The mental health ramifications of pop culture's obsessive fantasy of youth and beauty for women

Model Ana Carolina Reston before photo

The mental health ramifications of pop culture's obsessive fantasy of beauty and youth for women. Our culture is obsessed with ideas of beauty and youth, especially for women. Unfortunately, what our culture and our media present as the ideals of beauty are a lie. And they are certainly have nothing to do with health.

Through the use of models, which our culture now likes to call 'supermodels' to emphasize how amazing they are, our media and advertisers try to convince us that the ideal woman is five foot eleven inches tall and weighs about 117 pounds. And, of course, it helps to be 20 years old.

According to the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute's online Body Mass Index (BMI) calculator, the media's version of the ideal woman has a BMI of 16.3, even though a normal and healthy BMI is between 18.5 and 25. This means that our media and advertisers would have us believe that the ideal woman weighs a great deal under what would be considered their lowest healthy weight (which would be 133 pounds for a woman who is 5 foot 11 inches). Incidentally, the World Health Organization considers a BMI of less than 16 to be at risk for starvation.

This media and culture obession with presenting dangerously underweight women as the "ideal"
of beauty puts incredible stress on the minds and bodies of girls as young as eight years old.
The result is that adolescent girls feel pressure to be thinner even when they are at perfectly
normal and healthy weights. Some sites dedicated to eating disorders suggest that as many as 40-60%  of teenage girls in America who are already at healthy weights are trying to lose weight.

Calorie restriction among growing and physically developing young women is not only dangerous to
their developing bodies but also fails to provide proper nutrition to their developing brains. Psychiatry and psychology are huge fields in this country, and one would be hard pressed to find a professional in those fields who would not acknowledge the damage that a hostile mental environment can cause to children or adolescents (and even adults)..

It is generally accepted that children who are subjected to constant criticism that they are stupid or ugly are suffering from a form of child abuse. America needs to address the cultural child abuse that we inflict on our daughters when we let the media and advertisers tell them they are too fat if they are not bone thin.

And it does not stop with just telling them that beauty can only be achieved through an unnaturally low weight. They are also told that their lips, eyes, noses, hair and skin should be all be perfect: Not too dry, not too oily, not too big or wide, or too thin or small. They should have absolutely no blemishes or wrinkles, and their skin should be neither too light nor too dark. The advertisers want them to look at the photos of the so-called supermodels to see how perfect they are supposed to be.

If the body is not perfect, they can fix that also. It is interesting that a culture which uses ultra-thin models as the epitome of health and beauty also places an extraordinarily high emphasis on the importance of firm and well shaped breasts. This provides an interesting challenge to those trying to achieve the media and culturally idealized view of women because it is not possible to have large natural breasts when you have a very low BMI. Breasts are fatty tissue. Fortunately for the media and advertisers, padded bras and plastic surgery can augment those bone thin bodies with curves in just  the right spots.

The little secret that the advertisers and media have, of course, is professional make-up artists and
hair stylists, high tech lighting, and computer manipulation of the digital images before they are
released to the public. What that means is that they can manipulate the model's images just as they
are trying to manipulate the public into buying the products they are trying to sell.

The reason they present an unrealistic view of the perfect woman is that they want people to believe
that it can be achieved by spending money. Our culture is dominated by products and procedures we can purchase to be perfect, and the vast majority of those products are directed at women, and the damage being done to the mental health of the young women of America is tragic. What makes it even worse is that the cultural pressure put on women to be perfect also puts them at a financial disadvatage because of all the money that our culture demands they spend in order to be acceptable.

Many women in the workplace are told that they must wear pantyhose and make-up in addition to stylish clothes in order to be professional. In most cases, it makes one wonder what profession they are thinking about. To be fair to the men (usually) who have made the decision as to what is acceptable and professional for women to wear to the office, it must be noted that they also are victims of the culture, media, and advertising around them.

It is a frequent theme among many women that they feel a great deal of stress because of expectations that they are supposed to meet. Unrealistic and unacheivable expectations that are culture-wide provide a great deal of that stress. Much of it comes from the time, energy, thought, and worry about meeting those expectations, and much of it can also come from the financial investment they are expected to make in order to look as  beautiful as they are supposed to be.

Of course advertisers want people to consume their products. That is the business they have chosen. But Americans need to think about the consequences of what they allow their culture to value. To be healthy, one must be sound of  both mind and body. And it would be a good start if the medical community in the United States started to emphasize that fact.

Instead, the American medical community has chosen to became one of the purveyors of products and procedures to feed the lie. Nip, tuck, tighten, smooth, enhance, and inject to be more desireable and beautiful. Even if you are no longer young, they have something to sell you that can make you look or feel that way. It's all available for the right price. Do they call it plastic surgery because you can use your credit card?

Unfortunately, the mental health community is pretty quiet about the issue publicly. But Americans can always  contact their mental health professional and schedule an appointment to talk about it. And if one is fortunate enough to have health insurance, it might even be covered. And if talking doesn't do the trick, Americans can be sure there is a pill available. That seems to be the motto nowadays, "If we can't fix it, we can give you medication so that you don't think about it anymore." It's nothing new. Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones were singing about "Mother's Little Helper" over 40 years ago.

For the sake of the children of America, especially the young women, maybe we should get off the pills for a while and think about what we are doing with our lives and our country. How many cases of eating disorders, or years of therapy, or suicides do we need before we make a change?

The photo to the left is also of Ana Carolina Reston shortly before her death from anorexia. Thanks to Wikipedia.

Mark Rubi, September 16, 2009

Photo notes:  The Ana Carolina Reston photos are copyrighted photos. The author of this article does not own the copyrights. They are being used under "Fair Use" in United States Copyright Law to illustrate the dangers of eating disorders which resulted in the death of Ms. Reston. Any other use of
the photos may be considered copyright infringement.

• The Mayo Clinic
• The National Institute for Mental Health
• Women's Health.gov