a look at how multi billion dollar industries (cosmetics, dieting, cosmetic surgery, pornography, mass media) set impossible beauty standards and reap large profits by making women feel insecure about their appearance.
contact: aseachange [at] gmail [dot] com
On hiatus.
NYTimes : In Novels for Girls, Fashion Trumps Romance
“Heroines no longer become women through romance, they become feminine through consumption.”
feminist writer & doctor
speaking in Madrid at the World Congress of Women, July 4th 2008
currently working on my film treatment.
RTNDA Convention
Chicago, October 15, 1958
I’m sorry, but a long, long time ago, when I was in high school (mid-late 1990s, private school), I – or my friends for that matter – would have never, ever envisioned spending $768 on a handbag.
The mere idea of making such an extravagant purchase would have never even crossed our minds.
I also spent every high school summer studying English in Los Angeles, meeting and befriending other teenage girls and boys from the U.S., Germany, Japan, Spain, Turkey – you name it. And we never ever lusted after such things. We didn’t even discuss fashion or luxury items. Period. “Mom, I saw a $768 bag on Rodeo Drive, can I have it?” would have been met by incredulity – and would have probably generated a good scolding.
I remember noticing a shift in attitudes while I was a junior in college in the U.S. An enormous sea change in the way freshman and visiting high school girls dressed. I would see 18 year olds obsessed with Marc Jacobs and designer handbags. Not to mention expensive Juicy Couture items. This puzzled me for a while. Then the girls pining over these things became younger and younger. Middle school girls. And after a while it just became the norm.
The triumph of capitalism. Yippie! (not)
The Beauty Myth & Teenage Girls : Gossip Girl
“Thanks to the point-and-click shopping on its Web site and the fees it charges some brands to be featured in the series, “Gossip Girl” has been able to profit from its power to generate trends. It is not the first show to collect revenues from product tie-ins, but it probably is the first to have been conceived, in part, as a fashion marketing vehicle.”
The Guardian (UK) : Now, the Backlash
The sex industry is booming, the rape conviction rate is plummeting, women’s bodies are picked over in the media, abortion rights are under serious threat and top business leaders say they don’t want to employ women. It all adds up to one thing … an all-out assault on feminism. But why? And what’s to be done about it, asks Kira Cochrane
