Beauty in the Media: Unattainable Beauty: Self-Improvement or Self-Destruction? Sexy lingerie, skimpy clothes, high heels and lots of skin; this is what can be seen while walking down any street, leafing through any magazine, surfing online or shopping. Everywhere a person turns, women's bodies are graphically used to sell a wide variety of products. Sex sells is the mantra of the advertising world and why shouldn't it be if the use of sexual imagery dramatically and demonstrably increases sales. Sex has become the selling point of a product, rather than the value of the product or service itself. Beauty is no longer in the eye of the beholder, it is a fixed standard that can only be achieved by meeting impossible standards. Women struggle to change their attitudes, their appearance and their morals, in an attempt to conform to an extremely high standard which, after years of watching these images on television and seeing them in magazines, has become normalized to the point that, often unconsciously, they are accepted ideas, values ​​and standards; for women much more than for men appearance is crucial and more determining and it is difficult to achieve and maintain the image that the media has defined as attractive, sexy or desirable and the media promote it through a continuous barrage of visual cues. shown above the manufacturers are promoting their product using familiar advertising tactics. What the viewer sees of the woman is not much since the viewer cannot see the entire body of the woman; the excessive tone of the ad suggests that she is wearing little to nothing other than stilettos that perfectly accentuate her long legs. Her legs are spread seductively, as if to suggest that she is open to any prospect that might present itself... middle of paper... edit - and that the female body is simply an object to be perfected. Jean Kilbourne argues that the overwhelming presence of media images of painfully thin women means that real women's bodies have become invisible in the mass media. The real tragedy, Kilbourne concludes, is that many women internalize these stereotypes and judge themselves by the standards of the beauty industry. Women learn to compare themselves to other women and compete with them for male attention. This focus on beauty and desirability “effectively destroys any awareness and action that could help change that climate.” Sex and beauty are tools to sell more products; poor body image and low self-esteem only help to further sell items to improve appearances; and slowly this became an acceptable practice. The way we talk and think about appearances may require a radical overhaul.