What Are We Teaching Young Girls About Life?

What Are We Teaching Young Girls About Life?

As a woman in society I have always had a hard time dealing with my body image and the pressures to fit in. There are so many burdens within society for women to fit a certain criteria to be accepted. The media has a lot to do with the way women perceive the way they "should" look and act. Friends and family are another source from which this perfect image stems from. It's not healthy for young girls and women to be stick thin and starving themselves just to go along with societal norms and look like everyone else. Women need to learn that it's okay to have they're own look and not be "perfect" because it's impossible and they'll die trying. Instead of worrying about what we look like in the mirror, we need to take a look inside and try to make ourselves better there first.

The Media

All over magazines, television, and movies there are these beautiful and glamorous women with perfect bodies that women all over the world look up to. Since society looks up to all of these celebrities and makes it like they're the ultimate human being, it's natural for woman to strive to be just like them. When I was a young girl growing up it was all about Britney Spears and I wanted to be just like her. No matter what she wore, I wanted it and everything she endorsed, I bought it. I had to work out so that I could wear those tiny little belly shirts she wore, occasionally forget my lunch at home so I wouldn't have to eat anything. Because we all know, pretty means skinny in our society. Now, I know I'm not the only girl that looked up to someone famous. Every woman knows there was that one person they wanted to be just like when they grew up and they would've done anything to achieve that look. As women, when we see someone that's beautiful and everyone else thinks is attractive, we're naturally going to try and duplicate it. But, realistically, are we reaching too far?

The women we look up to all over the magazines are so thin that you can see every single bone protruding through their skin. That can't be healthy. Then, they're going on all of those crazy diets where they can only eat grapefruit or have no carbs everyday. That's just not a good image for young girls looking up to them to aspire to. But, the girls in high school see all of these women in the magazines leading fabulous (yet unrealistic lifestyles) and want to be just like them. So, they buy all of the clothes, make-up, get their hair done and either starve themselves or workout like crazy to live up to an image that's so unrealistic in everyday life.

Instead of celebrities being these ultra thin, sexed up Barbie dolls, maybe they could try to take a new approach. Try to encourage each other and younger women to find their own personal style. That way they'll be doing things in life for themselves instead of trying to be like someone else and live up to their own standards. Then, they can decide what type of clothing is best for them, if they like wearing makeup or not, and whether they even care if they're skinny or not. Life should be about finding yourself, being happy and having fun. Not finding what you like in other people and trying to incorporate those things into your life to make it work for you.

I've seen on the Tyra Show that she's trying to get girls all over the world to embrace their bodies. So many people have criticized Tyra for gaining weight and she doesn't want that to happen to other women and young girls. So, she's trying to show them that it's okay to be overweight, as long as you're okay with it and you're happy. Tyra Banks is trying to encourage women to love their bodies no matter the shape or size. I think that's a great message to be sending because what's inside is what counts and I think girls these days really need to work on what's inside and stop caring so much about their appearance.

Friends & Family

All throughout high school girls are always worrying about what people think about them and how they look. Teenage girls think if they don't have the best clothes or skinniest bodies then their friends and popular boys won't want anything to do with them. Then, when these girls do something out of the ordinary or show their own personalities, their best friends may push them away and shun them from their activites. So, then they're forced to conform into a person they might not want to be because they feel a need to be apart of the social scene. This instance reminds me of a scene from the movie Mean Girls when one of "The Plastics"