Task 3, Part 2 - essay

To what extent should magazines be held for the social ramifications of the representations they offer?

Over the last few years magazines have been blamed for the sexulisation of teenage girls. However I disagree with this assumption; I believe that the celebrities are to blame for this not the magazines.

Kim kardashian is a celebrity used in many magazines such as cosmopolitan; people aspire to be like her; she has a ‘good’ physique and the media are only presenting what is being given to them, if kim is happy with her body and works hard for to keep it why shouldn’t she flaunt it? Magazines have advised how to get a body like this and lets be honest who will complain, being told how to eventually own a good body will only boost your confidence. You will smile from the outside and be comfortable in your own skin. She has said things like

“For me, skinny is just a style of jeans – not a goal.”

“I love curves. Being super skinny just isn’t attractive to me.”

“if paris hilton thinks my butt is gross, i dont care, at least i have a butt!”

However when these magazines use woman with perfect hair and perfect make up this natural look goes to waste, it seems to put pressure on the young girls reading them to feel that they shouldn’t go out without make up and perfect hair, to know and understand about such as "The Sex Factor" when the average reader is aged 14 and the magazine itself aimed at ages 11-15.

      

According to associated content [1] if you look at the cover of virtually every magazine, especially teen magazines, you will see that a majority of the headlines revolve around making yourself look better. "Dress to impress." "Easy hair makeovers." "Find the perfect hair, makeup, and style for you!" "Be a knockout!" These are just a sampling of the headlines featured on the covers of teen magazines. If you take what all of these magazines have to say to heart, which most teenage girls do, than a more appropriate quote to live by might be one by Antoine Berryer, "There are no ugly women; there are only women who do not know how to look pretty." This again puts pressure on these young girls to constantly look their best, to constantly wear makeup, and to constantly worry about how they look making them uncomfortable in their own skin. This article suggest that the social content of these magazines are unacceptable ‘she has a very provocative look on her face, she has quite a bit of eye makeup on, and her shirt is very low cut. This issue also happens to be "The Sexy Issue!" What does sexy mean to teenagers? Do we really want our teenagers walking around trying to be sexy?’  And the answer is no, we don’t want this generation to fall into such a state of girls aged 11 upwards looking sexy! What happened to playing with a Barbie? Or painting pictures not painting your face.

The telegraph says [2] ‘parents would be shocked by much of their content.’ And ‘These magazines are pushing the boundaries of what parents would consider acceptable.’ Meaning that the parents do not know what their children are reading about, and would be horrified if they found out.

In conclusion I begin to wonder who is actually responsible for the social ramifications of today’s society; are the magazines to blame? The parents? The celebrities? I hold all these factors responsible not just one, the magazines for their choice of headlines and celebrities used, the celebrities themselves for thinking they are role models to young girls by ‘caking’ their face in makeup, starving themselves and wearing seductive clothing to a teen magazine shoot, yet I find the parents to some extent responsible for not looking and accepting what their child is reading and spending their pocket money on.

1-    http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/30544/popular_teen_magazines_and_their_possible.html

2-    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturenews/4990907/Teen-magazines-are-sexualising-readers-says-watchdog.html