Seventeen urged to publish unedited images

[Whisp]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/may/02/thousands-join-girl-seventeen-magazine

Thousands join girl in urging Seventeen magazine to publish unedited images

Julia Bluhm, 14, a ballet dancer and aspiring activist, says she'd like one spread a month that shows bodies that aren't 'fake'

A teenage reader of Seventeen magazine is hoping to change the title's practice of airbrushing images to make young girls appear flawless and thin.

Eighth-grader Julia Bluhm, 14, from Maine, delivered a 15,000-name petition to the Hearst magazine's editor-in-chief, Ann Shoket, on Wednesday calling for the magazine to publish at least one unaltered photo spread a month.

"A lot of my friends are happy in their skin, but I know people who aren't comfortable and wished they looked differently," said Bluhm, who dreams of becoming a professional ballet dancer and activist. "There are pictures all over the media that show photoshopped girls that have no flaws and they are perfect."

[Gormy Cuss]

1. A small town Maine girl who is trying to make a difference.

Good for her.

[TLM]

2. Why ask them to change?

Hey I just watched Superman, and I feel weak and inferior because I can’t fly or deflect bullets with my eyeball. I demand that the creators of Superman make him fat, slow, and weak… so I can feel better about myself.

Asking these kinds of publications to stop editing their pictures and use realistic images, is like sci-fi nerds demanding star wars and star trek shows remove the sound effects from space battles because there's no sound in space, and it’s not realistic.

If she does not like what they do, why not start up a mag that has real pictures of real people without airbrushing? Oh yeah, because that mag wouldn't sell, and would go bankrupt in about 15 minutes. Because if people want to see what real people look like, they can go outside.

[Whisp]

3. body image for girls and women is a bit different than your Superman woes.

young women are portrayed in magazines as thin perfections and far from the realities of what most of us look like. Men are not judged like that to that extent - unattractive men still get respect from others and gain their own self respect in that way. Young women are told more often and much louder lately that their only worth is their exterior and how best to make it look attractive to (mostly) unattractive males.

[fasttense]

4. It's not just at the movies.

And that's the problem. Superman is only in a movie and in stories about him. But girls and women are ALWAYS airbrushed and touched up to look like something they are not. It's very rare to see a normal woman in a magazine, movie, tv, internet and print of all forms.

Hell they don't even pair up fat old men with fat old ladies. They are always putting a pretty young thing as the love interest of a 70 year old man in movies and TV. When they pair up an old man with an appropriately aged woman, it is considered a daring and amazing thing.

In commercials they have 20 somethings pretending to be 60 and advertising wrinkle creams. Even in those commercials they can't bare to put up an image up of an old woman. It is so pervasive.

How do you think this constant taunt by the media makes young girls and women feel? Why do you think anorexia is our hysterical paralysis of Fraud's day and age?