The website for MEDiAGIRLS has a list of disturbing statistics about girls’ and women’s reactions after consuming media images. One that caught my attention was from The Representation Project, “By the time a girl from the U.S. is age 12, she has seen approximately 77,546 ads, with 56% using beauty as a product appeal.” An equally disturbing statistic follows:
“Fifty-six percent of teens feel that the media’s advertisements are the main cause of low self-esteem.” (2013 National Teen Body-image survey by the blog StageofLife.)
And it’s not just ads. The ubiquity of social media in young people’s lives has also contributed to the confidence problem. According to the teen body-image site Proud2Bme, “eighty-six percent of respondents say that social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter hurt their body confidence.”
“Many girls are posting pics of themselves on social media sites and YouTube asking ‘Am I beautiful?’ and then getting ripped apart by negative comments. It’s heartbreaking,” said Michelle Cove, MEDiAGIRL’s Founder, Executive Director, and Instructor.
MEDiAGIRLS is a new Brookline-based program designed to empower middle school girls to honestly discuss how airbrushed and idealized images of women in the media affect their self-esteem. MEDiAGIRLS also gives them tools to turn the trend on its head by teaching them to create their own girl-positive media.
For Cove, the program blends her love of mentoring and media. She has worked in the media as a documentarian, journalist, and author for the last twenty years. As a parent of a ten year-old daughter, she also has a parent’s perspective of how these glorified images of women’s bodies and faces affect young girls and women.
The idea for MEDiAGIRLS came to Cove 6 months ago and took off quickly from there. She visited the Brookline Interactive Group and was impressed with their space. Cove spoke with BIG coordinator Andrea Kalsow about using the space for classes and they agreed immediately. Amy Diamond, assistant teacher at the Michael Driscoll School, also signed on to help.
Each class has a topic. Girls start by journaling on a particular question, such as “How do you feel when someone posts a picture of you on Facebook without your permission?” Then after some writing time, the group discusses their answers. The second half of the class is devoted to the girls creating their own media, including writing reviews and opinion pieces . Girls learn how to conduct an interview and how to come up with good questions that showcase the best in people rather then tearing them down. Then they are given a female role model in the community to interview. Once a piece of content is created, there are revisions before it’s posted (and Cove was quick to add that the girls must make the revisions before their pieces go live.) This gives the students a sense for what it means to work really hard, helping them to gain self-esteem through their efforts.
“It’s not ‘Everyone wins! Everyone gets a trophy!’ These girls whose pieces go live earned it.” Cove said.
So far the girls have interviewed female video game designers and girls participating in other local non-profit programs. The idea is to steer girls away from popular images of “bad girl behavior” so pervasive on TV and online, and start to create a positive change in the culture.
It’s a culture that is already starting to change, albeit slowly. The Dove Campaign for Real Beauty and its Movement for Self-Esteem are examples. Cove referenced another corporate media campaign that she thinks got it right.
“The Always campaigns had filmmaker Lauren Greenfield ask young women and boys to show what it looked like to run like a girl and hit like a girl. Then they actually filmed young girls running and hitting a ball. It opened up a conversation.”
MEDiAGIRLS has had one session so far which Cove said went well. I asked her if she had ideas for improving the program now that she has completed a session.
“I will try to give the girls more breathing room during the discussion period. These are such important issues and I don’t want the girls to feel rushed,” Cove reflected, “Media hits them so fast—its important to slow down when we have discussions like these.”
Cove is also planning classes for low-income middle school girls in Boston. She already has a class for girls at the Washington Irving School in Roslindale.
“Girls of color are invisible in media. Or they’re seeing celebrities like Beyoncé, who often wears her hair blonde and straight. What message does that send?”
I asked Cove if she thought she might eventually open her classes to boys—either making class groups coed or holding classes specifically for boys, who are also under a different kind of societal pressure to look macho and not show emotion.
“I have been asked that question before but I don’t plan to have coed classes. It’s been demonstrated that girls don’t talk in the same way if boys are present. But boys will see the media these girls create and through that they’ll get to hear the pressures girls are under. I also would love to see someone else begin a program for boys about media messages because it’s deeply needed.”
During my talk with Cove, the bestselling author of Reviving Ophelia, Mary Pipher, was also brought up. Pipher famously wrote, “Adolescence is when girls experience social pressure to put aside their authentic selves and to display only a small portion of their gifts.” It’s with programs like MEDiAGIRLS that we can start to change this.
The Fall session (10 classes) of MEDIAGIRLS starts Tuesday, October 9th from 3:30-5PM. You can register here. Classes have a maximum enrollment of 12 middle school girls (6th to 8th grade.)
– Jennifer Campaniolo