Are you contented with the way you look? If you will ask me the same question then I would say NO. In this day and age, the positive self-esteem of individuals has grown to be more reliant on their physical magnetism. As what you can observe in the Media Industry or even just within the UP Community, a number of individuals go to extreme measures every now and then to revolutionize their looks through drugs, radical diets or luxurious cosmetic surgeries.
I am a Victim of Gendered Media. I am one of those who struggle with my self-image because of my daily exposure to the standards of beauty for men and physical ideals displayed throughout the popular media. As the saying goes, every one of us is unique. All of us are one of a kind. But nonetheless, this adage is starting to be outdated. Instead of upholding individuality among human race, what happens now is uniformity. Most of us obey the rules, the ideal standards of beauty set by the society.
I would like better to have a guy who is Tall, Dark and Handsome – More often than not, this is what you hear before from the ladies when they are asked of the qualities of a man that they would want to be with. Perhaps, there may still be some who retains these qualities as the standards for ideal beauty for men but we cannot refute the truth that ladies also fix their eyes at muscular bodies and rock-hard abs. As a result, the self-esteem of Men for this generation has been associated to muscular development and physical strength.
I cannot help but to be flooded with images of what the society considers to be ‘perfect people.’ When I watch the television, look at big billboards and skim some pages in the magazines, what I see are images of what is considered as an ideal body for a man. Then, I begin to raise the question: “Is that what a real man is supposed to look like?” Low body fat and lots of muscle make you look “cut” or “ripped” -- and that is what is portrayed as attractive. Throw in a narrow waist and large shoulders, giving the body a V-shaped torso and you have the idealized male body. If you do not have this, Pop Culture tells you that ‘You are not Worthy unless You Look Perfect.’
Moreover, not being able to meet the ideal Male Body according to the society also affects the way we handle and behave while we are in an intimate relationship. I begin to be paranoid and too much concerned with the way my partner is evaluating me, how I look and smell. I start to be ashamed, detach emotionally and mentally from sexual situations and begin not to be attentive to my partner’s needs or open with my own.
Another issue, it is not just the women who are dissatisfied with their bodyweight. Men do also. The men were evenly divided between two camps. One group of men felt they were overweight. The other group of men thought they were underweight. This study suggests that men have two pressures –- the pressure to be lean and the pressure to build large muscles. Obviously, I belong to the second group.
Now, we see how powerful Media is in shaping the way we think and see ourselves. What we see on TV and in magazines eventually become our standard of reality and desire. If I have a rounded belly or not firm bicep, it will be like a gross or unfortunate flaw for the Media. How can I not feel bad about my own body? This builds pressure to look like the media images that we see and this sometimes brings dangerous consequences.
For my case, I am spending more time, money and energy on looking “good.” I am spending more money on fragrances, facial creams, hair products, , but I have not reached the point of deciding whether to have plastic surgery or not. It is a good thing that I do not talk to my parents yet about crash diets or liposuction. I do not even use performance-enhancing substances such as over-the-counter supplements or anabolic steroids, restricting food to a dangerous degree or taking potentially harmful substances because it would really be a big problem. The only worst moments I had because of not being able to meet the ideal standards of Male Beauty is depression and having low self-esteem.
We need to be live in a world where it is acceptable to be thin and equally acceptable not to be thin. This planet is not just made for those who are considered to be ‘Perfect People’ according to the society. They do not own the earth. I own a part of this world and I should be getting what I deserve: EQUITY and EQUALITY.
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