Photoshop and Its Effects On Society

Hey everyone, I wrote alot but it would mean so much to me if you read it all. Trust me, its pretty interesting in my opinion.

Okay so I was browsing the web when I stumbled on this:
Jennifer Hudson, debuting her new album which is to be released in a couple of months
(September 2008).

And of course, the first thing I noticed was woah, since when was she that skinny! So I did some snooping, and I found that she was at the BET awards a month ago. This is how she looked like then:

And I am sorry, but I cannot believe that is the one and the same Jennifer Hudson. They made her look at least 20 pounds lighter! I can't believe that they could possibly release this album cover and expect the public to believe that she's actually that size. Definetly an abuse of photoshop. You may say that its not photoshop, just really really good technique use of lighting. Well you know what I say? Same thing. Who cares if the culprit is photoshop or a thousand high-tech lights, the point is that she doesn't look like that in real life. I mean, what message were they trying to send? Did they seriously think that by her being skinny and a size everyone knows she isn't, they could sell more albums? What were they thinking? "Oh its okay that everyone knows she doesnt look like that in real life. They'll still be more people buying it if she looks skinny, who cares if its fake". NOT okay.

Which is why I think our society has some serious issues.

(notice the tiles behind her are curved, not straight- they must have messed them up when they were making her thinner...and isn't the qoute next to her ironic?)

The fragrance "Believe" was launched in August 2007...mind you, this was post-baby-britney spears, which is why the ad for this fragrance of hers (which doesnt even look like her) came with alot of people saying that it was obviously photoshopped. The company in response told the press that this was in fact, not photoshopped, but a product of expert lighting. Chyeah, okay.

I am by no means saying that all models are photoshopped. But many magazine are guilty of models that have extreme lighting techniques, and are touched-up; I just really don't like it. I feel likewhen I look at a model in a magazine, what I'm looking at isn't a beautiful girl- its what the people in an office working for the magazine want me to think is a beautiful girl. They want people to think that a certain type of beauty exists, when its really doesn't.

I know that its because they want to sell their product. And they want girls to feel like they will be beautiful if they buy that product. But it has gone past a point where everything, everything is fixed, twisted, distorted, all to make us believe in their product! I want to know that if I see a model on the streets, she'll look at least somewhat like the cover she's splashed across.

It's not even just in magazines...in this day and age, everything is distorted. Do you watch fox news? Well don't trust everything they say. This is what I learned at the beginning of this year, it was something I really didn't know or realize before, but when I did, it was frightening.

You probably already know some of this, but for those who don't:
In the United States, there are about five huge companies. They practically own all of the media. For example, the News Corporation is a company that owns FOX, The Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones, The New York Post, MarketWatch, and a whole lot of other publications and forms of media, not only in the US, but also in australia, the uk, and in other random places. My point- say it was for some reason profitable for the company to sell grey jeans from one of these huge companies instead of blue. Then the company would put ads up in the New York Times for grey jeans, put an article of it in the Style section, then tell yet ANOTHER newspaper to put up an article about grey jeans to make it look like it was really a growing trend, and tell FOX news to report that all the latest celebrities are wearing grey jeans. The average joe american would see grey jeans everywhere in the media, and be like, "Wow its everywhere, everyone's probably using them, I'll buy them too."

This was just a made up example, but I just find it so scary that everything is owned by these huge companies, and news, ads, and the media can be distorted to the companies own will. Even things like the History Channel and all the news channels- someone owns them, and is probably telling them "Psst you better not publish anything bad about Obama its bad for our advertizement buyers" or turning to the other and saying "Make a big deal about the A-Rod and Madonna fling, Madonna wants the media attention". I remember I read an article that talked about a Colombian politician that had been held captive for seven years. When she was rescued, the article translated (she speaks spanish) it saying "I was so happy. It was like seeing a plane falling to rescue us" Or something to that extent. On the news on a spanish channel, I watched her speak and what she had actually said was "I was so happy to have been rescued, we were all jumping on the rescue plane, and for a moment were afraid it would fall down". As minor as that mistake was, it just shows you really can't always trust the news.

You may not want to believe what I say or think this is complete rubbish, but I thought I should say it because I believe it and it scares me to death that nothing on tv or in newspapers is the plain old black and white truth anymore. Its not only in the fashion industry, its everywhere in our society. Sorry if this came out to be a rant, I really did write alot (thanks if you read it all!), but I hope it maybe informed you a little. Or made you think.

Oh and on the brighter side, i was tagged by la femme chic =]



The Rules:
1) When received, you may post the premio on your blog.
2) Link to the blogger you received from.
3) Give it to 7 blogs
4) And link to those blogs
5) Also, leave those seven bloggers a comment about receiving the brilliant premio.

So, I'm going to tag cheapskatechic, icon, littlepinknotes, adele joanna , vintage vinyl, its called style, and too haute to handle, because they're all wonderful blogs.


EDIT: Here's the famous Dove film that covers the photoshopping problem:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYhCn0jf46U

Thanks for all of your patience with this monster post,
-New York Chique