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    • Audrey Versus the Media

    Every day, we are bombarded by anywhere from 400 to 600 images from the media. Each ad is a trap, a way for advertisers to reach into our pockets and take our money. Sometimes it amazes me the lengths to which these advertisers will go to.

    Sometimes, I can't even tell what is being advertised. For example, the following picture:

    And what is being advertised here? It's an ad for fragrance. And I'm sure she's wearing the fragrance, but she sure isn't wearing anything else.

    The Facts:

  • 69% of female television characters are thin, only 5% are overweight (Silverstein, Peterson, Perdue & Kelly, 1986).

  • Irving (1990) found that subjects exposed to slides of thin models consequently presented with lower self-evaluations than subjects who had been exposed to average and oversize models. The results also showed that all subjects experienced the greatest pressure to be thin from the media, followed by peers and then family.

  • Richins (1991) found that exposure to idealized images lowered subjects' satisfaction with their own attractiveness. Stice and Shaw (1994) studied subjects' reactions to pictures of thin models in magazines. Their results indicated that exposure to the thin ideal produced depression, shame, guilt, body dissatisfaction, and stress. Stice et al. (1994) found a direct relationship between media exposure and eating disorders symptoms.

    Until the media starts portraying real women and men as beautiful, we will be living up to an impossible (and unhealthy) ideal. Where will it end?

    You might think I'm foolish, starting such a project on a little-known website. But, in spite of (or maybe because of) the odds against me, I will take on the media and the billions of dollars it spends to lure the innocent.

    The battle has not yet begun.

    Most Wanted List:


    At this rate, they're not going to be wearing the advertised clothes for long. Emporio Armani.


    Bebe wants you to wear more makeup than clothes. And note the new trend: hold you clothes up with your hands. Look ma, no buttons!


    Sexy saddles? Michael Kors thinks so.
    cK truth: all you need to wear?


    Ungaro says: Open wide!


    As my friend Kayla said, "What? That's an ad for jeans?" Versace.


    Usually, people who can afford Louis Vuitton can afford blouses.