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 Linda Thomas
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Linda is the morning news anchor and features reporter for KIRO Radio. This is her local news blog, with an emphasis on social media, technology, Northwest companies, education, parenting, and anything else that grabs her attention.

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No airbrushing for a popular teen magazine

July 5, 2012 @ 3:30 pm (Updated: 6:41 pm - 7/5/12 )

Long lean legs, a teeny tiny waist, flawless facial features. That's the stuff fashion magazines are made of, but not anymore for one popular teen publication.

After years of featuring only perfect teens, "Seventeen" Magazine now wants girls to stop obsessing about body image and to start appreciating their bodies.

They've come to this conclusion after pressure from more than 80,000 people who asked the magazine stop airbrushing perfection onto their pages.

Almost all the images you see in magazines, and online, have been photoshopped. Wrinkles from clothing and faces are easily removed. Imperfections in skin, poof, gone. Slim models are made even skinnier with airbrushing.

See if you can spot the differences in these photos from various fashion magazines. The photos on the right are the result of "digital diets" or airbrushing.

Body

Face

Kim

"Seventeen" magazine's promise to stop airbrushing models, or at least tell readers how and why an image has been altered, comes after a Maine teen started a petition drive against the magazine's airbrushing.

"I hoped that Seventeen would do this but I guess I didn't think it would actually happen," says 14-year-old Julia Bluhm.

In response to Bluhm's campaign, "Seventeen" vows to:

Never change girls' body or face shapes.

Celebrate every kind of beauty in our pages. Without a range of body types, skin tones, heights, and hair textures, the magazine - and the world - would be boring.

Always feature real girls and models who are healthy. Regardless of clothing size, being healthy is about honoring your natural shape.

Be totally up-front about what goes into our photo shots.

Help you make the best choices for your body - food that fuels you, exercise that energizes you - so you can feel your absolute best each day.

Give you the confidence to walk into any room and own it. Say bye-bye to those nagging insecurities that you're not good enough or pretty enough - they're holding you back from being awesome in the world!

That according to a letter in the magazine's August edition, signed xoxo A (Editor-in-Chief, Ann Shoket)

Another petition effort is underway asking "Teen Vogue" to do the same. That campaign, started by a couple of girls from New York has more than 13,000 signatures in one day.

Will realistic, non-airbrushed images become the next fashion trend?

MakelaI talked about body image with a woman I introduced you to a few weeks ago, Makela Steward was Washington state's first Miss Plus pageant winner, going on to the national Miss Plus America competition.

She won the title, with the highest points total overall.

She's an accomplished educator with three degrees, wrapping up a year of teaching English at Seattle's South Lake High School.

Now she'll work on her platform for the year which is creating a more equitable education system.

"In certain areas of Seattle, and in cities across the country, there are students who may not live with their parents, who may be homeless or in foster care," says Steward.

"There is a lot of disparity in education and not a lot being done, so I am here to make some noise about this topic."

By LINDA THOMAS

More from Linda Thomas

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Comments (19)


  • Add A Comment

  • Troll Hunter wrote...
    Finally
    July 5, 2012 8:02 pm
    Get rid of the obviously artificial values shoved down our throats by marketing machines and lets finally embrace the real woman in all her splendor. Enough of the 80 lb models and medias obsession with skinny women with huge udders. They so skinny I'm always wondering if they will blow away in the wind, or break during sex.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • Cougsfan34 wrote...
    Slow news day
    July 5, 2012 9:24 pm
    Slow news day. Another useless news story. Poor little people whining about something so pathetic. If you actually believe that the pictures of "models" in magazines are real then you might want to put your head in the sand.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • Cougsfan34 wrote...
    besides
    July 5, 2012 9:26 pm
    How long do we think this will really last? I mean, most of these "models" and "actors" bodies are just as much a trademark as their name. So your going to show their trademark with all it's scars? How many lawsuits and dropping circulation till this teen rag goes back to its old ways. I give it 6 months.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • Troll Hunter wrote...
    They'll switch back
    July 5, 2012 10:46 pm
    right after the Cougs will a national title.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • roomtemp wrote...
    Quick pass...
    July 5, 2012 11:30 pm
    Airbrushing/Photoshopping... Bah! I like women with their faults intact. Reminds me that they're human, like me. (Ok, maybe still with less faults than me, but you get the point.)

    Kardashians (had to google the spelling) Meh! X 2, or however many of them there are.

    AJ and his creepy mode lately. I'm a TheNewsChick fan too, but dude, -whiskey tango foxtrot-? Your suit is about as impressive as the Kardashians in 30x30 pixels. Who cares?

    Makela Steward... Miss plus, minus, whatever... She's total win. I was rooting for ya. You go girl! (Ok, she did. Go further then!)

    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • mnpat wrote...
    roomtemp....love the whisky tango foxtrot!
    July 6, 2012 6:41 am
    My opinion on all of this is, media including radio, magazines and TV will all do what it takes to sell product.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • kata wrote...
    these crap mags are mostly ads
    July 6, 2012 8:59 am
    will this apply to the ads, too? Or just the magazine sponsored "articles" & cover.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • fourstringfuror wrote...
    Pointless
    July 6, 2012 11:00 am
    Real or fake, girls are still picking up magazines with images of other girls and woman held up as a standard of beauty (which, in reality is not beauty but sexuality). Sorry, I'm not impressed. This is like a car salesman being "honest" with you and making you a "special" deal.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
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