Western Influence On Society

In contrast to past gender stereotypes, they argue that girls should be strong, independent, and intelligent. Orenstein takes a second wave feminism approach, meaning females are just as capable as males. She references how she commonly writes about feminism and warning parents of a “preoccupation of body and beauty” in order to pull for a change in society (327). The beauty standards give women an impossible set of goals deterring their confidence. In addition to unrealistic standards, Orenstein is alarmed by the growing popularity of princesses because she views them as “retrograde role models” (329).

These women were on diets to get the right shape of their body for their outfits they would wear when they went out places. Flappers became the image that represented the tremendous change in women’s lives during that time period. When America became a part of the flapper trends it spreaded like crazy. Many were getting sick and tired of not being treated fairly like the rest of the people and they wanted thing to change that. One of the first ever flappers was Zelda Fitzgerald.

They both critique our culture’s misogyny and rigid standards of beauty. In “Losing Bodies”, Susie Orbach argues that modern Western beauty standards have a profoundly negative impact on women, encouraging women to take drastic measures to conform to the mainstream ideal of beauty. Duhamel refers to this in her poem, “The Limited Edition Platinum Barbie”. Orbach also claims that gender roles dictate what behavior is acceptable for women (248), as does Duhamel in her poem, “One Afternoon When Barbie Wanted to Join the Military”. Although these works express similar concerns, they are presented very differently.

It is shown through the literary elements of Imagery, Simile, and Verbal Irony. “Our skin was diagnosed by the department of beauty as ‘shallow’ we definitely needed some strong foundation to tone down that olive”[pg.39] Alaverse’s use of imagery is spread throughout the story, she uses this tone most when she is describing how much distaste she had for herself, or how she needed to change herself to be like the models seen on the television, magazines or her classmates. Throughout the story, she has an internal urge to be something she’s not. “We complained about how short we were, about how our hair frizzed and how our figures didn’t curve like those on T.V” [pg.39] In both situations, Alaverze is taking the situation

Social media plays a big role in how society portrays body image. “Alternatively, an increased number of Facebook friends may provide girls with greater opportunity to rapidly make multiple social comparisons, itself shown to be associated with body image concern”(Tiggemann and Slater 82). According to the survey that was taken by Marika Tiggemann and Amy Slater, the more Facebook friends the girls had, the more likely it was that they had body image concerns. They were able to compare themselves to the other girls that they were friends with, which led to them to have an increase in their drive for thinness. “Further, these comparisons are likely to be with somewhat idealised images, in that girls mostly post photographs in which they look good or are doing something ‘cool’ (and can be digitally altered)”(Tiggemann and Slater 82).

(Cohen,1984). It was later attacked for its restrictiveness, both in breathing and movement. According to Featherstone (1982), the 1900s began to use cosmetics, fashion, Hollywood, and advertisements to represent the female body image. The popular look of the late 1800s continued until the early 1900s. This look was the "Gibson Girl," who was tall and thin, yet with ample bosom and hips and an exaggerated S-curve that she showed off by wearing a swan-bill corset.

The Victorian Age consisted of women who wanted to create the illusion of a perfect body based off of societies standards. The hourglass figure was a must, making females forced into wearing corsets in hopes of cinching their waists into perfection. (Reader, 1967). A women who wore a corset was a representation of a higher class, due to the fact that it flaunted their lack of physical labor (Riordan, 2004). Women of this era also wore hoop cages in order to create an illusion of full, voluminous hips.

It values sexual attractiveness opposed to the importance of being a movement about the social, political and economic equality of the sexes (Goldman et al., 1991). Entrepreneurs through advertisements have in turn transformed and re-defined feminism into a “symbolic currency” (Goldman et al., 1991). Contemporary advertisements bombard our televisions and billboards still with half-naked women, but half naked women who promote magical lipsticks and high-heels promising to decrease your student loan, equal pay between you and your male colleagues and world peace. They construct a woman who symbolizes independence, ambition and individual freedom by attaching these ideals to the product their selling. “Give a girl the right shoes and she can conquer the world”, this quote by Marilyn Monroe is a prime example of commodity feminism, capitalizing on femininity to sell a pair of shoes, depoliticizing the movement by turning feminist social goals into individual lifestyles (Goldman et al., 1991).

As the technology era change over time, the social media becomes an important part of our life. We use social media to connect with friends and family, also to found out the latest news or fashion trends. Especially after the great success of Facebook, many other social media follow along such as Snapchat and Instagram. Numerous young age children gradually sink into the virtual world of Social Media. According to the Pew Research Center survey, that majority of Americans use Facebook and YouTube, but young adults are especially heavy users of Snapchat and Instagram.

With the world evolving each day, the internet evolves with us. Therefore new websites are being created to fit the needs of each person, business, dating, friendships. Paragraph #3 - Cyberbullying Not only does social networking just for sharing photo’s or connecting with one another, it is also a leading cause of cyberbullying. Because social networking is used almost everywhere and used by everyone, it’s hard to not be apart of it if it’s in your everyday life. Today, cyberbullying can cause teens to be more anti-social when all they’re worrying about is