My 9-year-old daughter is becoming increasingly aware of fashion and beauty and other girls and women. It's hard to avoid the near-perfection that's paraded around as normal on TV shows and commercials, movies and magazine covers. I cannot shield her from the images. They are out there, and the older she gets the more they will seep into her world. But I can help shape her view of what she is seeing and remind her over and over again that beauty, in many cases, is not necessarily in the eye of beholder but in the hand of the Photoshop editor.
When I saw this video clip, I knew it was something she should see. Every girl should see it. Maybe every woman should see it too. Because too often it is too easy to believe that what we see is real and to think that we are less than. Women are more than the sum of the manipulated parts on a billboard or magazine ad. Let's not forget that. Watch this:
