Which one is the real woman? In this case the picture on the right most accurately represents the revered form of Marilyn Monroe we are familiar with. Her image has recently made rounds on the Internet sometimes paired with the phrase, "Real women have curves." While this message was meant to promote the idea that skinny isn't the only beautiful body shape and as a woman, I find it just as exclusive and potentially harmful.
For years there has been a dialogue on the harm Photoshop and the effect impossible images of toned, skinny women have on the self-image and esteem of girls. The negative option women can have about themselves is not a new issue; it has been discussed at length in all forms of media from blogs to Dove soap commercials. Despite this people still insist on telling us how we need to look and think to be a ‘real woman.’ Recently there has been an interesting trend where now it is shameful to be skinny. The recent single “All About That Bass” by Megan Trainor promotes the idea of being comfortable in your own skin, but not without slamming all the “skinny bitches” for being “stick figure silicone Barbie dolls.” I find this flip of extremes troubling. It seems we as a society still feel we need to define what the ideal woman should be by her body shape and yet can’t agree what that is. Are these messages really that harmful? After all Megan Trainor supposedly means well. As Jenkins explores in "How Texts Become Real" it is the meaning attributed to a text that gives it weight. In the Velveteen Rabbit, the boy's investment gave the toy added significance. It is a similar situation to all texts with this dual message to women. They may mean well at face value, but those whom are excluded from this new 'correct' view of womanhood might see their perceived faults mirrored in the text.
I presented the two images above, one the true image of the famously voluptuous Marilyn Monroe and the same image I doctored to flatten her all of her curves, to show that both images represent real women. Women come in all shapes and sizes, and not fitting someone’s ideal shape cannot take away our womanhood. Our gender is not dependent on whether we have an hourglass figure or are flat as a board. I used the images of Marilyn because she is an icon of female sexuality. The original photo shows her true curves and true self and the second, while obviously changed, is still clearly of a woman. She may not have” all the right junk in all the right places” but that doesn’t warrant the shame of being told she isn’t woman enough.
I do not condone the practice of photo shopping a person to completely change their figure. In fact, even the action of shaving off Marilyn Monroe’s curves bothered me. It was so easy and by the time I was done it really wasn’t her body any more. This is a common issue discussed among women, but its unoriginality does not invalidate the emotions each of us feel facing these conflicting messages. As a woman in this environment I have felt pressures from both ends of the spectrum. I am neither curvaceous nor petite. So if a real woman is petite and small or has bodacious curves, what does that make me?
