Beauty Is In the Eye of the Man

I would like to start with a little bit of background information to give a sense of my frame of mind and maybe some better understanding. As a white male, with the many priveleges associated, growing up was a time of clear right and wrong, good and bad, natural and unatural. Life was so good to me that I did not have time to recognize other peoples problems, only my own. I lived this way until I was a teenager and realized that other peoples problems were often bigger than mine and needed to be recognized as well.

After reading Naomi Wolf's, The Beauty Myth, I began to think back to my childhood and see how a lot of the things she said were very apparent. I saw, and still see, the effects that the media had on my sister and female cousin. Both of them have had security issues growing up, as mostly any other girls would. When I saw these things happening to them I saw them as objects of nature, not products of male dominant media and society. What I also did not see was how there was a message hidden in my sisters's and cousins' cause for suffering. The media has given females close to me, and everywhere, a false image of "beauty", and with it oppression and suffering. The media has given me, and other men everywhere, a false sense of superioty and ignorance.

In a way, the white male dominated media is mediating all of our thoughts and beliefs. Minorities are not the only ones being oppressed anymore. A step in achieving equality would be shattering the medias false image of women. Replacing the image would be very difficult as well.