New Moon Girls is supporting the #KeepItReal Challenge with Miss Representation, SPARK Summit and many other organizations who empower girls and women. Seeing girls and women photoshopped to unrealistic standards of beauty and “perfection” is unacceptable. Girls Editorial Board member, Ava, shares her feelings about it in her story:
Imagine walking down the street in a city. You look around marveling at all the advertisements, billboards, videos, and pictures of models in the store windows. All of a sudden your wonderful day turns into something less perfect.
You look down at yourself and start noticing things. You’re not as skinny as those people- your face isn’t as perfect, you have freckles, your hair isn’t shiny and perfectly brushed, you have a pimple on your chin. You look around again, and see many ads for a particular company. They are in windows, on magazines dropped earlier today on the sidewalk, and on flashing advertisements around you. Then you look in front of you and see – could it really be her? – the celebrity in the photos. The photos and the person don’t look the same, but you are sure it is her! What’s going on? This is an example of the effects photoshopping has on society daily.
Photoshopping is something you see a lot of these days in magazines, on billboards, and on TV. Many people don’t realize that photoshopping is changing the perception of beauty to only include girls with flawless skin, perfect hair, and skinny bodies. In reality no one has all these characteristics naturally, and it makes lots of people feel badly about the way they look.
Take magazines for example. Women shown on magazine covers go through many processes to become what we see in the photos. First they are covered in extensive makeup and then their hair is styled into perfection. Are the models’ eyes too small, ears too big, waist too wide? No problem! After the photos are taken, the professionals manipulate the image by changing shapes, moving features, and creating highlights digitally. These effects can completely change how a person looks, thus creating an impossible example for girls to live up to.
When I see photoshopped images it makes me sad to think that girls think they have to live up to these perceptions. Our society is inundated with pictures like this, and they influence a lot of people. Some girls may experience depression or eating disorders because they want to make themselves resemble someone that isn’t even real.
Photoshopping has changed the way that people look at themselves, at others, and at the world. Photoshopping has raised the expectations of beauty to an unhealthy level where many girls strive to reach an unrealistic goal of physical perfection.
So why do it?
-Ava, New Moon Girls Editorial Board Member
We are proud to be a magazine who has NEVER photoshopped! Girls and women are beautiful the way they are.
See what we mean by getting a gift copy of our current magazine from the link on our Facebook page.
Show your support for #KeepItReal from Miss Representation, SPARK Summit, I Am That Girl, and LoveSocial. How will you #KeepItReal and support the movement to encourage magazines to use photos of real girls and women? See how New Moon Girls members are telling magazines to #KeepItReal on NewMoon.com.
