The past couple of years witnessed a real sea change with regard to how society views media feature photoshopped bodies and idealized human forms.
Once the surefire way to sell everything from high fashion to electronics, there is a movement now towards healthy body acceptance and a more natural look. In other words, the unrealistic expectations that some people place on themselves because of the abundance of edited images out there have a markedly negative effect on their mental health and some would say the way society perceives beauty.
Now the UK wants to put a warning label on edited images like those described above as a kind of warning, a la tobacco products like cigarettes, the dangers of having unrealistic body expectations.
Sky News reports that Conservative MP Dr. Luke Evans proposed the Digitally Altered Body Image Bill to specifically address issues such as eating disorders that can arise from having an unhealthy body image.
“When I was a GP, particularly young women with eating disorders would talk about the fact they're driven by these images and think they need to have a perfect physique.”
“Because, if you doctor your image, make your biceps bigger, your waist slimmer – and there are multiple images reproduced across social media – the problem is you're creating a perception that no matter what you do, when you go to the gym, no matter how good your diet is, you are never going to be able to reproduce that. …If you saw that person in real life the next day that body would be very different to the one they're claiming to have – that's my big concern.”
It’s not hard to establish that social media influences how people behave; we’ve covered more than a few examples right here on this blog.
What do you think of the idea of putting a warning label on edited images of the human form? Let us know your thoughts on that in the comments below.
Check out some of our other photography news on Light Stalking at this link right here.
[Sky News]
