However, in her article, Never Just Pictures, Susan Bordo explores the eating habits and the kind of problems, and the influence the various types of media have on society.
The aim of this paper is to create awareness for the audience concerning the effects of the manufacturers advertisements. In a bid to pass the ideas convincingly, this paper is based on Bordos perception about pop culture, as shown in her essay, Never Just Pictures and Jamie Holguins article, Iran: Nose Job Capital of World. Besides, this paper will also reflect on Kristin Prevallets essay on the Dislogics of Beauty.
Societys fascination
The contemporary society appears to create fascination over nearly all aspects of life, particularly when an advertisement is engaged. As Bordo (2003) writes regarding societys fascination with being oversize and how it is hard to slim, such interpretation is highly influenced by the fashion industry via media advertisement. Eating disorders are multidimensional aspects with varying causes such as biological vulnerabilities, depression, self-image, and social aspects, among others. Therefore, based on Bordos perception, this issue is reduced to cater for the organizations motive to sell their products for profits.
The advertisements are meant to influence the way people think about what is appropriate to wear. As Prevallet (2007) suggests, clothing industries are driven by consumerism narcissism when marketing their products to lure the minds of the public by utilizing social beliefs. For instance, clothing designers have realized that most young people are highly attracted to the pop culture and particularly fixing their faces. Since young people might experience budget constraints, clothing industries stress the essence of clothes over facial makeup. Prevallet (2007) argues that consumerism is propelled by peoples anxiety to buy things.
The fashion industry tends to imply that the body is an essential factor that projects the internal traits of an individual. The significance given to the body has made society develop an obsession with the body image. Consequently, the youth have started to believe that a slim body is an ultimate goal that everyone should reach in a bid to fit the societal expectations. The idea of a thin body leads to another fascination with eating disorders.
Apparently, eating disorders have a broader meaning than just having the desired body size but also being in a position to fit into a particular lifestyle. A slim body symbolizes ones ability to deny themselves of the goodies available to them. Western culture is rich in cravings; thus, it takes a huge amount of media influence to lure people into saying no to various eating habits.
The idea of adjusting ones body shape or size to match a certain message is popular with the fashion industry. Such modifications are meant to communicate individual beliefs. Moreover, body changes are done in a bid to fit in with a particular group or sector. On the contrary, body modifications can be utilized as a way to differ with social norms. For instance, most clothing stores in the United States supply clothing suitable for thin people. Those who fail to suit the stores standard size may feel left out and may end up starving their bodies to attain a slim body. Such brands convey a wrong message by implying that only thin people can appear beautiful in their clothing.
Cultural Change
Bordos essay demonstrates cultural criticism in an objective way. She responds to the upcoming popular culture and the obsession with thinness as one orchestrated by fashion designers. The pop culture aims at perpetuating a negative image in a bid to gain from the sale of their goods. Things that used to be termed as reasonable and culturally accepted have been altered to look abnormal. Prevallets essay connects to the pop culture by arguing that the advertisement sector is encouraging consumerist narcissism by luring the people to starve their bodies to lose weight and become thin. In this light, society looks at the media and commercial adverts, and it develops the perception that thin is a new way.
The marketplace commoditizes every aspect, for instance, workers are expected to wear the right brands, thus creating a narcissistic environment. This knowledge should serve to warn the people of the risks of lucrative advertisement and the delusive solutions for anxieties brought by consumerism. The current generation opines that being fat is an awful condition, and thus it is unacceptable in the society. Consequently, most people, particularly the young come to think of obesity as bondage where everyone seeks to get free and fit in the society. For instance, in her work, Bordo (2003) elaborates this idea by a story of young children. Bordo (2003) claims that during a study, when children asked to draw a picture of what annoyed them, most of them drew images of fat people.
The popular culture has developed a condition where a certain image appears to be all encompassing hence it is difficult to overlook the way one looks. Unlike in the past, today beauty and outlook is defined as flawless and thin. Social stereotypes have become inevitable particularly in the advertising, music and news production. Every youth wants to associate to some celebrities they see in magazines or on television. In this way, the media is reconstructing peoples self-image.
