How Sexy Can a Woman Feel​, If She Hates Her Body?

"How sexy can a woman feel, if she hates her body?"

A statement made by Jean Kilbourne in her TEDx talk about the dangers of hyper sexualized and unrealistic images of women in American culture. ​For years, magazine ads and different media chose to perpetrate negative and dangerous protrayals of women's bodies, what it should look like and what it should do. Kilbourne went through multiple slides of sexist, unhealthy, sexual, and misogynoir snapshots of ads published beginning the late 60's to the late 2000's.

As the slides played through the fashion ads I noticed the focus moved from being women being objectified to unrealistic body expectations and sex appeal. Most ads focused on over glamorizing sex as well as listing imperfections and other common insecurties to sell products; It was targeted to women byt the underlying message was to please men. I'll admit I was disgusted by the blatant display of sexism, however, it made me realize without it the fashion industry would not be the trillion dollar industry it is now; if they didn't make us hate our bodies the economic pillars would collapse. Consumers (aka EVERY DAY WOMEN) spend so much money to feel/look beautiful, some unfortunately, become heavily influenced by these images and spiral into low self esteem.

Personally, seeing thin white women glorified as beautiful is not new for me. t's difficult to lobe yourself just the way you are when the culture you're in tells you you're not. Kilbourne truthfully said, So the image is impossible for everyone, but particularly for women of color, who are considered beautiful only insofar as they resemble the white ideal: light skin, straight hair, Caucasian features, round eyes." I resonated with this heavily because I know in Ethiopian culture skin color shows what region a person is from. In the time of racist government regimes, being a lighter skin tone gave you a higher status or advantage, such as being seen as the epitome of beauty, over others. This is not any different than the colorist/racist definition of black beauty in American culture.

We can all agree times are changing so I ask, Have we made the hyper sexualization a sign of empowerment? Being proud of body positivity and sex, is it really that bad?

Stay Cultured,

Red