It seems that the Ralph Lauren Photoshop scandal is continuing to wreak havoc, sparking a whole – not entirely new – debate about the ethics of photo manipulation.
Randy Cohen of The New York Times writes that -
It is commonplace that women are pressured to meet an artificial standard of beauty. These ads affect men too, giving them false expectations of how women look. Now technology makes that standard unobtainable even by professional beauties, as is evident in paired photographs, pre- and post-Photoshop, of Jessica Alba, Keira Knightley and even, anomalously, Andy Roddick.
French parliamentarians have called not for a ban but for warning labels on manipulated images. The representative Valérie Boyer, a leading proponent of such a law, sees it as an ordinary matter of truth in advertising. “Rules on food-labeling let consumers know the origins of the contents and the presence of things like additives and preservatives,” she said. What’s wrong with “informing them when photographs have also been modified from their original form?”
Personally, I don’t think it’s about the truth in advertising at all. Clearly, when we look down at our average female bodies with lumps and bumps, we KNOW that alien-like proportions aren’t the norm. We KNOW that these images have been altered and we KNOW that what you see is not necessarily what you get in real life.
I’m not sure I have a problem with this. Maybe it’s due to the hours and hours of analysis I’ve performed for my studies, involving debating how the female figure is portrayed in advertising and the media, but I can’t help thinking that consumers aren’t as dumb as everyone’s making them out to be.
Perhaps the whole argument here is not that females think, “Gosh, she’s got a bit head and a skinny waist, I must look like that too!” but rather that these cultural products are encouraged a new ‘norm’. And a skinny one, at that. The fact that magazines sell with digitally enhanced celebrities gracing their covers, yet hypocritically contain articles on self esteem and positive body-image is not, necessarily, evident of a convinced culture.
Upon reading comments from users – and presumably consumers – positive hatred (if there ever were such a thing) has been making the rounds. People are aware that images are altered and hell, they hate it, decrying that ‘she would look better with hips’. More to the point, Ralph Lauren hasn’t exactly gained a positive reputation after this onslaught of bad press.
I think the important thing, which is being frustratingly overlooked by the media (both independent and mainstream) is that public discourse is a-happening. Debate has been inspired and public hatred for this manipulation of our thoughts has been fueled by this commercially silly move by Ralph Lauren.
Is this not good news?
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
