Dear future president,

      “Pretty hurts, shine the light on whatevers worst, perfection is a disease of a nation..” (Beyonce). Today, women and men are being told by media to change their appearances. This affects kids and adults of all ages, in fact approximately 91% of women aren't happy with their bodies. Studies show that the more reality television a young girl watches, the more likely she is to find appearance important and the more we show unrealistic body standards in the media it's only going to get worse. It's important that everyone feels comfortable in their own skin and they are not pressured to change. 

     As a young girl I looked at ads on T.V. and in magazines with pictures of photoshopped and airbrushed models. This made me think that that's what I needed to look like to be “pretty” or “normal” looking. I never thought I met those standards and not for a while realized that were unrealistic. Not just me but well over 30% of the girls felt that the media pressures them to have a perfect body. So, some of these women and men too try to change themselves, especially girls my age. Sometimes the need to look perfect causes people to go to extremes by going on insane diets and starving themselves.this can cause serious health problems including eating disorders. In fact, 95% of people with eating disorders are between the ages of 12 and 25 and only 10% of people suffering from an eating disorder will seek professional help. Hopefully this can change and you can help solve this epidemic for the future kids of America.

     One solution to this problem is making rules for the T.V. and magazine ads to not body shame or photoshop their models. This would make more people feel that they look beautiful just the way they are. Another solution is having schools teach that all body types are beautiful. Children should never feel insecure about how they look and school should be apart of the solution because it's an easy way to spread the message to millions of kids nationwide. Lastly, they should have less commercials on products that encourage people to change themselves such as plastic surgery. This would make people feel less pressure about changing their bodies.

     No one should ever feel insecure about how they look and be influenced by unrealistic standards. We need to make sure there are no ads on T.V. making people feel bad about their appearance. Fixing this problem would make less people spend their time trying to change their appearances. I would like the future president to take this problem into consideration and try to find more ways to fix and take action to this concern.