Nowadays social media plays an enormous role in everyone’s life, but what we see on the Internet and even in magazines is not always that truthful. Over the past couple years the issue of Photoshop has become abundantly worse. It’s hard to believe what you see, because almost everything is altered to an unrealistic standard.
When you look at a photo of someone famous on the Internet you often think, “How does she/he have such an amazing body?” Half of the photos we look at on social media or in a magazine literally look like these people are starving themselves. Now, of course it’s important to be fit and healthy, but these photos present characteristics that just seem a little too perfect.
It’s ridiculous that companies feel the need to digitally shrink a women’s waist, slim down her upper arms, or enhance her inner thighs. Everyone has their own individual body that they should be proud of, and all Photoshop is doing is just making others feel insecure about themselves.
Many people think that all these celebrities and famous people probably ask for their photos to be altered so that they can look as perfect as possible, but actually that’s not the case. Many celebrities have actually gotten very angry over what Photoshop is doing to their body. Kate Winslet was one of the first to speak out about this issue after she took action against GQ magazine for, “digitally altering her body in its photographs-making her unrealistically thin” (Huffington Post). She was perfectly pleased with the way her body originally looked and found it very offensive that these people still felt she needed to be altered. No one is perfect, nor should they be. Companies are abusing the tool of Photoshop and trying to display these images to the public that are technically impossible to achieve.
Another celebrity, Zendaya, was dismayed when she saw how her body was “manipulated” in her final photos for the Modelista magazine. On Instagram she posted the original picture side-by-side with the retouched shot, saying how shocked she was to find her, “hips and torso quite manipulated” (Time). She even further stated that, “These are the things that make women self conscious, that create the unrealistic ideals of beauty that we have.” It’s extremely sad that people can’t be happy with their natural beauty. It always has to be altered in some way, and that’s so wrong. Photoshop is dominating media way too much!
Every women and even men are naturally self-conscious about their body, and all these reformed pictures of different models and celebrities are not helping in any way. The detrimental effect of these images on young girls and boys is serious and statistically proven. You open a magazine and you see a girl that’s extremely skinny, or a guy that has an eight pack, of course you’re going to say, “I wish I could look like that,” and that’s the big issue here. No individual should ever be self-conscious about their body. It has been proven that “40-60 percent of elementary school girls (ages 6-12) are concerned about their weight” (NEDA). Also, in just the U.S., “20 million women and 10 million men suffer from a eating disorder at some time in their life” (NEDA). This is a serious wake up call and proof that the use of Photoshop needs to be reduced dramatically, and should stop trying too take away the natural beauty one is born with.
If you thought Photoshop was already causing a lot of problems, wait till you hear this. Recently a new program has been developed called Adobe Voco, which, is like Photoshop for the voice. This software makes it possible to take an audio recording and, “rapidly alter it into words and phrases the original speaker never said” (BBC). This can cause a lot of trust issues in journalism, and definitely create problems in other fields as well. It’s not something people should be proud or happy about, it’s like we are living in a world of lies.
Yes, Photoshop can be useful in certain situations, and if the person wants it like, to clear up a bad break out they had that day, but unfortunately it’s often used for way more than that. Companies are taking advantage of this software and completely manipulating these individuals’ bodies. Worst of all, it’s young girls and boys who see it, believe it, and then feel bad about themselves. Maybe it’s time people show their real selves; being “perfect” is getting kind of boring.