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Beauty Stereotypes

Anastasya Carmeilia Raharusun (K2219007)

Video Title: Beauty | Documentary on Societal Beauty Standards

Date: 16 November 2021

  1. What is being discussed in the video? Explain your answer.
    There are some people, which are men and women, being interviewed in the video. There were questions about what is beauty to them and whether they think they are pretty or not. Some people think that they are not pretty even though I personally think that they are really pretty. There were also some facts from a survey that only 5% of women feel pretty and 45% of men feel that they are not handsome.
  2. What is the speaker’s main purpose? Explain your answer.
    I think that the purpose of the video is to give proof or a small sample of society that there are some people that still think of pretty as someone who has fair skin, long hair, perfect face etc., and feel that they are not pretty enough as what they think. The creator wants to portray how our society, which is sampled by the people in the video, thinks about beauty.
  3. How trustworthy is this video? Who is the speaker? What is the source? Do you think the source and the speaker are trustworthy?
    It is trustworthy because there are some people answering the questions and it is genuine.
  4. What the speaker’s attitude or tone towards the subject? Does he/she seem to agree or disagree with it? Explain your answer.
    Some people agree with the definition of beauty that society thinks and some people do not agree with the definition.
  5. Does the speaker put forward valid or strong arguments? How does he/she support the key points? Explain your answer.
    I am not sure about this because there are some people in the video and from the video, the creator put in 2 facts from surveys, but there is no further explanation about it.
  6. Explain how this article will help contribute to your larger group project.
    This will help to be a little source to my larger project as proof that there are people who think they are not qualified to be pretty.

Video Title: Why You Think You’re Ugly

Date: 16 November 2021

  1. What is being discussed in the video? Explain your answer.
    The video discussed how society defines beauty and how it, unfortunately, affects us. It affects us not only in our environment, our family, friends but also in work. Society makes us think that pretty women are those who have fair skin, long hair, perfect teeth, an hourglass body with fine breasts, quite big butts, but small waist, face with no acne, etc. Not only women, but men are also considered handsome if they are tall because it makes them look more powerful and attractive. So, if we are not like that, we feel ugly and sometimes people around us think that we are ugly. From the video, the speaker said that 70% of women in Lagos, Nigeria bleach their skin and it shows that they are trying to catch up with the beauty standard that lingers around us. Moreover, the data shows that surgery of the butt and thigh is up 4,200% since the year 2000. It shows that many people feel that they are not enough with themselves and change something they didn’t like.
  2. What is the speaker’s main purpose? Explain your answer.
    I thought the speaker’s main purpose is to persuade us that the beauty standard is ridiculous. But, when I recall what’s there in the video, I think that the purpose is to persuade us to love ourselves because we are beautiful in our way. She first said what are the beauty stereotypes, then stated the fact about bleaching and plastic surgery, then in the last minute of the video, she said that we should start loving ourselves by avoiding something that triggers us not to feel pretty.
  3. How trustworthy is this video? Who is the speaker? What is the source? Do you think the source and the speaker are trustworthy?
    I would say that this video is not that trustworthy, there are parts that are subjective. Melissa Butler is the speaker of the video who also owns a beauty cosmetic brand. I am actually kind of confused about the standard of trustworthiness, but I would say that the speaker is quite trustworthy because she felt and maybe still feels that unreal beauty standard because she is also not that type of pretty woman that comes out if we search for beautiful women in the search engine. I don’t know about the source of her speech because she didn’t tell the source of the data that she found.
  4. What the speaker’s attitude or tone towards the subject? Does he/she seem to agree or disagree with it? Explain your answer.
    She strongly disagrees with the beauty standard. It is because even though she is not “qualified” in the unreal beauty standard because of her brown skin, gap teeth, and flat butts, she once realized that she feels pretty even though she is not what the beauty standard wants.
  5. Does the speaker put forward valid or strong arguments? How does he/she support the key points? Explain your answer.
    I think her arguments are not strong enough because she didn’t state the source of her argument. After she opened her speech, she then gave arguments about why we feel ugly and then spilled some facts or data related to the beauty standard.
  6. Explain how this article will help contribute to your larger group project.
    https://www.treadmillreviews.net/building-the-perfect-body/ h

