Women's Magazines = Identity Crisis?

As much as I enjoy reading most womens' magazines, my biggest concern with them is the (what some might consider to be overwhelming) influx of information provided for women, which I brought up in a previous blog post. I feel like many magazines, in an attempt to break stereotypes of female roles (i.e. housewive), have provided even more roles and characteristics that women should have in order to be a considered a good or successful in society. This can be a good thing for women who can sort through these messages and decide on their own identity, but for other women these messages can cause confusion and discontent if they don't meet all of these expectations. De Santis put it perfectly when saying "[magazine articles] stress the fluidity of female subjectivity, encouraging readers to make themselves over and even construct multiple selves, often to meet the demands and opportunities of prolonged courtship" (Dines and Humez, 120).

This magazine cover provides an example of these messages being sent. On the cover alone, women are told they can "reveal their best body" in one month, achieve "happier, hotter sex," be a "natural beauty" (probably with the use of make-up, of course), and do "at-home health checks." So at one glance women are provided with the idea that they should have a perfect body, sex life, and be their own doctor...all while looking naturally and effortlessly beautiful. Problematic? You decide.

Ouellette also argues that the Cosmo Girl is encouraged to be phony; to create the "illusion of beauty" with things like fake eyelashes and push-up bras. I think that this is definitely an unfortunate fact for women in our society. In fact, we don't even seem to realize that that's what we're doing. It's considered normal to wear high-heels because, duh, we want to appear taller and slimmer. And how dare we leave the house without mascara?! I'll be honest, I often enjoy engaging in these "illusions of beauty," and I think that the majority of females would agree with me. If you take even the most anti-conformist, feminist woman and put her on a make-over show, chances are that she'll be crying at how beautiful she looks and feels when the make-over is complete. Is that a bad thing? Well, yes and no. I'm not going to say that it's natural for women to enjoy these beautification rituals - it is certainly a product of our society, and that in itself is not a bad thing. However, if some women find that they don't fit in or are considered weird if they don't conform to these ideals, then that is problematic. And womens' magazines fit into this equation because they oftentimes prescribe how women should be rather than describe how we actually are. And that, my friends, is why I want to work for a womens' magazine one day and transform it into the amazing resource it can and should be for women around the world! :)