Magazines Controversies: The impact of Images

How much can an image in a magazine affect our vision or the perception of ourselves?

Nowadays, magazines have a very important and valuable place in our societies and especially in our personal lives. Magazines have the advantage of producing a major impact by the images that they show through their pages. I think this is one of the beauties of media today, because we are able to express our thoughts and even illustrate them for better understanding.

Unfortunately, magazines can also impact us in a negative and less productive way; in many cases this occurs because of the images that are shown. One of the main groups of magazine consumers are women, the ones that want to be in touch with trends, beauty products, etc. We have many magazines that base their content on the woman’s image, but in most of the cases they expose women like a "plastic doll" creating a superficial image beyond everything else. This is something very harmful to any woman because are susceptible targets, taking and using a woman’s insecurities as an advantage to sell their articles by putting images of perfect and unrealistic body types, it can affect and depress a woman's emotions and especially her physical health. It’s shown that most of the women that view fashion magazines prefer to weigh less; they are more preoccupied with the desire to be thin.

With this statement I don't whish to say that all of them are the same but I'm explaining how magazines can affect us and impact our ideas.
I think it’s important to have a real vision and not only a false image of our self, but find the real meaning behind every picture.
Helping us to be inspired by them and believe in our own beauty by not judging our physical appearance.