CAMPAIGN, from page 3 Rallying against negative ads
By REBECCA GROSS Special to the Daily Press
Local high school students are fed up that girls their age are portrayed as perfect in magazines and they intend do something about it.
The Women’s Issues Club at Crossroads High School this month plans to launch a campaign against what members consider negative messages in teen magazines. For Crossroads junior and club president Shauna Miller, the campaign is about raising awareness that some ads can be harmful to a girl’s self esteem.
“The absolute goal would be for them to change the way they format the magazine, decreasing the number of advertisers that are objectifying the female body,” said Miller, 17.
She said she wants the magazine industry to change its advertising content to reflect realistic images of teen-agers. The 20-member high school club will first contact West Coast magazine executives and ask them to be conscious of what they put on every page. They plan to go through the magazines page by page, pointing out negative articles and advertisements, as well as contradictory messages.
The club has compiled binders of what they consider both positive and negative images. Members plan to show those binders to magazine officials and attempt to hold them accountable for publishing the negatives ones, Miller said.
One negative ad shows a girl in a short, sexy mini-skirt with a highlighter in her pocket. The ad makes it seem like girls should use highlighters because it makes them look sexy, Miller said.
Another negative ad features a girl wearing Victoria Secret lingerie standing in a very sensual position that reads “What is Sexy?” Miller said that’s a negative message because it’s telling girls that wearing Victoria Secret lingerie is sexy, rather than how they feel about themselves.
“It was trying to portray sexy in a way that was only benefiting their own product. That to me was very gross and disturbing,” she said. “No one can define what it means to be sexy, it’s a very subjective thing.”
Other negative messages include ads that promote excessive thinness, Miller said.
“Negative (is) displaying this kind of stereotype of girls, of this person who always has to be sexual, to be submissive to men and to be not caring of things of the intellect and mind but only caring of things of fashion and make-up and clothing.” she said.
Miller and her counterparts would rather see ads that are more realistic and feature girls of all sizes, races and looks.
Some magazine companies already take steps to monitor advertisement content.
YM Magazine, a teen magazine based in New York City, took a no-diet stance two years ago. The magazine will not print diet-related content and tries to portray real women, according to publisher Laura McEwen.
“We encourage advertisers to use girls that have very realistic body types,” she said.
YM tries to use models of all backgrounds and ethnicities, as well as plus size models, she said. The magazine also will not print any advertisements relating to cosmetic surgery.
McEwen said YM’s models don’t look like typical runway models — they may have big noses or funny hair.
“The goal is to show girls that beauty is both inside and outside,” she said. “(Our advertisers) are making efforts to make the images positive and appropriate for girls.”
“The goal is to show girls that beauty is both inside and outside.” — — LAURA MCEWEN YM Magazine publisher
But as the Crossroads club may soon realize, magazine executives know that girls in mini-skirts sell more highlighters than a plus-sized girl reading a book.
“Sex sells... That’s what their business is based on,” said Jacob Gershbock, a 15-year-old Los Angeles resident and a student at Milken Community High School. “The chance of changing opinions on what to put in magazines is, shall we say, low.”
Miller said she has always been interested in the mass media and how it affects society. When discussing women’s issues with her friends at school, Miller said the conversation frequently came back to the images portrayed in magazines.
“I was kind of like, that’s it, I need to do something about this,” she said.
For her, the campaign is a feminist’s call to action to try and make men and women more equal in society.
“By attacking the media’s way of portraying women... it can help neutralize the society we live in,” she said.
Carole Winters, the chair of the history department at Crossroads, sponsors the women’s issues club. “(The club’s) intention is to become more of a political force in dealing with the infrastructure in many areas,” Winters said.
Amanda Moret, a 16-year-old junior and member of the organization, said she expects negative feedback at first from magazines and the public, but thinks the campaign is an important step.
“When you try to critique anything that has been a norm for so long you are not going to have a positive effect,” she said. “It might take people a while to adjust... but it’s a change for the better.”
This is the first effort the club has planned outside of the community. Within Crossroads school, the club has conducted sexual harassment educational programs and launched a “say no to crack campaign” on girls wearing thong underwear and jeans, said Zach Meredith, one of three boys in the club.
The say “no to crack” campaign looked at the way girls portray themselves through their dress. “(Girls) don’t even think about the fact that their pants are hanging off their butt and their thong is showing,” Meredith said.
Meredith said he joined the club because he has noticed that women are objectified even in high school.
“The club isn’t a feminist club,” he said. “It’s for equality between the two sexes.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on April 2, 2003. Read the original PDF.