Thursday, September 06, 2007

Deception

4 comments:

Sabine Hossenfelder said...

this video is just so great. I've used it for this post. It leaves me hoping that this trend towards artifical beauty that magazine photos so often show will not continue. It's so completely pointles having pictures of men and women that are 'beautified' on the computer and look anything but natural. who does really believe she'll start looking like the women on the ad after using that lotion for 10 days? I mean, come on, how stupid do they think customers are?

Kat said...

Wow. I feel better about myself already.

Rae Ann said...

Hi Bee, I surely must have watched it from your post, or maybe not? Sorry, sometimes my memory isn't so good. But yes, it does clearly illustrate how we should not trust the images we are feed by the media, especially when it comes to "beautiful" women. It would be interesting but perhaps uncomfortable to have my own appearance altered in such a way. Of course, many women are having plastic surgery to achieve similar results. I've even heard of women my age having face lifts already. It's insane.

Several people hint to me that I would look younger and better if I colored my gray hair. But you know what? I like my gray. I've earned it, every single one of them. And letting it shine is my little rebellion against artificial beauty. Fuck anyone who doesn't like it. Sorry, not in such a great mood this week. ;-)

I'm constantly puzzled at the persistence of those stupid cosmetics ads that show the "before" and "after" images of a woman's face. The after shot is always obviously lit and angled differently to make the wrinkles, etc. disappear. Do people really believe these ads? Are most women really that dumb to believe it? Maybe they are? I don't know. Unfortunately, the evidence seems to suggest that they are when so many women are getting surgery and wasting money on silly products.

Hi kat, you're very pretty already! You shouldn't ever feel bad about yourself. :-)

Sabine Hossenfelder said...

Hi Rae Ann,

What puzzles me even more is how much time and money some people are apparently willing to invest in this industry. I can't avoid thinking their life must be very very empty. And it annoys me that we life in a society that so obviously amplifies unhappyness with this nonsense. I have been paiting and drawing for quite some while, and I appreciate good photos, but most of the stuff one finds in today's magazines is so obviously computer-edited that it's really depressing to look at. There are only very few magazines who have really good photos, and the best are always those where people look, well, natural. Isn't that what originally made photography such a great invention? One didn't have to take lots of pains to make a painting, but one got a realistic image just by pushing a button. Now we're constructing a world of fictional beauty. Best,

B.