Powerful Bodies
Not So Social Media
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, right? Wrong!
Beauty standards, in its simplest form, are the individual qualifications someone is expected to meet to display the ideal body, resulting in them succeeding in life.
But this topic cannot and should not be put simply, there are so many factors that influence our current standards.
From evolution and racism to social media and commercialism.
The book, Perception and Deception: Human beauty and the brain, by Daniel Yarosh investigates how beauty standards are evolutionary. He argues that the standards are designed by humans to lead to sex and since people like to make themselves look more attractive with clothes and make-up it is all a deception.
Capitalism and commercialism are examined in Anoushka Benbow-Buitenhuis’ article, A Feminine Double-Bind? Towards understanding the commercialisation of beauty through examining anti-ageing culture. She suggests that beauty products are made to create an inescapable beauty standard for women – youthful forever.
Beauty standards are cultural as well, however, Westerners have brought their ideals to other countries and promoted the idea that white skin is more attractive.
While beauty standards may have begun as something that helped people reproduce, it no longer is this simple.
Kate Povey from the University of Washington provides this food for thought.
“[Beauty standards have] snowballed into a means of power – a way in which one group of people can dominate another and perpetuate an exclusivity in the beauty standard.”
The way in which it has gained this much power is through social media.
Social media is taking the place of traditional media in the way it represents bodies and lives. 87% of women and 65% of men compare themselves to others on social media. Comparison theory states that social comparison leads to body dissatisfaction and engaging on social media develops a negative body image.
One age group that is affected particularly hard are the youth. Adolescent brains are still developing and therefore more vulnerable to the content they consume online. Studies related teen social media use to depression, anxiety, loneliness, envy and low self-esteem.
However, a postdoctoral researcher from Macquarie University’s Centre for Emotional Health, Jasmine Fardouly, says that it is important to remember that social media is a tool and when you sign up it is a blank slate.
“We take all of our offline experiences, motivations and desires and bring that into the online world on social media,” Ms Fardouly said.
As a user, you can decide whom you want to follow, if you like baking, home design or animals the algorithm will update to only show you your interests.
“Social media gives people a platform to focus on their self-representation and control how they appear to others, it gives people a lot of access to curated and idealised versions of people’s lives and appearances.
But social media itself isn’t harmful, it’s how you use it,” Ms Fardouly said.
Essentially social media is just the platform that perpetuates the beauty ideals that are also offline, as do other forms of media – women must be thin, and men must be muscular.
The other side of the coin mustn’t be overlooked.
But once again, it doesn’t have to be all negative. Many content creators are using their platforms for good.
Representation is very important for self-acceptance, however, the representation that plus-size people have gotten in the mainstream media is significantly negative and fuelled by stereotypes.
The main stereotype that is seen in almost every comedy film is large people being used for comic relief. We see people like Johna Hill play the ‘funny fat guy’ role in most of his movies, and we have Rebel Wilson’s character called Fat Amy in Pitch Perfect. To an audience, this conveys that a person is bound by their weight.
Another is the 'lazy slob' who places weight and motivation hand in hand. In many ways, it is used as a warning to skinny people that this is what they could end up like if they do not have a good work ethic.
And another trope is that overweight people are greedy and selfish. This has them being the villain in many movies. We see Ursula from The Little Mermaid, Jabba the Hutt from Star Wars and Baron from Dune. The depictions of these villains are made to be gross and ugly, so they are hated by the audience more.
What do these representations tell plus-size people?
There are trends and movements that social media promotes such as the ‘Fitspiration’ movement which sees women’s ideal body be slender yet toned and muscular. There is also the rise in influencers and celebrity influence like the Kardashians promoting a small waist and big butt ideal.
And potentially the most dangerous feature of social media are filters. We see content creators using filters that alter entire body and face shapes and it is argued that it has changed the beauty ideal to have a narrow face and full lips.
This is dangerous because if their audience is part of the younger generation, it is harder for them to differentiate between what is real and what is fake. Sometimes the filter is so good, not even an older person would be able to tell the difference.
These are the trends that children grow up with and are surrounded by. It is hard to unlearn something that is drilled into your mind.
The television industry has been pushing specific agendas right under our noses.
It is important to become aware of what you are being forced to believe and make changes where necessary in your life.
Kels or Honey_those_hips on Instagram is a plus-size creator who shares fashion and lifestyle content. She didn’t set out to be an influencer but fell into the role when she saw there was a need for her content.
“I think the reason I have such a following is because plus size people are so under-represented in the fashion industry,” Kels said.
Kels said one of the best things she did for herself was following like-minded people and blocking out any other content she did not wish to see on her feed.
“It is important for young people to remember that what we see on social media is not always real and we should be careful when comparing ourselves to someone’s highlight reel,” Kels said.