Video Title: Decoding the Instagram Beauty Standard

Date: 23 November 2021

  1. What is being discussed in the video? Explain your answer.
    The video discussed what is the ideal beauty of our society based on the research that has been done by the speaker. The speaker listed 100 most followed women on instagram and did research to find the ideal beauty standard that our society likes. The speaker identifies the age, skin color, eye color, lips, hair length, hair color, nose, body shape, breast size, bottock shape, etc. of the 100 most followed women on instagram. From the research, the speaker stated that women with age 22, have full lips, brown or dark eyes, hourglass body shape, medium hair length,fine breast size or cup b and above, etc. are the most followed people on instagram. Then, the speaker bought some instagrammable outfits, took photos, and photoshopped it based on the findings of her research with the help of a professional.
  2. What is the speaker’s main purpose? Explain your answer.
    I think the speaker’s main purpose is that she reminds us that that kind of perfect beauty doesn’t exist, it is very unrealistic. Through the research, we can see that that is what our society wants or likes. Those kinds of beauty only exist with photoshoping, retouching, etc.
  3. How trustworthy is this video? Who is the speaker? What is the source? Do you think the source and the speaker are trustworthy?
    The speaker is Cassey Ho who is an award-winning fitness instructor, entrepreneur and online personality. She is also a creator of the YouTube channel Blogilates. The source of the video is from the accounts of 100 most followed women on instagram and the research that the speaker did. It is trustworthy enough because the research is based on the instagram post of the person, but there are maybe other researches that have different findings or else, so I think I need to go on the internet to search another sources.
  4. What the speaker’s attitude or tone towards the subject? Does he/she seem to agree or disagree with it? Explain your answer.
    The speaker wasn’t showing any disagreement or agreement towards the subject in terms of tone, but she was quite shocked too after knowing some facts from her research. She was also quite shocked after she photoshopped her photos to look like an instagram influencer and it showed on her face.
  5. Does the speaker put forward valid or strong arguments? How does he/she support the key points? Explain your answer.
    I am not sure about this, but I don’t think she put any arguments in the video because she was just stating the facts and remaining neutral about the topics.
  6. Explain how this article will help contribute to your larger group project.
    https://www.pulse.ng/lifestyle/beauty-health/the-dark-side-of-social-media-how-unrealistic-beauty-standards-are-causing-identity/hv4tffb This article will help contribute to my project in a way that it talks about unrealistic social media beauty standards, the relationship between social media and eating disorders, etc. It is related to the topic and will be my additional source in my video.

