As collegiettes, we are reminded everyday about the weight society places on us to be beautiful. From a very young age, girls are bombarded with photo-shopped images of celebrities and models on magazine covers and on TV. This causes girls to believe they need to look like that, too, even though the girl on the magazine cover looks nothing like that in real life. The amount of pressure placed on girls and women in general from society to be perfect is overwhelming, and ultimately toxic. Many collegiettes can’t help but to break under the pressure.
On November 20 from 7 p.m. – 9:30 p.m. at the Bow Tie Cinemas, Landmark 9.5, Landmark Square in Stamford, Timberline Knolls Residential Treatment Center is hosting a free screening of the new documentary, “America the Beautiful 3: The Sexualization of our Youth” by filmmaker Darryl Roberts. The documentary questions the highly sexualized media present in our culture, specifically towards children and women. The screening is showing the third part of a trilogy of documentaries entitled “America the Beautiful.” The first film debuted in 2008 and focused on the fixation of perfection and beauty in our culture. The second part of the series, “America the Beautiful: The Thin Commandments,” was released in 2011 and paid a closer attention to the overwhelming pressure put on thinness and weight in the United States.
Roberts’ new film attentively examines the way in which the media sexualizes women and children and the affect this has on our youth. The film shares many startling statistics, such as that 95% of people suffering from eating disorders are between the ages of 12-15 and approximately 91% of women are unhappy with the way their body looks, causing them to resort to extreme dieting to obtain their ideal body shape.
The film focuses on other controversial issues, including child beauty pageants, teen pregnancy, and rape culture, particularly on college campuses. It also shines a light on the fact that women are raised to believe they have two options in life, to be desirable or to be invisible, while boys grow up in a culture of porn, where it is difficult for them to create a vision of a healthy relationship with a woman.
Roberts stated that with this documentary, he hopes to “foster more honest conversation about the sexualization of our youth, particularly between parents and their children” and that “adults need to highlight for the young women and men in their community that looks aren’t the center of their worth as a human being.”
The event is open to the public and will offer complimentary refreshments. After the screening, a panel of experts in the field will be hosting a Q & A session. To attend the event, you must register online before.
Follow Shana on Twitter.