Unattainable Beauty: The Decade’s Most Egregrious Retouching Scandals (Newsweek)

As a budding dermatologist, I am always conscious of men and women’s expectations of beauty, particularly as they age. And despite the fact that we are living longer and feeling younger longer – not to mention all of the advances in dermatology and anti-aging medicine – the fact remains that we are unsatisfied with our appearances, maintaining a $10 billion cosmetic surgery industry, even in the midst of a recession.

This 2010 Newsweek slideshow of the greatest airbrushing scandals of the past decade really astonished me. Although I am not one to blame the media for most behaviors, I do think that exposure to perfectly retouched images of celebrities puts unnatural standards on American women. For instance, take the pictures of Jessica Alba from Newsweek, shown above. She is certainly beautiful before, toned and healthy, realistic. After, she is almost unattainably stunning: a perfect meld of runway-skinny model legs and torso, blessed with pinup curves in exactly – and only – the right places.

Another photo that really shocked me from Newsweek was the photo of Madonna above. Before, the 51-year-old mother of three is beautiful, elegant, and stunning. But after, the woman is positively ageless, and couldn’t pass for more than 30.

If Hollywood celebrities, blessed with access to the best nutritionists, chefs, trainers, dermatologists, plastic surgeons, and stylists, cannot even look as good as themselves in photos, then how can we expect to do so? While true beauty comes from within, we are tend to seek out beautiful role models. With that said, it is a lot healthier – and more attainable – to look at beautiful women we know in person or at old photos of models/actresses from before the airbrushing days (like Sophia Loren, Marilyn Monroe, or Carole Lombard) for inspiration, rather than airbrushed perfection. Because, truth be told, if we all achieved the ability to look like celebrities in airbrushed photos all the time, we would look like Heidi Montag (before and after shots here).

Truth be told, although this post is not in my usual style, I am simply appalled by the extent to which celebrities are airbrushed and the unrealistic expectations many patients now have as a result. I hope sharing this Newsweek slideshow encourages other women to be kinder to their faces and bodies – and to look to more realistic role models in the future.

9 thoughts on “Unattainable Beauty: The Decade’s Most Egregrious Retouching Scandals (Newsweek)”

thank you so much for this nicki! as a guy, i am most certainly not immune to these “standards” of beauty, male and female, i see in magazines. though i know things get retouched and airbrushed i don’t think i could imagine to this extent! this article made me feel much better knowing these people don’t look nearly like the images we see in the magazines! perhaps i’m doing just fine!

This is a great post! I’m always completely disgusted when I see photos that have OBVIOUSLY been retouched. I would love to see a magazine where none of the photos area altered and anything featured costs less than $100.

Yes, it’s true and very obvious! I’m glad that you posted this because these standards are so unreal and unfair. It simply reminds me that I shouldn’t get caught up in trying to fit these standards of beauty because they are after all false. There is not just one way to be beautiful and that is what the magazines are trying to get at!

Excellent post! Some of these retouches are seriously over-the-top!

Still, even knowing that I’ll never look like Barbie certainly isn’t going to put the brakes on my retinol/peptides/sunscreen routine!

Here’s my take:
http://theskinstudio.blogspot.com/2010/02/attainable-beauty.html

Cheers!

great post. thanks for bringing this to light.

egregious.

Well done… more such truths is what the 21st century needs to empower the young and old alike..true beauty never lies in perfection as it simply does not exist except in one’s own perception…The absence of flaw in beauty is itself a flaw. Beauty – in projection and perceiving – is 99.9% attitude

Wonderful discussion! Your article brings up some very important and disturbing issue! If these already beautiful celebrities still aren’t beautiful, maybe there is something wrong with our idea of beauty! Whatever happened to natural beauty.