We often discuss how people on TV, especially women, are almost always very thin. Similar to this, I can't help but notice how nobody on TV has acne. Not even one zit. Nobody has anything other than perfect skin, unless a point is being made of it, and this is almost always in the form of that cliched storyline of children's sitcoms (think Nickelodeon shows) where a teenage female character gets one zit on her face before a date and spends days in her room sobbing that her life is over. I didn't use to watch that much TV as a child, but I still remember this storyline on many different kid's programmes of that decade, like 'Sister, sister', and this has also shown up on British children's channels CITV and CBBC programmes (I remember seeing it in 'Custer's last standup' and another in 'Bailey Kipper's POV', both truly awful shows, and even more because they had to resort to this awful cliche) My mother tells me this goes way back, she can remember it happening on 'The Brady bunch'. Apart from these programmes for pre-teens, no characters have acne at all.
TV adverts and articles in teen magazines follow the same pattern: teens - usually female - with absolutely immaculate skin, get one, isolated pink dot on their skin and freak out. In the fantasy land, this is solved by putting some product on your face. As we know, this is not the way acne works; unless you're very lucky you will not only have a little pimple like an island in a perfect face, but you will have a sea of red marks, discolouration and blackheads, even after you've got rid of your pimples. And if getting rid of them were that easy, no one would have them. If you were to watch TV and never meet a real person, you would not only think that fat, menstruation, leg hair and STIs are non-existent, but also that acne is almost unheard of. Even female characters in books who are supposed to have acne, or be fat, or not conventionally attractive, are cast in TV or movie adaptations with conventionally good-looking actors with good skin, and thin.
Why do I believe this is a feminist issue? Because women are held up to a much higher standard than men when it comes to skin, and this is just one more thing in a continuum of prejudice against people who look perfectly normal, which causes unnecessary worry. Boys also get insecure about acne, it's true, and I can see WHY they would use actors with good skin. But women are told that, not only should it be blemish-free, but it also must be hair-free, line-free, SHINE-free (and yet moisturized), and 'glowing' (whatever that means). A phrase which comes up more and more in adverts is 'virtually poreless' which seems ridiculous not to mention kinda creepy. Can anyone imagine a man being told he should be virtually poreless, have a radiant and shine-free complexion? Can you imagine the classic kids-sitcom-girl-gets-zit-and-her-life-is-over storyline being played out with a male character? It would just seem pathetic and unrealistic. Which it is.
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While I definitely agree this is annoying, it isn't necessary limited to women in this case. The first "OMG, a zit!" episode I think of is from Doug.
Actually, here's a whole list of examples, both male and female:
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/RiseOfZitboy
I LOVE TVTropes.
And yeah, this is for everyone. But the "perfect skin on TV/film" goes far further than just no acne. Anyone being filmed has had some sort of professional makeup work done prior to being put to celluloid. It's nothing short of magic what some of these professionals can do. They take folks with (almost uniformly) already good skin, and then make it look even better.
It's not a shock, though. Beauty sells. It simply is what it is. People are less likely to watch a show if they hire actors with acne and then don't mask it. It's cyclical, really, with blame on the supply side and the demand side.
People are less likely to watch a show if they hire actors with acne and then don't mask it. It's cyclical, really, with blame on the supply side and the demand side.
Sorry, I think this "blame the audience for liking the unrealistic beauty standards" is bullshit, not to mention unsupported by research. Media is not created nor run democratically, and ratings don't constitute someone making a genuine "choice" - they constitute someone making a "choice" between a few already severely narrowed "choices." The media is FAR more influential on its audience than the audience is on the media - hence advertising's success at affecting people's self-esteem and changing people's beauty habits (e.g., in the 20th century, hairless legs for women wasn't popularized until like the '30s, after aggressive advertising campaigns).
Something doesn't have to be a true democracy in order to have input from both sides, though. Think of it more like a dictatorship in classical times. Autocracy with the threat of assassination. Media networks certainly get to shape trends gradually, but rarely is there ever a big shake-up because of the fear of losing audiences.
So the media certainly gets to gradually shape beauty, but they still have to play by their own rules, and the rules we then hold them to.
