Airbrushing away our childhood memories
By: Shannon Polugar
Issue date: 2/27/08 Section: Opinion
Body image has been and will always be an issue in society. As long as there are magazines with airbrushed bodies, squinch lenses that make television news personalities look like a size two instead of the real world size eight that they are, and airbrushing kindergartener photos so that the trials and tribulations of childhood never show.
That's right. Airbrushing kindergartener photos.
A phenomena that used to be relegated to fashion magazines and beauty pageants has now found a new home in the school photo. Major school photography companies, such as Lifetouch and Prestige, for a small fee will airbrush any students flaw into smooth skin, perfect hair and none of the little imperfections that make a person individual and unique.
No one is perfect and children are no exception, but we shouldn't be out to make them perfect either. Some parents I've spoken with who have opted to have their elementary students Photoshop say they want their children to remember things happily, not that they had their hair parted oddly or braces on their teeth.
Trust me, they will remember the bad things. Every student does. Years from now they will look back at themselves, so cute and perfect, see themselves now and wonder what went wrong. If every photograph is airbrushed, touched up, photoshopped or otherwise tweaked, when does it cross the line that it is no longer you?
There are also greater implications than just recognizing your own face in photos. Currently we blame the media for body image issues and are lax to blame parents. Parents hold the checkbook. By paying for these changes to be made to your child's image you are starting the issue by saying "you're not good enough as is."
Some may argue that there is a line to be crossed. That a little bit is okay but too much isn't right. But where is that line? Is removing a few zits ok? Corrected that black eye little Timmy got on the playground the day before school photos? How about adding fake lashes? Making the eyes bigger? How about changing the expression? Where does it end?
It shouldn't begin to start with. School memories may be great or they may funny or any other range of emotions, but we shouldn't try changing them. We take school pictures as records of who we were and what we were like all those years ago, not as images of perfection.
That's right. Airbrushing kindergartener photos.
A phenomena that used to be relegated to fashion magazines and beauty pageants has now found a new home in the school photo. Major school photography companies, such as Lifetouch and Prestige, for a small fee will airbrush any students flaw into smooth skin, perfect hair and none of the little imperfections that make a person individual and unique.
No one is perfect and children are no exception, but we shouldn't be out to make them perfect either. Some parents I've spoken with who have opted to have their elementary students Photoshop say they want their children to remember things happily, not that they had their hair parted oddly or braces on their teeth.
Trust me, they will remember the bad things. Every student does. Years from now they will look back at themselves, so cute and perfect, see themselves now and wonder what went wrong. If every photograph is airbrushed, touched up, photoshopped or otherwise tweaked, when does it cross the line that it is no longer you?
There are also greater implications than just recognizing your own face in photos. Currently we blame the media for body image issues and are lax to blame parents. Parents hold the checkbook. By paying for these changes to be made to your child's image you are starting the issue by saying "you're not good enough as is."
Some may argue that there is a line to be crossed. That a little bit is okay but too much isn't right. But where is that line? Is removing a few zits ok? Corrected that black eye little Timmy got on the playground the day before school photos? How about adding fake lashes? Making the eyes bigger? How about changing the expression? Where does it end?
It shouldn't begin to start with. School memories may be great or they may funny or any other range of emotions, but we shouldn't try changing them. We take school pictures as records of who we were and what we were like all those years ago, not as images of perfection.
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