This really annoys me...

if they just showed regular people in like jeans and a hoodie it wouldn't be very interesting, you see that every time you go outside so why would seeing that on a magazine make you more interested in buying it, personally if i saw some crazy **** on the cover like cee lo green dressed like a farmer in overalls, I'd be like sweet gonna buy that, I don't really remember how i got to talking about cee lo green dressed like a farmer but i hope i helped

On the front of magazines are stick thin, tanned, airbrushed perfect models wearing a face full of make up. Their teeth are white and perfect, and their outfits are fancy and lovely-or risque. Often both. Why don't they have normal people with no make up on, their hair down and their bodies not conforming to society's warped idea of beautiful? Magasines are supposed to represent people so eby not do it with a normal person? I know it shows off fashion and gets sales but they should encourage people to an themselves and not some angelic perfect model-magazines should be about normal people, who are still beautiful, and about encouraging people to be confident in their own skin. These people often encourage anorexia which is awful and takes countless lives. Why do we, as a society, have an unrealistic idea if beautiful, slap it on a magazine and expect people to look like that when half of it is fake? What are your opinions and views about this?
Sorry for long rant 😀
Purplemonkeys xoxo

My point is that these models should be average people not airbrushed angelic looking people and these people should, if confident enough to do so, have their picture taken in a natural state.

Models are aspirations, chosen to represent a particular vision of beauty. An archetypal male/female. The point is they're not ordinary people, they look better because this is the proper direction in which to aspire. Average people would not serve this purpose.

You could aspire to be as disgusting as possible, but I can't see that catching on.

People don't become anorexic as a result of society's idea of beauty being promoted, it's the responsibility of the individual (and/or their support networks) to develop healthy coping strategies. You wouldn't criticise the classic art or the Greek myths for depicting rape, because someone might get upset and decide that they should develop a mental disorder. This seems like it wouldn't address the problem, because it's not addressing the problem.

The aspirations are unrealistic and like shouldn't model themselves off them because they sometimes end up dying in the process

The actions of an individual are the individual's responsibility, not the fault of society. If a murderer said that media violence caused him/her to kill someone, even if they were deranged, you would hold him/her criminally responsible for the murder he/she committed. You wouldn't blame the media that millions of people watch without becoming killers. You'd only be justified in saying, "it was an influence in this individual's case", and nothing further. The same principle applies in making attributions to any sort of media, including models in magazines.

Unless they are photo-shopped into oblivion, which admittedly does happen occasionally, these models depicted are real human beings. It is simply not true to say that these humans that exist are unrealistic. You can expect a degree of stylised photography due to the skill of the professional photographers, but this can't make it "unrealistic".

I expect if you saw a model in real life, you wouldn't think looking at them might make people anorexic. You'd probably think, "wow, she's pretty, I'm going to go to the gym so I can look like her!" Or conversely "Wow, she's pretty, I'm going to the gym so I can sleep with her!" Depending on whether or not you're batting for the girls' team.

You are correct in stating that people "shouldn't model themselves off them" if they do it so badly that they "end up dying in the process". That would be an example of hilariously poor execution on the part of the prospect, as opposed to the fault of the modelling industry.

I see you drinking milk on a magazine, so I decide to drown myself in milk; the safe consumption of milk is entirely my responsibility. You are not to blame. It would be unreasonable to hold you accountable for anything I do after seeing you drink milk. If I seriously cannot deal with a picture of you drinking milk existing, I must call upon professionals to help me deal with everyday sights.

Pragmatically, if one person every so often decides to look at a model on a cover and stops eating, it is more parsimonious to deal with that single person's issues. Restructuring society around the potential for innocuous things to exacerbate mental illness, is the most inefficient, difficult, and unreliable solution humanly possible. Or should you be held responsible for my milk-related antics and be prosecuted for manslaughter?