Video Title: The dark reality behind male beauty standard

Date: 30 November 2021

  1. What is being discussed in the video? Explain your answer.
    The video discussed about male beauty standards from many perspectives. The speaker talked about South Korean beauty standards for men, which is a flamboyant type. Then the speaker also talked about male beauty standard in India, which is masculine, very muscular, and has a fairer skin tone. Then, the western male beauty standards which is masculine looking man. The speaker also gave other male beauty standards perspectives from the culture. There were men using makeup because of the culture, men using pink, having long nails as a sign that they don’t do any labour work, men using skirts, and men wearing crop tops. The speaker also talked about men’s ideal body type through the years. There are fat body types which show wealthy, normal body type, skinny body type with long hair, very muscular body type, etc. The speaker also talked about the culture where men shouldn’t cry. At the end of the video, the speaker said that it would be great if men have body positivity as what women have.
  2. What is the speaker’s main purpose? Explain your answer.
    I think the speaker wants to inform the audience that there are many kinds of beauty, not only one kind of beauty, we have to respect every beauty.
  3. How trustworthy is this video? Who is the speaker? What is the source? Do you think the source and the speaker are trustworthy?
    The speaker is Ibrahim Kamit who is a YouTuber who likes to talk about beauty, lifestyle, etc. There are many sources in the video, articles publication and mostly other YouTube videos. This is quite trustworthy because the speaker not only states his opinion but also gives sources to what he says.
  4. What the speaker’s attitude or tone towards the subject? Does he/she seem to agree or disagree with it? Explain your answer.
    He seems to disagree with the subject because I can see at the end of the video that he encouraged us to have a broader perspective of beauty standards especially on men.
  5. Does the speaker put forward valid or strong arguments? How does he/she support the key points? Explain your answer.
    Yes, the speaker supports the key points by showing some article journals and YouTube videos that are related to the key points that he is saying.
  6. Explain how this article will help contribute to your larger group project.
    https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20210707-what-does-the-perfect-man-look-like-now This article is in line with the video above, it talks about South Korean men’s beauty standard, American, etc. This will help a lot to strengthen the video that is talking about men’s beauty standards.

Video Title: Beauty and how we’re obsessed with the wrong idea: Christina Gressianu @TEDxFoCo

Date: 2 December 2021

  1. What is being discussed in the video? Explain your answer.
    Firstly, the speaker started it with her perspective as a photographer. She said that ,mostly, 98% of women that she photographed were asking to get photoshopped because they saw their imperfections. She thought that it was a normal thing that people want to be more beautiful, but it changed after her step-daughter took photos of her goofy face and thought it’s cool. She realized that she was wrong if beauty was defined that way, to look prettier or perfect. She said that all of us know that beauty is from within, but still there are some things that make us think that we are not beautiful, like we know that prettier women get more dates, good careers, etc. Those self-critical habits about our appearance should be stopped, we should take care of ourselves with the way we feel about ourselves and the way we take care of ourselves. That will make us feel beautiful. Here’s how we make it happen: identify the voices in your head, look yourself in the eye, and lastly, thank yourself.
  2. What is the speaker’s main purpose? Explain your answer.
    To persuade us to give respect and love to ourselves because we are beautiful as we are.
  3. How trustworthy is this video? Who is the speaker? What is the source? Do you think the source and the speaker are trustworthy?
    The speaker is Christina Gressianu who is a photographer. She is an award-winning photographer, whose work can be seen in publications such as The Knot, and several blogs. I think she only uses the source from her own experience and her own personal opinion. I think that isn’t trustworthy because the speaker hadn’t shown any other sources to her speech. But I do agree with her that we should love ourselves more.
  4. What the speaker’s attitude or tone towards the subject? Does he/she seem to agree or disagree with it? Explain your answer.
    The speaker disagree with the concept of our society’s beauty stereotypes that makes us feel less beautiful and always feel the imperfections in ourselves. It can be seen when she started talking about how she was wrong when the idea of self-critical is normal.
  5. Does the speaker put forward valid or strong arguments? How does he/she support the key points? Explain your answer.
    No, she supports it with her own personal experience and I don’t see any sources showed in the video/her speech.
  6. Explain how this article will help contribute to your larger group project.
    https://www.oprah.com/spirit/how-to-feel-beautiful-and-boost-confidence/all This article and video will help me to make my closing statement at the end of the speech to give strength and persuade the audience to feel confidence about themselves.

