WOMEN AND THE ADVANTAGES OF SOCIAL MEDIA

The biggest critic that women have ever faced is the media. The media dictates how we should look, what we should wear, eat and sound like. To make things worse, women have never been able to escape the standards the media imposes on our bodies. However, in a strange turn of events, the media has become an advocate for us, but not through its own accord.

Social media has become an imperative part of our lives. Many of us can’t fathom a life without it, especially for the younger generations. It has become a place where keeping in touch with others is made easy. It has also become a platform to express ourselves and our hobbies, so it is no shock that social media has become the biggest advocate for women.

Women have taken control of the narrative of what it means to be a woman in today’s society. By way of social media apps, we have set up our own standards and disproved the old, unattainable ones. Our voices have risen to the top making them loud and inescapable.

A New York Times op-ed by child star Mara Wilson, who famously played Matilda, states that the media, and Hollywood more specifically, builds girls up only to destroy them. She mentions how she sympathizes with the scrutiny that Britney Spears went through, and how people are now starting to realize how horribly people treated her.

This realization didn’t fall out of the sky. Recent events, like the MeToo moment have brought to light the hardships that women face within the patriarchy. And these hardships are now sitting loudly in the front seat making itself be known to anyone with a social media app. Women have basically said, “no more!” and decided to tell it how it is.

At times it might seem like social media is the biggest villain in our stories when it bombards us with pictures of photoshopped perfection and praise for the so-called ideal body type, hair type, skin, etc.—the list is endless. But social media is only our biggest weapon when we show our true selves unapologetically.