There’s been a good amount of controversy in recent years over standards of beauty portrayed (and fetishized) in the fashion & marketing industries. From the skeletally thin models on Fashion Week runways, to the Dove/Axe controversy, there’s no shortage of buzz about how popular media can often negatively affect the body image and self-confidence of young women. But very little has actually been done about the issue besides the occasional rant in the blogosphere.
Now WWD reports that the British Fashion Council may be working with London magazine editors to put a warning label on airbrushed photographs. Citing the fact that airbrushed images in fashion photography (and advertisements, we might add), play a major role in perpetuating an “unachievable aesthetic,” several groups are working together to assess options for dealing with what’s become a pretty grave societal problem.
In December, the BFC [British Fashion Council] said it wrote to the PPA [Periodic Publishers Association], the British Society of Magazine Editors and the Advertising Association in the U.K. to suggest what the BFC calls “a voluntary code covering the use of digital manipulation [in photography].” A BFC spokeswoman said Tuesday that no guidelines had been drawn up governing the magazines’ use of airbrushing. She suggested that rather than limiting magazines’ use of digital manipulation, publications could instead be asked to declare if an image had been altered.
Could this turn into another case of overregulation like the FCC on primetime television? Or is it a necessary step to combat a real - and growing - issue in the media?
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“But very little has actually been done about the issue besides the occasional rant in the blogosphere”
Actually, a lot of academic work has been issued on the subject since the 1970s. There have been rants going on on campuses for a good 30+ years about the portrayal of women in “glamour” magazines with students studying every aspect from the fashion spreads to the advertisements.
April 3rd, 2008 at 6:28 am
I think that’s exactly my point: lots of people studying the issue, lots of people talking about it (true, for years and years), but still not much action. And lately, I do think that the rants are hitting the mainstream more prominently - moving from college campuses into mainstream popular culture
April 3rd, 2008 at 7:25 am
The real issue at stake here is labeling photographs. How much touch up work and manipulation counts as “photoshopping?” For me, the bigger realm of photography having to be labeled in media is the issue at stake. How many war photographs are touched up with photoshop to make situations seem more dire or violent? I would love to know honestly, if a photo was accurate or skewed. I just can not imagine the media stopping their practice of sensationalizing images to attract readership and manipulation of historical events for financial gain.
April 3rd, 2008 at 9:40 am
Wygle well said.
The glamour industry and marketers forget that the pressure cooker that they are creating will destroy someone within their family and friends too.
It would be great if we all could stand up and say I am going to be responsible but in real world that doesnt happen, hence some amount of regulation is required.
Atleast a warning that this is not a true life image and has been altered (how much is not the point here).
April 3rd, 2008 at 11:36 am
Wygle… how much counts as photoshopping? ANY TIME PHOTOSHOP IS USED PERHAPS??? Maybe all that’s missing, or what’s next, is a software that can easily show the original/authentic document enabling any alterations to be seen. A wish list product that’s so super savvy and easy to use… shareware to give people a sense of media trickery… pop the balloon of fantasy.
April 5th, 2008 at 1:45 am
As well meaning as the British fashion council sounds, pretty much nothing real will be done to stop the proliferation of photoshopped images as long as they (the images) prove to be a good selling tool for advertising consumer products. Brands and companies have a large amount invested in presenting a certain female “ideal” which require a lot of personal capital to obtain- ie photoshopped images make people think they can look like these models if they buy expensive shit they don’t need. This is not new news in anyway, but really the whole way marketing targets women would have to change before anything really got done. Photoshopping models into oblivion is a symptom of our cultures emphasis on unrealistic beauty standards and desire for materialistic goods- not the cause.
April 8th, 2008 at 12:42 pm
Something the Media needs to sort out..
Just need to take a look at Women today in British Society, its just disgraceful and a Joke. People living in a Fairy World completely lost all touch from Reality..
April 28th, 2008 at 9:00 pm