Blog Post #2- Elizabeth Kvil
What really stuck out to me throughout unit one is when we have covered the topic of technological determinism. “Technology as external agent that acts upon and changes society” relates to what is happening now. Technology has affected our lives in various ways throughout the years that people started using it. An example that we have covered in class was how girls struggle with eating disorders and self esteem issues because of Instagram. It is clear that the models or those influencers that we see on social media are not all 100% authentic. However, unfortunately younger girls (or even older) tend to put them all on a pedestal and look up to them. It is sad to see that when girls do this, they start changing themselves and their bodies as well. I was reading a Reddit post in regards to Brandy Melville and the concerns about the brand. Brandy Melville is a brand where there is one size fits all and that is how it has been advertised for years but the size does not actually fit all. This one mom wrote how she bought her daughter some clothes from that store but they ended up not being her daughter's size. As time went on, she saw that her daughter started not eating as much and was losing a lot of weight. Her daughter had to start going to the hospital and therapy all because of these clothes that the smaller models wear. In the end, social media is all for show and these photos that the girls look up to should start becoming more real to show that not everyone is perfect.
I really enjoyed reading your post! I completely agree with you, many social media platforms, primarily Instagram, can be extremely harmful to people's self-esteem and confidence and this unfortunately has many negative consequences. I was not aware that Brandy Melville was only "one size fits all". I can only imagine just how detrimental this must be to girls, especially teenage girls, who might not necessarily fit into this size. While I understand the convenience that Brandy Melville might be trying to provide their consumers by designing their products like this, I believe that the negative impacts on people's self-esteem outweigh the potential benefits of this policy.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading your post! I personally have bought some items from Brandy Melville and have experienced a similar experience with the sizing dilemma. Essentially, I would argue that this specific brand promotes an unrealistic body stereotype to the youth, instead of inclusivity. Furthermore, the impact of this brand’s “one size fits all” goes beyond clothing and can cause self-esteem issues. While I can not argue that this brand is doing so intentionally, I can argue that both parties involved (buyer and seller) would benefit from Brandy Melville implementing a wider size range. Therefore, this would promote inclusivity and eliminate some of the negative stigma associated with this brand. In the makeup industry, most brands used to only offer a wide range of foundation shades for caucasian skin tones. Therefore, people of different cultures were less likely to find a foundation that best suits their skin tone. Recently, more brands are starting to become more inclusive, such as Fenty Beauty, Pat McGrath, and Morphe to offer a larger range of shades. It is unfortunate that in the 21st century this is still an ongoing issue, but I hope brands become influenced by some of the few I have listed.
ReplyDeleteExcellent discussion post; you incorporated social media's harsh realities and truths on teenagers' lives, having the pressure of fitting in with society's standards. Technological determinism is an important, influential factor that acts upon all aspects of life; it changes how we live and go on with our lives which is a great point you brought up. Brandy Melville is a well-known brand that has great influencers that projects negative body imaging to the internet through having models that only fit a size 'small' but is deemed to fit all. I believe it's not suitable to input these ideas for little girls like the one you mention to be disappointed and deceived. In class, we talked about power as hegemony, which is the capacity to influence the standards individuals use to determine their goals, which correlates to the little girl as she wants to fit in with society's standards of fitting the 'one size fits all' clothes. Hence, she resorted to eating less to lose weight to fit in, as she may think it is necessary at her age, as teenagers' minds are in a delicate place to fit in with everyone through hegemony.
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