It’s easy to blame the media, society or any other vague concept for public issues or even one’s own low self-esteem. But what is the media exactly? There are so many names and euphemisms that it goes by that it’s difficult to tell. The media is everything, essentially. Maybe it isn’t the rocks and the trees in the forests, but it’s essentially everything else. Our favorite breakfast cereal, television show, super-bowl advertisement, magazine, radio station, politically questionable news program, social-networking site, magazine, and soda pop are all directly associated with the media: gargantuan businesses that thrive off of selling people unnecessary products to mask insecurities the created by the media itself. The media negatively affects the way that we perceive ourselves and the world around us. Eating disorders and steroid useage are an epidemic, and people shake their heads wondering what is wrong with the world these days when the answer is simple.

What is beauty? Look to the makeup ads produced by the media, turn on the television, wait for a commercial, or look at the latest issue of Seventeen Magazine to find out. Not only, does the media influence what consumers purchase: it rearranges our priorities entirely. Somewhere around the time Nancy Reagan declared war on drugs, Hollywood declared war on fat. It is truly a travesty that eating, which is an essential function to human existence, has become so widely frowned upon. Models, movie stars and magazines glamorize an asinine ideal body type for men and women. Not only is the perfect body impossible to achieve, but once achieved it isn’t even healthy.

The glamorization of eating disorder is the greatest tragedy in the history of pop-culture. The number of people suffering from diseases anorexia and bulimia is skyrocketing worldwide. The state of American weight is polarizing. With two extremes: underweight and obese, the amount of healthy people is rapidly declining. The phony diet companies, worth billions of dollars, inflict never ending ads upon everyone through commercials aiming to sell pills and other useless products. Anorexia nervosa has the highest mortality rate of any mental illness. This statistic alone should be alarming enough to put a stop to the mindless skinny worshipping that is sculpted into the minds of children. But sadly, every day, vulnerable young girls are exposed to the Miss Universe competition, Victoria’s Secret Angels and other ringleaders of the hiatus such as Posh Spice, Kate Moss and Lindsay Lohan. As if growing up isn’t hard enough, girls are taught early on that thin is good and fat is bad which does unparalleled damage to their psyches. Internet sites Tumblr and Instagram glorify skinny bodies with protruding collar bones, hip bones and the great all-powerful thigh gap (space between the upper thighs which is typically only possible by means of self-starvation). At the checkout line of every supermarket, dozens of different magazines share the same goal: criticize celebrity beach bodies, and make women feel inadequate. Eating disorders, at any extremity level, are a legitimate problem to be taken seriously not widely encouraged by the new get-slim-fast detox scheme.

Approximately ninety-five percent of women do not have means to be considered attractive by the new socially-construed standards. The five percent who do temporarily possess this ever-coveted frame stagger several inches above average height. A woman meeting these criteria also tends to be roughly fifteen pounds under-weight, have breasts disproportionately large in comparison to the rest of her body, and a perky little buttock that barely squeezes into a size one pair of Guess skinny jeans. Once the body has passed inspection, and it will certainly be inspected, a young woman, and she must be young, still is not allowed to feel pretty until her face checks out. A pretty face is symmetrical, free of moles or blemishes, freshly tanned but not too orange. The features must be well made-up, accentuating full lips and high cheek bones. Eyes, preferably blue, should be outlined with pointy black eye liner and the lashes must be decorated with heavy mascara like they are in Cover Girl ads and red-carpet events. Not too much make up, that looks clownish. Eye makeup has to be even, or that would defeat whole symmetry thing. Beauty is hard. Imagine if women actually liked themselves, or weren’t taught to hate themselves; the cosmetic industry would go out of business.

This is not to dismiss the hardships endured by young men. Male eating disorders are becoming more prevalent than ever due to our body-obsessed culture and demanding weight cuts wrestling. It is a reasonable assumption that promoting disordered eating habits and emaciated bodies is a threat to everyone’s health and peace of mind. However, men typically struggle with different yet comparable issues. While women feel pressure to be slender and aesthetically pleasing, men are bombarded with ludicrous expectations of masculinity. In the nineteen sixties, G.I. Joe action figures became popular, leaving a macho-man standard for young boys to meet. Gigantic muscles, absolute toughness without a single feminine quality for that could mean homosexuality, a faux confident attitude, and athletic ability are all basic necessities for a man to be labeled desirable (vast financial resources don’t hurt either.) Strong male leads in movies virtually always possess these characteristics. James Bond, Indiana Jones, Bat Man, Super Man, Spider Man, and Magic Mike are a few characters whose bodies and egos normal men are forced to compete with.

Cinema isn’t the only opportunity for the male form to be critiqued. Just as women are told to look like models, men are being urged, at younger and younger ages, to look like professional athletes. This is dangerous, considering how many young boys participate in sports, idolize steroid pumping baseball, basketball and football players like A-rod, and have unrestricted access to anabolic steroids in their local gyms. Not only are they prohibited in sports, but steroid use causes a host of medical problems. Young boys grow up watching sports, and they are brainwashed into thinking that the overly muscular look is the only acceptable one. The portrayal of male bodies in the media seriously derails self-esteem during adolescence which may lead to poor body image, unhealthy nutritional or workout habits, and relationship problems later in life.

The real head-shaker with the media is if pretty women are supposed to be skinny, then why does everyone seem to be worshipping voluptuous beauties like Beyoncé, Kate Upton, Kim Kardashian and company? These are the so-called curvy girls do not exist as a realistic role model for young women, but as a male cop-out. These ridiculously fit narrow wasted bodies paired with exaggerated breasts and hips are no more attainable than their super skinny counterparts. Men are not evolutionarily designed to be attracted to stick thin runway type women with little reproductive capability. It doesn’t work like that, so ingenious marketers developed a simple solution: show more curvaceous over-sexualized women with pornographic qualities in movies, music videos and ad campaigns. Common women seem to be less offended, and men can hardly keep their pants on; it’s a win-win. Except for the woman who isn’t a thirty-six twenty-four thirty-six, she’s in a tough spot. By these standards, most of us don’t match up.

It honestly makes no difference whether the bodies exemplified in the media are that of Gods or couch potatoes; unfortunately, only one genre is considered acceptable. Intolerant body hate runs ramped on both ends of the weight spectrum. Real women are neither contractually obligated to be thin nor thick, curvy nor well-made-up. In order to be considered a sufficient man, one should not have to be a larger-than life, gym rat. From the limited information that I have learned in biology, the only prerequisite when it comes to being male or female is possession of proper anatomy, sex organs.

My disgruntled attitude towards the media isn’t that it shows some bodies are too picture-perfect. The problem is the media acts as if only one body type exists. I just find it despicable that so many young people feel inclined to harm their bodies in order to fit that one role. A seriously misguided, and occasionally airbrushed, image should not mandate the way we value ourselves as human beings. There is more than one body type, so it is unfair that television, movies, and magazines only sport one look when there is such vast diversity in the world. What is shown in the media trickles down into every aspect of life. This wouldn’t be such a bad thing if the messages sent weren’t so heavily afflicted with self-loathing. The monstrous media has far too great of an impact on every-day people’s lives and seems to be inescapable. We will continue to be surrounded by this delusional plague on society but do not have to be victimized madness. Each individual has something of value to offer, and I fear that by over-emphasizing the importance of physical appearance, the media will create a sickly shallow society that is entirely destructive.