Blog #5 The Globalization of the American Concept of Beauty Leading to Mental Illness

             Is America spreading a low self-esteem disease all over the world?  Is this increase in insecurities contributing to a possible “crazy people” pandemic?  There are global arguments saying that America and its celebrities are causing people all over the world develop anorexia and bulimia to alter their bodies to look like the supermodels they see in advertisements.  The western idea of beauty has been a relevant issue in my life and I feel it is absolutely crucial to teens of my generation.  To this day when I go to the mall with my friends we look at the models on the product boxes and point out that no one has eyelashes like that, or perfectly shaved legs.  

            My small group talked a lot on Friday about the issues all over the world that especially girls are developing striving for that unachievable western flawless look that supermodels have in pictures.  I found Cindy Crawford’s quote really enlightening, “I wish I looked like Cindy Crawford”.  Thus, she was saying she doesn’t even look like how she does in her own pictures.  This is due to all of the computer editing and refining photo shop workers do along with advertisers for her endorsed products.  It was really interesting in the video when we watched how a magazine cover girl was formed from 4 different women – consequently creating “the perfect woman”.  This is a surprisingly popular technique used by many photo shop geniuses, you would never know that Jenny’s body is actually attached to Monica’s face, but with Heather’s lips and Stephanie’s ears.  All these girls are models but each one of them had something imperfect about them that needed to be fixed in order to make other women around the world feel ugly enough to buy the product.

            We need to train our brains to not be so highly susceptible to deception by big companies who are just trying to get at our insecurities.  This is why videos like the one we watched in class on Friday, and the Dove commercial are so important to have.  The people that say that you’re too fat, have thin hair, or need this new mascara to catch boys’ attraction and generally be considered attractive are just wanting you to buy their product to give them profit.  Making money is a huge part of what America was founded on, but we can’t corrupt the world’s mental health in order to get rich.  We must stop this pandemic before it gets out of control.