The media has great influence on the spread of pop culture by engaging the thoughts, ideas, and opinions of todays society. For instance, the music industry provides a platform upon which most teenagers are building their identities. The value of music has hugely declined as the value for looks gain immense popularity. Nowadays it is not about the voice or the message; it is about the outlook of who presents the message. Young people cannot avoid the temptations of pop culture when they are surrounded by false images of what the society believe is acceptable.
Feminism
Bordo (2003) looks at the unbearable cultural approach to the female body. She observes the obsessive body practices of the modern society and aims at not portraying these fascinations as weird but rather as the logical presentations of fantasies propagated by the media. Obsession with the thin body has led to bizarre practices such as cosmetic surgery and anomalous dieting among females.
Such practices account for the increasing rate of body disorders among women. Consequently, disorders such as anorexia and bulimia cannot merely be described from medical and psychological perspectives but should be defined from within a cultural dimension as modern crystallizations of culture. From Iran: Nose Job Capital of World, it is clear that women are compelled to undergo plastic surgery, which hits at their self-esteem, and thus they perceive their bodies as objects for commercial advertisement (Holguin, 2005). Such devastating effects of media advertising manifest the calamitous effects on the contemporary woman.
The modern advertisement shows continual manipulations of issues that the society has identified as fears of the modern woman. Advertising aims at implying that women have a tougher life than men have, and they need to make various adjustments to fit in the society.
Implications of pop culture
Popular culture can have both positive and negative influence on the society. Some of the positives include the firm economic basis since it encourages new lifestyles and purchases. Besides, pop culture serves as a unifying factor since it is a foundation for conversation during everyday lives. Such unifying sentiment eliminates personal differences and enables dialogues to extend from a point of oneness.
A shared perception of a new fashion can build a context for common understanding and a platform for relationship building. Nearly all pop culture icons magnify their visibility via brands that are sold through advertisements or products bearing their names. Teenagers who see, for instance, clothes bearing the label of their stars may be influenced to wear them regardless of the negative aspects regarding the particular star.
Pop culture often creates benchmarks with which young people pin their identity. Prevallets essay suggests that narcissist experiences lead to a sense of self within the advertising sector thus depriving people their identity and replacing them with consumerism ideals that exalt fame. Consequently, young people end up assuming characteristics from various entertainment icons and fashions they see in pop culture.
The desire to have a thin body image is seen as sexual and might promote sexuality since most fashion designers promote clothes that reveal too much of female body. Even though the evidence of sexuality in pop culture is not conclusive, the sheer amount of sexual imagery in fashion wears influence peoples perception towards sex. For example, in the essay, Iran: Nose Job Capital of World, women are viewed as vulnerable to the emotional effects of beauty and they might be influenced to make judgments based on pop psychology (Holguin, 2005). Ideally, as Bordo (2003) presents in her work, young people cannot stay comfortable with themselves when they are encountered by images of what the society think is normal due to media influence.
The media-constructed images of bodily perfection in the modern consumer society manifest delusive paragons for the public, which relates with such images and utilizes them as reflections for physical appearance. Despite the media sensitization toward the dangers of starvation, eating disorders persist in the contemporary society. This paper agrees to Bordos disapproval of the skinny appearance cultural perception. Even though thin bodies may possess fantasized solutions to people anxieties and insecurities, such practices are not worth the effects self-starvation. People should understand that clothing manufacturers are out to make profits rather than caring about their health as it might appear. Undoubtedly, pop culture manifests beauty from a biased and unthinkable viewpoint.
The mass media offers the society with messages and images that aim at communicating the ideal size and appearance for everyone. Such messages and images focusing on the appearance have huge adverse effects on body shape, eating habits and emotional satisfaction of people in the Western culture. The media has been determined as the main contributor to the construction and sustenance of eating disorders. Based on the prevalence of eating disorders and body image delusion among the people in the society, it is essential for lobbyists and the public to campaign for positive messages to be passed to the society via media. Further study should aim at finding means to challenge the effects of the media and promote body satisfaction free from fashion industry manipulation.
References
Bordo, S. (2003). Never just pictures. In A. Jones (Eds.), The feminism and visual culture reader (pp. 454-463). New York, NY: Routledge.
Holguin, J. (2005). Iran: Nose Job Capital of World. CBS News.Â
Prevallet, K. (2007). Or, Essay on the Dislogics of Beauty. Web.
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