By Rachel Smith

Staff Writer

Magazines and advertising companies are beginning to give into demands for natural beauty.

Key movements from 2012 on seem to suggest that the beauty industry is changing to relieve social problems associated with low body-image. CSUSM’s opinion on the matter is examined.

On Feb. 5, 2014, the Cougar Chronicle released the article ‘Reshaping Perception: The Vogue Image Creating Controversy’ by fashion columnist Alex Maravillas, regarding the subject of utilizing Photoshop in fashion magazines and manipulating images for unrealistic expectations of beauty.

As image retouching  has been a trend in advertising for decades, CSUSM students  were not surprised when the Vogue controversy erupted.

“People these days are far too much into looks and should be into learning more,” one student wrote anonymously in an in-person survey conducted by the Chronicle.

“Many magazines, especially fashion magazines do not portray “average” people. People should not compare themselves to them,” another participant wrote in the online version of the survey.

Learning more is exactly what some magazines are beginning to do. Back in 2012, a petition with over eighty-thousand signatures was filed by a fourteen-year-old girl against Seventeen Magazine, hoping to “celebrate every kind of beauty.” This spurred a movement in many magazines and even advertisements for lines like, Aerie, American Eagle’s lingerie line that launched in January. This is an astonishing advancement and may continue in the coming years, as the need to change negative perceptions of beauty and the levels of self esteem, in both men and women become apparent.

Out of 102 participants in a survey handed out on campus, 58 female respondents, 38 male respondents and six who didn’t specify their gender, 29.26 percent of people that read magazines primarily focus on the entertainment. Also to be noted, many of the individuals at CSUSM who took this survey have a higher opinion of their friends of the same sex than they do themselves. Participants were asked to rate themselves on a scale of one to 10 on agreeing with the statement “I am an attractive person.” The majority of people at 52.57 percent viewed themselves at a seven or lower and 39.17 percent responded as an eight or higher. Eight individuals (8.24 percent) declined to respond. But when looking at the attractiveness of their friends, 34.02 percent answered that their friends of the same sex were at a seven or lower, while an overwhelming turnaround showed that those at eight and above were 56.70 percent.

“Attractiveness sadly determines a lot of how people are treated in life even if attractiveness is socially constructed,” one survey participant answered in the in-person survey.

As seen in a social experiment sponsored by Dove in 2013, a forensic artist drew portraits of women based on how they described themselves and how other women described them. The results showed something similar to the results we received in the survey, the women viewed themselves as dowdier, sadder and more wrinkled than they actually were.

The campaign for natural beauty images is growing every day and hopefully will benefit the self-image of those to come.