“If you can squeeze it, we can freeze it!”
If driving through beauty-obsessed Los Angeles alone didn’t make me feel bad enough about myself, seeing this ad for liposuction plastered across a huge billboard in a skyline of gyms and juice bars did. This advertisement bluntly stated the message beauty corporations have been pushing for years—if you don’t have a perfectly rail-thin body, you should, and you can, for the right price.
Most advertisers send this message more subtly. They take a naturally attractive model, apply just enough makeup to accentuate her features, Photoshop her flaws until she is impossibly beautiful, and then present her to us as if her look were effortless. It doesn’t matter what product is being sold, because the formula is always the same. People don’t want or care about the product: they want to be like her.
The problem is that filling magazines, television programs, and billboards with women who are impossibly attractive distorts female consumers’ perception of how they are supposed to look. As a result of this unrealistic standard, women are becoming increasingly insecure about their bodies and looks.
The high levels of insecurity have created a new market that companies are beginning to exploit. Instead of attempting to sell beauty, these companies are selling confidence. They present “regular” women stripped of makeup, often in minimal clothing, and make uplifting remarks. The bottom line of all these ads is “You are beautiful.”
These are the ads that get shared on Facebook or Twitter because they are #empowering and #inspiring. They are lauded by the media for sending out a positive message to young women. It seems like these companies have figured it all out. Problem solved! All women have to do is watch the latest Dove campaign and they become filled with confidence.
But that’s not even close to true.
These commercials are not just ineffective, but they are also counterproductive because they are, just like their counterparts, centered around women’s appearances. It is, however, impossible to eradicate the insecurity of feeling insufficiently attractive by backhandedly reinforcing the importance of physical attractiveness. It creates a twisted notion for women by inadvertently saying, “You should feel confident and happy, but only because you are beautiful.”
Why is it so important to be beautiful? Why are millions of dollars spent on campaigns to make girls feel beautiful? Why do organizations hang up post-its saying it in girls’ bathrooms and SharpIe it on walls? Why is it our go-to compliment for women?
I have been forced to swallow “You are beautiful” in all of these circumstances and not once has it ever felt like a compliment. Instead, it has always felt like a barrier because the message gently suggests that beauty is the highest thing a woman can hope to achieve.
Society inflicts pressure on males to look a certain way as well, but it never seems to be the most important thing. When men are insecure, they are not told they are handsome. There is no “you are handsome” campaign. Men are not manipulated in the same way or to the same degree women are. They are told they need the product in order to get the job or win the game or pick up the girl. While men are portrayed as active agents with the ability to accomplish anything they desire, women are the passive objects with the potential to be desirable.
So why do we continue to laud companies that tell women they are beautiful, praising them for supposedly changing the narrative?
Companies are not trying to inspire confidence. They are only trying to sell their products in the most effective way possible.
Companies need to take the messages they are sending out more seriously. Media plays an important role in how women perceive themselves. Perhaps instead, there should be campaigns run telling young girls they should be kind because kindness is attractive and powerful. There should be advertisements designed to empower women by showing women’s potential to effect positive changes in the world.
Before we tell girls they are beautiful, we should tell them they are funny or intelligent or thoughtful or creative and that all of those qualities are meaningful ones to have. We should tell girls they are meaningful. We should tell them they are worth more than their image.