Video Title: Ending the pursuit of perfection | Iskra Lawrence | TEDxUniversityofNevada

Date: 6 December 2021

  1. What is being discussed in the video? Explain your answer.
    The content of the video is about self-care to show that we embrace ourselves. The speaker firstly talked about our images of beauty that we had since our childhood. We look in the mirror and start to point out the things we hate about ourselves because we look at social media -where the photos mostly aren’t real or only to show off- that makes us think we should be like that. The speaker taught the audience her practice of self-care, which is to find good things about our body, find our body parts that we feel helpful for us, show ourselves more gratitude like we thought about the good things that happen to our life, etc. The speaker also said the shocking fact that teenage girls are more likely to die from an eating disorder than any other illness. 30 million people in the US have eating disorders, 90% of people who die from suicide have mental health condition, 52% of US teens have been cyber-bullied. It shows how society’s stereotype of beauty shapes them to have that mind, they are pressured to have those body images of perfection, that we should look perfectly perfect as those models in magazines, etc.
  2. What is the speaker’s main purpose? Explain your answer.
    She is trying to make us embrace ourselves and feel that we are enough and stop pursuing perfection because that will never be enough.
  3. How trustworthy is this video? Who is the speaker? What is the source? Do you think the source and the speaker are trustworthy?
    She is Iskra Lawrence who is a British model and an ambassador of NEDA (National Eating Disorders Association). I googled it and found out that she might be using the statistics from ANAD (National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders) and it might be other reliable sources -which I cannot find-. This is quite trustworthy, but there is this thing that is ambigue, it is related to toxic body positivity. I think that some people may misinterpret it as saying that we should feel enough of the size of our body, which is true, but if people have serious health conditions like anorexia or being overweight, they shouldn’t only embrace themselves without doing anything to make them back healthy. They should embrace themselves with the real action of self-love, I think we all should be like that.
  4. What the speaker’s attitude or tone towards the subject? Does he/she seem to agree or disagree with it? Explain your answer.
    The speaker disagrees with the conception of beauty stereotypes, those perfect beauty. Even when she saw the photos during her “prime” modeling days, she couldn’t stop thinking about how she could look like that (skinny, etc.), she started asking if that was the real definition of beauty.
  5. Does the speaker put forward valid or strong arguments? How does he/she support the key points? Explain your answer.
    Yes, she put valid arguments with herself as the example when she was modeling, the project of inviting three women to wear bikinis on the streets to show that they are confident about themselves, and her self-care in present. She also said some statistics about eating disorders, cyber-bullying, etc.
  6. Explain how this article will help contribute to your larger group project.
    https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/article/beauty-today-celebrates-all-social-media-plays-a-role-feature

Video Title: The Business of Beauty is Very Ugly​ | Carrie Hammer | TEDxSantaBarbara

Date: 8 December 2021

  1. What is being discussed in the video? Explain your answer.
    The speaker discussed how the media like magazines lying about beauty. There are models that only use their faces and the hands and legs are from other people, this means that businesses don’t see that our whole body is beautiful. Businesses want to pursue perfection which is not the real situation. They also like to photoshop the models’ imperfections like skin textures, slimming the waist size, pulling the legs to look taller, erasing freckles, etc. That is the reason why women in our society don’t feel pretty, the speaker said that only 4% of women feel that they are pretty. This leads to the use of applications like facetune, many people like to use it to redefine themselves, to make it look perfect. The speaker told a story where she did her first ever fashion show. She changed the runaway models into role models (the strong, independent, confident, and working women) because she wanted it to fit her fashion aim, her brand wants to show that women are professional, strong, confident, and powerful. She also had a disability person who happened to be in a wheelchair that walked in the runaway. That was viral and many people emailed them saying that they felt encouraged by the fashion show that she had.
  2. What is the speaker’s main purpose? Explain your answer.
    To encourage the audience that beauty is when we feel powerful, confident, and we focus on ourselves.
  3. How trustworthy is this video? Who is the speaker? What is the source? Do you think the source and the speaker are trustworthy?
    The speaker is Carrie Hammer who is a designer and once an advertising sales executive. Mostly, her speech came from her experiences and she said about the source of the data that is from Dove. It is trustworthy enough, but I still have to look at other sources about the advertising and business industry.
  4. What the speaker’s attitude or tone towards the subject? Does he/she seem to agree or disagree with it? Explain your answer.
    She really disagrees with the idea of how business portrays beauty. It is shown as she quit from the advertising industry because she felt that working in that industry won’t reveal her true self, her professional self, because she was taught to dress for the job she wanted, not the job she had. It is also shown when she changed the runaway models into role models.
  5. Does the speaker put forward valid or strong arguments? How does he/she support the key points? Explain your answer.
    Yes, she supports her points by telling her experiences in the advertising industry and fashion industry.
  6. Explain how this article will help contribute to your larger group project.
    https://doi.org/10.4236/jss.2021.99005 This article will be a source of information that advertising is shaping the beauty stereotype. “… and they create a perception that wearing make-up and grooming the body is essential for good-looking. Therefore, most of the women believe that they look better with make-up and when they wear cosmetics they feel more confident, attractive and feminine (Freedman, 1990: p. 197).” “ As Acevedo and Tamashiro (2006) pointed these women either display their partial nude bodies, and they are in the role of a decorative object or they imply to other women that they should set being beautiful as their main goal in life and shop for cosmetics.” “ Furthermore, the cosmetic advertisements imply that grooming the body is so significant that Turkish women should share some of their time during the day just for grooming the body with different cosmetic products such as shampoo, face creams, or wax. Cosmetic advertisements also promise average women that their skins can resist aging if they use certain beauty products regularly. Moreover, they advise women to have a fit and athletic body by using slimming tools helping to shape the body.”

