Commercializing ourselves

For a long while now, there's been a big voice for the 'average' American woman. A voice telling us that we are beautiful just the way we are. That we're not SUPPOSED to look like the models on TV or in magazines. Even Dove has a campaign teaching young girls about appreciating themselves, where they even made this video -

which is actually a REALLY cool video.

And just today I watched a HILARIOUS mock commercial created by one of my favorite bloggers "Single Dad Laughing" you can find here-
Muffin Man's Magic Weight-Loss Muffin Mix

Unfortunately, we can tell ourselves we are how God made us, and beautiful just how we are. We can even sing ourselves "Beautiful" by Christina Aguilera, and try to feel better about ourselves. But when it comes down to it, how much do we REALLY believe, and how much do we commercialize ourselves? Look at the woman who is singing that song, after all. My God, it's Christina Aguilera- the 'Genie in a Bottle' herself.

Yeah, Christina- you're beautiful. We don't need you to spell it out.

Maybe that's why I love Jennifer Aniston so much.

Even in a super sexy, shoulder bearing photo shoot such as this one, Jennifer doesn't need bleach blond hair, heavy make up, and breasts hanging out all over the place to look absolutely amazing. She just is who she is, without having to be trashy to make it work.

I'm not saying there's anything WRONG with make up. I have a SUPER hot friend who does the most awesome job on her make up, and even does tutorials

I'm just saying that she doesn't NEED that make up to look beautiful. And hopefully she knows that.

It's hard being a woman this day and age. Well, I'm sure it was hard being a woman for most of the 20th century, however, with internet and television as important as it is today, there's SO much more pressure on us to look a certain way. While the mid-19th-century women had their own expectations to deal with, they were lucky enough to only have to see what they were 'supposed' to look like in magazines or newspapers.

Back then it was easier to close the magazine or newspaper and go on with your life.
For us 21st century women, we have a lot more competition for our self esteem. Magazines, television, billboards, newspapers, internet ads.... it's no wonder there's such a problem with the way our society views its women, and how we view ourselves.

My daughter is 8 years old, and occasionally for the last 2 years she has asked me questions about her body. One of which being, 'do [I] think she's fat?'. I'm not sure I've ever felt the sadness that I feel when she does this. And I know it's from the commercials she sees on television, as I am very careful not to complain about my looks in her presence. I want her to see a confident mother with self esteem, so she can look up to me. If I went around saying how I REALLY felt about myself, she'd look at herself with the same disdain. And who wants their daughter to grow up hating themselves? I'm sure my mom didn't.

Unfortunately the world isn't going to change... not in my lifetime anyway. It's probably only going to get worse. Sadly, we don't have enough Queen Latifah's out there either, promoting LOVE for our curves.

Instead our daughters are seeing crap like

THIS

(that would be Lindsay Lohan, if you couldn't tell)

Or this

Or this

(Paris Hilton)

And let's not even get started on the Halloween costumes.

The sad fact is that until EVERYONE changes their view on women, nothing is going to change.

When THIS

becomes as sexy as THIS

then I think our society will be on the right track.

But as long as Olay tells us we need to look younger, Botox says we need to look poutier, Hollywood shows us we need breast implants and liposuction, and Revlon tells us we need longer eyelashes, Dove, Jennifer, and the Queen's voices are going to be hard to hear.