Photoshopping, digital alteration, image manipulation, blah blah blah. Everyone talks about the fact that so many images of women are “perfected” with the help of technology, but do we really understand how serious this issue is? Like exactly HOW MUCH these photos are manipulated to fit some seriously unrealistic ideals that we view constantly? And do we understand that it isn’t just fashion magazine covers that feature altered images? It’s everywhere.

While the vast majority of images of women are being digitally altered, so are our perceptions of normal, healthy, beautiful and attainable.

One of the main strategies used to reinforce and normalize a distorted idea of “average,” which sparks body anxiety when we don’t measure up, is media’s representation of women as extremely thin (meaning much thinner than the actual population or what is physically possible for the vast majority of women). This is done by consistent use of models and actresses that are extremely young and thin and by making the models and actresses fit their idea of ideal of youth and thinness and beauty through digital manipulation. This unrealistic form is consistently represented across almost all media forms, along with blemish-free, wrinkle-free, and even pore-free skin, thanks to the wonders of digital manipulation as an “industry standard” that is openly endorsed and defended by magazine editors and media executives the world over.

What we see in media, and what we may be internalizing as normal or beautiful, is anything but normal or beautiful. It’s fake. It’s a profit-driven idea of normal and beautiful that women will spend their lives trying to achieve and men will spend their lives trying to find. Until we all learn to recognize and reject these harmful messages about what it means to look like a woman, we all lose. And we don’t want to lose.

So here’s to taking back beauty — and the Photoshop phoniness that makes us crave seeing reality even more. Please help us spread the word about media manipulation by sharing these images on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, your own blogs, and unite with women in grasping our beautiful realities! Need more help developing body image resilience that can help you overcome your self-consciousness and be more powerful than ever before? Learn how to recognize harmful ideals, redefine beauty and health, and resist what holds you back from happiness, health, and real empowerment with the Beauty Redefined Body Image Program for girls and women 14+. It is an online, anonymous therapeutic tool that can change your life, designed by Lexie & Lindsay Kite, with PhDs in body image and media.

Note: Some of these images are inappropriate for young or very conservative readers, or those seeking to avoid eating disorder triggers. We always take caution to exclude any truly explicit images, and never include nudity, but the occasional bikini does cause offense at times, even if the image demonstrates an important message. Please proceed with caution.

Thank you to Elizabeth Fletcher of Union University in Tennessee for finding BR and designing this masterpiece to promote our cause through guerilla marketing in women’s restrooms! We’d like to recommend some online guerilla marketing by our beautiful supporters! Let’s see how many pins, shares, likes and blogs we can get for this powerful image! Ready?? Go!

For more information on how Photoshop Phoniness affects us, please read and share our research at these links:

Photoshopping: Altering Images and Our Minds

Beauty Whitewashed: How White Ideals Exclude Women of Color

Physically Photoshopping Ourselves Out of Reality

Please join us in shedding some light on Photoshop Phoniness by slapping one of our sticky notes on that magazine in the doctor’s office or checkout stand, the sign in the mall or at the bus stop, or even on your own mirror to remind you that “there’s more to be than eye candy” or “you are capable of much more than being looked at!” Support this cause by purchasing these messages as sticky notes, posters, postcards or fliers. Now go show your beautiful reality to the world and look eye to eye to spot real beauty and in your own life!