Video Title: Beauty Standards Are Bullsh*t. [RANT]

Date: 10 December 2021

  1. What is being discussed in the video? Explain your answer.
    In this video, the speaker said that beauty standards are artificial or not real. It is shown by how the beauty standards changed over time; in 2000s, slender body type is the most hype body type because it looks good on low waist jeans; for centuries – until mid 20th century, being a little bit fat was a sign that you can afford to buy meals and not do any outdoor activities (for women); in the 15th and 16th centuries, thin lips is considered beautiful; not also a beautiful hair because in the ancient times, it was hidden under a cap or braided; not also a small nose, because Amelie Gautreau was considered as the most beautiful woman in Paris in the late 19th century; not also a smooth skin, as in the 17th century women were mostly have viewable fat in their body; in 1801, flat chest is considered to be the beauty standard; in 1720s, small waist is not the beauty standard because it couldn’t be seen because of the clothes; in 1850s, round shoulders are considered to be pretty, etc. We can also see that white people are trying to look tan, they have tanning lotion, cream, etc., people who are tan or dark skin trying to be white, people with no freckles are drawing freckles in their face, people with curvy body are now considered to be the pretty body in the Western, etc. It shows that there is no such thing as beauty standards, that happens when numerous people find that this kind of beauty, e.g. have thick brows, is pretty. Maybe in 10 years from now on, the beauty “standards” will be changed again.
  2. What is the speaker’s main purpose? Explain your answer.
    The speaker’s purpose is to tell us that actually beauty standards are not real, it is artificial because she said that the standard of beauty has changed over years and it shows that actually beauty standards are not something we should follow.
  3. How trustworthy is this video? Who is the speaker? What is the source? Do you think the source and the speaker are trustworthy?
    She is a YouTuber called Karolina Zebrowska, she often posted videos about the old centuries’ history or mostly fashion. I assume that she looked at the history, her personal experiences, and her view of the society’s beauty standards. It is quite trustworthy, but I still need to have other sources to support this video.
  4. What the speaker’s attitude or tone towards the subject? Does he/she seem to agree or disagree with it? Explain your answer.
    She boldly disagrees with the idea of beauty standards, because she madly said that beauty standards are bullsh*t and she proved it with the data that she collected.
  5. Does the speaker put forward valid or strong arguments? How does he/she support the key points? Explain your answer.
    Yes, what she said was true because she used some pictures on most things she said that proved her points.
  6. Explain how this article will help contribute to your larger group project.
    https://www.scienceofpeople.com/beauty-standards/ This will help to strengthen the video, it is as the evidence to what the speaker said.