The complicated truth about social media and body image




Now that influencers fill up our Instagram feeds, it's easy to understand that social media, is mostly bad when it comes to body image. This has become more obvious with the popularization of social media, where the so-called “influencers” tend to fake happiness, health and high social status by promoting their “luxurious” and “perfect” lives in shamelessly edited photos, thus inspiring Illusory superiority in their followers. Many of us realize that the beautiful, often highly-edited images of people we see on social media make us feel worse about our own bodies.


 Most of these influencers are paid to promote a certain product they say they like by over-exaggerating its beneficial properties merely because they are getting paid. So, maintaining positive illusions by endorsing questionable items and standards shows how two-faced they could be. Just because they have admirers and are somehow popular doesn’t mean it is acceptable to lie to people and create a deceptive image of themselves for their followers to aspire to.


 Moreover, it has come to my attention that even magazines photoshop their covers to such an extreme degree that their impact on adolescents’ health and psychological well-being tends to be detrimental as the expectations are rather unrealistic and unachievable.
Undoubtedly, using social media does appear to be correlated with body image concerns. I have come across so many pop-up ads about extreme photoshopping apps many a time and it is really disturbing that they have so many customers among the younger population- they clearly set unattainable and unhealthy body image standards. It is certainly frightening how easy it is to get your hands on an application like that-even on your phone, and for free.  This is why social media has become a hazardous place not only for people suffering from low self-esteem, or depression, but for everyone who is even slightly unconfident or self-conscious.  

At this point the standards of the human body set by the media all over the world are remarkably impossible to achieve. That is why more men and women of all ages and of different financial and social statuses are undertaking dangerous plastic surgeries. Many people often starve themselves, over-train or even develop eating disorders in order to alter their bodies and achieve these idealistic expectations. Research suggests that “fitspiration” images in particular – which typically feature beautiful people doing exercise, or at least pretending to – might make you harsher on yourself.
You should preach and practice self- love, not Self(ie) love. When it comes to posting our own pictures on social media, selfies tend to be the focus. How many photos of yourself do you take until you take the “perfect” one to post on social media? Is it ten, twenty, or seventy-five? Do you retouch yourself using an app or filters? Are you focused on aspects of what you don't like about the way you look, rather than on the ones you like? How often do you check your notifications to see who has liked the photo?


There’s this rollercoaster of feeling anxious and then getting reassurance from other people that you look good. But that probably doesn’t last forever, and then you take another selfie…
Our bodies shouldn’t conform to “one size fits all”. Our faces shouldn’t be filtered to the point of losing their distinctive features. Yet, we continue to endorse such behavior by praising people who photoshop and alter their appearance on social media instead of applauding the uniqueness and variety of natural beauty, and encourage people not to be ashamed of their appearance. It is a pity that so many people crop their bodies in order to fit in the society’s expectations. My advice is to take a break from social media, and engage in other activities that have nothing to do with appearance and comparing yourself to other people; this might just help you remember there’s more to life than what you look like.        




Автор: Мария Давидкова

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