Hmm. Well, I think we should also remember that pretty much all forms of media now have the capability to digitally "touch up" their actresses/models. People we see in magazines and on TV pretty much aren't even real PEOPLE anymore - they're computerized images. And people really DO forget that the "people" on the screen are in fact just images, representations.
Your post is interesting not only with regard to acne, but with regard to ANY skin conditions, of which people have multiple infinite types. I broke out with psoriasis (a genetic autoimmune disorder that causes your skin cells to reproduce too rapidly and thus leaves dry, flaky patches) at age 1 after a bout of strep throat and was absolutely COVERED with it for the first few years of my life. I have awful memories of Mom forcing me into oatmeal baths, slathering my scalp with tar, and raking through my hair with flea combs. When I was in second grade, my teacher remarked to my mother that I always had flakes falling out of my hair and onto my papers and distracting other students (my mom of course told her to piss off). But when I started studying dance in college, I realized pretty quickly that I could never dance with a professional company, even if I wanted to, because of the patches on my skin. Thankfully the university environment was much more accepting.
I also like to think of the "beauty standards" argument not so much as "women are held up to a much higher standard than men" (because the meaning of the word "standard" is always sort of vague and elusive), but more that men with physical imperfections and men who are not conventionally attractive have more opportunities and possibilities available to them in show business than women who are not conventionally attractive. I think this could probably easily be proven by doing, e.g., a simple content analysis a la the comm arts/media studies department.
Even female characters in books who are supposed to have acne, or be fat, or not conventionally attractive, are cast in TV or movie adaptations with conventionally good-looking actors with good skin, and thin.: This pissed me off TO NO END about _Ugly Betty_. If America Ferrera, in any pair of eyeglasses, is what we consider ugly in America today, then the rest of us must be goddamn hideous monsters.
I have really bad skin, myself, and have been thinking about the same thing - with one addition. The only (usually female) character who gets a zit that doesn't magically go away is the "bad girl." The example I always think of is Hillary Faye in Saved!, towards the end when they're at prom.
I see all this Hollywood movies and I have never seen ANY man (or woman) with acne, or so much as a single pimple on their face (Orlando Bloom apparently has the best skin among men...) So I'm not seeing where this men get away with more in terms of skin thing. Maybe American TV has lower standards for men?
I noticed that Rupert Grinch had pimples in the last installment of the Harry Potter films. I only noticed because it's so unusual though, so it still stands as a bit of a trope.
I noticed Grint's acne, too! It made me giddy.
The only time you'll see men with less than perfect skin on any screen is when it's a choice (for example Johnny Depp in Public Enemies). However, if you look closely on a lot of young actors, there are zits they've just been covered up very well. Elijah Wood in the first Lord of the Rings is a good example of this. He was 17 during some of the filming, and in the sequence where they're in the boats after leaving Galadriel, he has a zit that's been covered up.
On TV and in movies, the people with purposely bad skin are almost always bad guys and bullies, as if their skin reflects the ugliness within. However, I have noticed that many male actors (Brad Pitt and Edward James Olmos come to mind) have pockmarked skin, which female actors never seem to have. For these men, their acne scars make them look rugged and tough. Since these are traditionally considered masculine traits, pockmarks are much more acceptable on men than on women, placing further limits on female appearances that are not as heavily imposed on men.
Like katemoore, the Doug episode was the first thing that came to my mind, followed shortly by an episode of the Wonder Years, so I think the teenage zit calamity probably has more to do with coming-of-age than idealized beauty standards.
In the Wonder Years episode, for instance, Kevin can't get rid of his zit before he has to meet a girl, but he discovers that she also has a zit she's been fretting over! I can't remember how the Doug episode ends. I just remember at one point he imagines four zits playing cards with each other on his face...
However, I do think that as a whole, women have more idealized beauty standards--flawless skin is one of the ultimate representations of youth (ironically) and fertility.
I know on one episode of "That's So Raven" (terrible show, BTW), the main male character, Eddie, got a zit the day before a date. Raven put concealer over it, which inevitably led to the oh-so-hilarious reveal at the end: "ZOmg! He's a guy! Wearing makeup! LOLOLOLOMGLOL!"