Miss Representation

As a child I was infatuated with Barbie. I also idolized the princesses in movies such as the Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast. So as a young child I thought the concerns of a woman were solely to obtain physical beauty, dress in sexy clothes, and to find prince charming. But as I grew up I realized the images created by Barbie and Disney princesses were not realistic and that women are capable of so much more.

Today I feel inner empowerment as a woman when I see an intelligent female with strong determination running for office or in any leadership position. Sometimes I do catch myself focusing on a woman’s look or on her outfit because that is what society has trained me to do. But I manage to refocus and find encouragement in seeing a fellow female in an authoritative position. My personal career goal is to hold a position of power within a company after achieving my accounting degree. Most of the women that I look to as examples that support my career goals are not in movies or on TV.  

I do agree with the idea that having no role models in the media leads to a lack of women leaders. I don’t watch much TV right now in my life but in the past I really enjoyed reality shows. I would look forward to episodes of Keeping Up with the Kardashians and the Jersey Shore. These shows fixated on superficial beauty and displayed the party scene as glamorous. I wanted to look like Kim Kardashian and I wanted to party like Snooki. Thankfully I got over that quick but many young girls do not.