Do Media Cause Individuals to Develop Negative Body Images?

Over the weekend we were assigned, as a class, Issue 4, regarding if media causes individuals to develop negative body images.

I strongly agree with this issue. Media is often accused of representing images that result in people's negative behaviors. Although the media is constantly in our face, we as the viewers, have the choice to let it influence us or not. We know that media have some influence over the way some people construct their ideas of reality, but the most difficult considerations have to do with who is affected, and under what conditions.

Fat has become something to be feared, and grooming  practices and fashion are "sold" as imperatives for both men and women. Maintaining a fit body is no longer viewed as a personal choice, but as an obligation to the public good and a requirement for good citizenry. Rarely ever do we see more realistic but still presumably healthy bodies in the media. My big question is, what is so wrong with women who have a shapely body? Advertisements are also going so far as to not only feature slim models, but they are now using airbrush, and photoshop, to make the subject have an hourglass body.

Men are given the status of subjects while women are objects. Both women and girls come to experience themselves as if someone were looking at them as an object and evaluating themselves based on appearance and their successful presentation of self as an object.