Words: 956
The Ethics of Using Image Manipulation on magazine covers. You hear that beauty is only skin-deep, that it fades with time or is in the eye of the beholder. Every year people spend billions of dollars on products to try to look beautiful. Every day you see ads in newspapers and on magazine covers with beautiful men and woman that have been digitally altered. All the while wondering things like what kind of makeup is she wearing, is she really that thin, how does he get his teeth so white?
The answer is airbrushing or digitally altering the photo to remove pores, fine lines, or the bags under their eyes and may other items that most people do not even notice. With people seeing these images almost from birth now, is it ethical to use these false images as the perfect body type when it is not even their real body? With all the editing done to them should there be a disclaimer “warning digitally edited don’t try this at home”? Image manipulation is a tool used by magazines and newspapers to make their models look more appealing to the public.
There are many tools that take the image and put it in a computer then with programs like Photoshop or Paintshop pro they remove unwanted thing like in this photo of Country Singer Faith Hill; the first image is the non-altered image the second is after they manipulated it. As you can see there has been a major rework done on this photo they have removed bone, skin, fat, muscle, and have even added an arm. Looking at the changed photo you can see that this body type is impossible to achieve in nature; look at the left arm you can see that her elbow would be below her waist and that it would be thinner than the bone itself.
The cover of this magazine seems to be applauding her on her weight with a title of “The new Skinny Pills yes they work” implying that others could look this way when the publishers know that you cannot. In the United States people spend billions on beauty aids and surgeries so we can be thin and beautiful like the men and women on the covers of magazines. The reality of it is that we can never achieve this look that they have. Girls starting at a young age are encouraged to be thin and beautiful, we give them Barbie?? dolls to play with and makeup to look pretty.
In the article Eating Disorders they describe the Barbie dolls measurements showing how unrealistic her body type is and that it would be imposable to achieve in nature; they state “Barbie is part of the message that it’s better to be thin than not to be thin,” (Worsnop). Young girls read magazines like Seventeen and Cosmo Girl and see the models and diet ads and think “I’m fat” (Worsnop). This is leading to a nation of young children with eating disorders like Anorexia and bulimia. In the article “Is societal pressure to be thin to blame” it stats that It is not uncommon to find 8- and 12-year-olds with these disorders.
It is not just girls that the media targets men’s photos are now being touched up to look better. On this cover of Men’s Fitness tennis pro Andy Roddick is portrayed as having huge arms and a more filled out frame the second photo is the same man without the touch up. Andy Roddick gave a statement about the cover after seeing it for the first time ” I spent the last few weeks in Austin really focused on my training and getting back into shape…but pretty sure I’m not as fit as the Men’s Fitness cover suggests…little did I know I have 22 inch guns and a disappearing birth mark on my right arm.
I saw the cover for the first time when I landed after Rome I walked by the newsstand in the airport and did a total double take …if you can manage to stop laughing at the cover long enough, check out the article inside, the photo shoot on the boat was pretty cool. And I recognize the person in those photos…” so magazine companies are not even asking permission to alter these photos they just alter them regardless of the persons wishes. Is it ethical to edit the photos of a persons idol is it good for society, no one knows. Young girls and boys are dieting or developing eating disorders due in part to these types of ads and photos (Worsnop).
Models are thin to begin with some unhealthily so (Prah) and then magazines and newspapers go and edits their photos to make them look even thinner or worse force the models to lose even more weight or there career (Prah). If the fashion industry or magazine companies were held accountable for the images they showed and where not allowed to slim their female models or buff there male models then there might not be so many people with body images issues. Work Cited Prah, Pamela M. “Eating Disorders. ” CQ Researcher 16. 6 (2006): 121-144. CQ Researcher Online. CQ Press. PPCC library, Colorado Springs, CO. 5 Mar. 2008 http://library. qpress. com/cqresearcher/cqresrre2006021000 Worsnop, Richard L. “Eating Disorders. ” CQ Researcher 2. 47 (1992): 1097-1120. CQ Researcher Online. CQ Press. PPCC library, Colorado Springs, CO. 5 Mar. 2008 http://library. cqpress. com/cqresearcher/cqresrre1992121800 Redbook cover Advertisement. Most blatant use of Photoshop in magazine ads. Your cover INC. 5 Mar. 2008 http://www. yourcover. com/Most-Blatant-Uses-of-Photoshop-in-Magazines-Ads. jsp Men’s Fitness Advertisement. Most blatant use of Photoshop in magazine ads. Your cover INC. 5 Mar. 2008 http://www. yourcover. com/Most-Blatant-Uses-of-Photoshop-in-Magazines-Ads. jsp