It’s no surprise that issues involving body image have become more prominent for women today. Unrealistic standards of beauty are embraced through media, causing problems of low self-esteem, self-doubt and oftentimes threatening eating disorders.
What is often mirrored through culture and reinforced through the media is an ideal standard of thinness. Young women across the country are expected to meet a particular standard of beauty, and if they fall short they’re seen as less valuable, less substantial and less beautiful.
The real question then comes down to how Pepperdine can combat the unrealistic ideal of beauty and thinness, the answer being the help of professionals eager to fight against society’s idealistic standards of beauty. Pepperdine has decided to resist these pressures through the Body Project, a program that aims to empower and teach women to love themselves by inspiring them to ignore negative societal influences and focus on self-love and acceptance.
The Body Project develops research aimed at preventing eating disorders and destructive lifestyles for women, which are essential on campus. Programs like these train student leaders to help to empower women to see themselves as valuable, significant and beautiful without the approval of cultural standards brought on by the media’s thin ideals.
Alan Duffy, the research process coordinator at Eating Recovery Center in Denver, Colorado and associate director of the Body Project, has developed a system of integrating the Body Project on campuses all over the country.
A program like The Body Project will encourage positive thinking of the self and will help women develop methods from which they can fight against unrealistic standards of beauty that are praised by the media and society every day.
Senior Kelly Byram said she decided to become a peer leader for the Body Project because of the program’s core values.
“I am passionate about empowering girls to love themselves,” Byram said. “I want to promote the idea of taking care of your body, and encourage people not to take extremes in order to fit an unrealistic image of the body.”
Byram also said the standards seen through the media are unrealistic and belittling for women.
“The media tells people that they need to look a certain way in order to be loved and feel significant,” she said. “When in reality, only about one percent of the population actually looks like the people the media idolizes.”
The Body Project is taking meaningful steps toward creating and reassuring a culture at Pepperdine that will aim to uplift students through positive support and encouragement, which is necessary for women to combat the thin ideal and tune out demoralizing messages brought on by social pressures of perfected beauty and popular culture.
The Body Project will launch its week-long sessions next Monday, Oct. 26 through Tuesday, Nov. 10. To register, go to www.tinyurl.com/HESWworkshop.
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Follow Vanessa Dillon on Twitter: @v_nicoledillon