If people are so delicate that seeing Kate Moss compels them to starvation, the problem is definitely not the shape of Kate Moss. I'll go so far to concede that people with serious mental difficulties might be destabilised through the constant media exposure, but this is a problem that starts and ends with mental illness.

Your points are admittedly good and aboutbit the case of a murderer, you could argue that violence they have witnessed would be a primary influence for their behaviour and the same for models: of course, not everybody who sees models will become anorexic but it has happened and of course people are entitled to look that way. We can not avoid mental illnesses by doing one thing like taking thin female models off magazines, however sugar tax in the case of obese children will begin preventing people from eating unhealthy food, thus subsequently people become thinner in a healthy way. If people see something, especially adolescents, it can influence them in a way in which they will have an idea in their head that they must be that. However, I'm aware this should not necessarily be held accountable for cases of anorexia as internal and external factors aside from the negative influence of the media cab shape this, however in this technological say and age we are bombarded continuously by these types of media in which models are slimmer. Teenagers often model themselves off these people because they are brainwashed to see these by the media. After a while, thus takes a psychological effect, though of course not all of these people are in their adolescence, just the majority, and not all adolescents feel this way. However, like my earlier example about sugar tax, putting less slender and airbrushed models would lead the way for diversity and help people feel confident in their own skin, for example of a plus sized model (who was healthy and a healthy weight) was on a magazine, it'd make the types of people who were plus sized feel more confident as they often feel ashamed about this. Magazines need to include more diversity in ethnicities, looks, shapes and sizes.
However I fully comprehend what you mean and respect the fact that you, like anyone else, are entitled to your opinion and have free will to say what you like, just putting across things from my point of view. Your argument is brilliant however and far, far outweighs mine; your debating skills are excellent! Are you an aspiring law student/ law student/ lawyer? I say this because you seem like you have had experience in debating.
Xoxo

This was such a civil and considered reply that I'm more startled than if you'd tried to insult me. I've written a lot, hopefully you will appreciate my taking the time to respond to you. I've condensed it by theme, so that should help you to follow my rambling train of thought.

Unfortunately there is so much I've had to leave out, it was getting too long anyway, and I have run out of coffee and time. Sorry about anything I've been unable to elaborate on, some points haven't been made as explicit so you might have to read between the lines. There are also lots of pretty girls to google in here, so you might want to open a new tab.

My background.




The example of the murderer; personal responsibility, and the applicability of media-lead social learning theory across societies in history.



An alternative to top-down media censorship + the individual and his/her relationship to media.




How attractiveness is a biological phenomenon, and how censorship would paradoxically support the idea that physical beauty is a valid determination of human worth.



How maintaining the freedoms of the individual is the best argument you have but don't realise it.

This was such a civil and considered reply that I'm more startled than if you'd tried to insult me. I've written a lot, hopefully you will appreciate my taking the time to respond to you. I've condensed it by theme, so that should help you to follow my rambling train of thought.

Unfortunately there is so much I've had to leave out, it was getting too long anyway, and I have run out of coffee and time. Sorry about anything I've been unable to elaborate on, some points haven't been made as explicit so you might have to read between the lines. There are also lots of pretty girls to google in here, so you might want to open a new tab.

My background.



The example of the murderer; personal responsibility, and the applicability of media-lead social learning theory across societies in history.


An alternative to top-down media censorship + the individual and his/her relationship to media.



How attractiveness is a biological phenomenon, and how censorship would paradoxically support the idea that physical beauty is a valid determination of human worth.


How maintaining the freedoms of the individual is the best argument you have but don't realise it.

It's a marketing ploy. They are different on purpose. They are marketed as fashionable so that everyone wants to be them by spending money on their products. I guarantee you if the population was stick thin then they would use larger model.

Different is desirable and desirable sells. That why people like to go on beach holidays to sunny places rather than Blackpool.

If people were the same as the models used in these things then people assume they are already fashionable therefore no need to buy what they are selling.