Weekly Links ESO —55

Images from the videos

Tomorrow is International Women's Day and we have been watching these videos to get used to different acents, but also to think about the image media usually convey about women.

• Punk girl gets the makeunder** treatment and oh my!

** "Makeover" is a term applied to changing one's appearance, sometimes through cosmetics. "Makeunder" is the opposite: removing artificial enhancements to a person's appearance to give a more 'natural' look.

• Another video about women who react to their images being photoshopped: Photoshopping Real Women Into Cover Models.

An here is the transcript of this video:

A: Growing up I was kind of always self conscious, like wanting to look a certain way.
B: It's a never-ending battle.
C: And you look at yourself and you know you can never attain that ideal.
B: As I've gotten older, you see different changes.
D: I feel like have some wrinkles around my eyes.
C: I'm never going to be skinny. I'm not a skinny girl.
A: It can be hard when you see models and celebrities and like, you just don't look the same.

Photographer: Put out the arm, okay?

B: Wow.
C: Oh my God.
A: I did not expect it to look like that at all.
B: I feel like it doesn't even look like me.
D: I think because I know myself, this looks really different.
A: Why would you want to make someone look so different?
C: I like my freckles, I think that they add character. And the fact that they're gone, I don't even know who that is.
B: Just as a normal person, seeing yourself change and your identity change, it's pretty shocking.
D: Once someone else has done your makeup and someone else has done your hair and someone's directed the way your body looks and then taken away your imperfections then there's not much left of who you really are.
A: This is how I always wanted to see myself. But now that I see it, I'm, like, questioning why I ever wanted to look like that.
B: You look at these ads in magazines and you see these women who look absolutely flawless and you're like, "Ah. I wish I could look like that," but who really looks like this?
D: I think we live in this really interesting time where we feel like we have to make people look to the standard that's not attainable for anybody.
B: Instead of looking at other things and trying to aspire to be something else, we should just be comfortable in who we are and just try to be our best selves.
A: I think something that everybody should keep in mind is that it's natural to be critical of yourself, it's natural to be uncomfortable or awkward but you just to know that the ideal just doesn't exist.

Have a nice weekend.