Media and digital platforms

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MEDIA AND DIGITAL PRACTICES IMPACT ON THE CONTEMPORARY IDEAS OF
BODIES AND SEXUALITY
Name
Course and code
Date
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Media and digital practices on the contemporary ideas of bodies and sexuality
Media and digital platforms are products of human ingenuity in the 21st century that have
substantially impacted on several societal aspects including matters sexuality and the human
anatomy. They have either made the processes of data acquisition efficient or lead to the
manipulation of it to fit a given narrative or ideology. The two include elements such as social
media for instance (Internet, Facebook, and Twitter) and mainstream media (i.e., Cable News
Network -CNN or British Broadcasting Corporation - BBC).
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This paper will demonstrate how
the two (media and digital platforms) have impacted on the contemporary ideas revolving
matters sexuality and the human body anatomy.
Primarily, media and digital networking are the global interlinking platforms that
continuously evolve; they are those features that take what is localized at a given place on the
globe and broadcasts or shares it with the entire world. However, in their wake, the two impact
gravely on the opinions of individual people and revolutionalize their ideologies mental
concepts. One of the significant successes that the two have managed to impact is the idea of an
appeal. What the media gives life by casting more attention on it takes prestige, and the vice
versa is valid. The media in the effort to advertise itself has craftily incorporated the use of
pertinent humane issues as mentioned (sexuality) to advance its advertisements both in verbal or
non-verbal expressions. By such doing they have interpolated on the very essence of this concept
(sexuality) and created their concept attune to the fact that; what has more sexual appeal is better
than the one with less.
1
Ghaznavi, Jannath, and Laramie D. Taylor. "Bones, body parts, and sex appeal: An analysis of#
thinspiration images on popular social media." Body Image 14 (2015): 54-61.
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Secondly, in the functionality of the media and digital platforms, continuous adaptation
(as mentioned) to current trends prevalent in the society must be endeared to. One of the relevant
contemporary issues is the human body and its relation to sex appeal. The media and digital
platforms have played a significant role in revolutionizing the modern views and opinions of
how the two are applied in the materialistic world. In this context, the role of the two (media and
digital platforms) is giving rise to fashion. Fashion is a dynamic trend that is ignited or
extinguished by the element of media. According to ethnographers, every community has a set of
popular culture or fashion that they subscribe.
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Therefore; considering the human person globally
as a single entity, there are the aspects of popular culture and fashion that touches on matters
sexuality and the human body. The indirect effect of fashion as driven by the media is; digital
platforms provide the necessary technological skills to place a trending genre, for instance, a
certain body deodorant and the mainstream media provides the platform to broadcast it by
advertisement. In advertising, the media relies on what is susceptible to attract attention, in most
cases they tend to attach some level of sex appeal to any fashionable object or trend to capture
the attention of many.
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Thirdly, media and digital platforms have had quite a significant impact on the rise of
contemporary trends such as feminism the latter has participated in shaping the views of the
human anatomy and sexuality. Feminism is the ideology that tends to give pre-eminence of
matters related to women. It is via the media that such trends have been created and through
2
Csordas, Thomas J. "Embodiment as a Paradigm for Anthropology." Ethos 18, no. 1 (1990): 5-
47.
3
Csordas, Thomas J. "Embodiment as a Paradigm for Anthropology." Ethos 18, no. 1 (1990): 5-
47.
4
which they can thrive. It is the media that devises new ways of promoting such patterns, and in
doing so, they highlight the feminine issues that are bound to attract attention. Sexuality has been
one of the tools craftily manipulated by the media; women have been idolized as the symbols of
pleasure and ecstasy. They have cunningly shifted the place of a woman from a productive
person to a more of sex toys.
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It (media) has not shied to put to limelight the fact that success has
to connect with the issue of appeal, the more a woman is beautiful, the more she sells or is
compatible and relevant in the modern community.
Media and digital networking have also led to the birth of the idolization of nudity which
in turn has impacted on the general view of the human body. According to ethnographic studies,
more people are likely to read an article with a cover of a nude person on top than that without.
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Nudity is an aspect that the media has successfully elevated from its taboo notion to fame. To
capture crowds media incorporate the use of associated nude pictures that are bound to do the
trick. Moreover, its interactive platforms such as Twitter and Facebook have also preyed on this
phenomenon to further the idolization of nudity. Sociological statistics note that profile platforms
with nude pictures are bound to have more likes and views than those without. Emphasis has
been created on the perfect body shapes and skin tones all tuned to evoke a particular appeal
4
Phillips, Christian. "Self-pornographic representations with Grindr." Journal of Visual and
Media Anthropology 1, no. 1 (2015): 65-79
5
Ogden, Jessica, Susan Halford, and Leslie Carr. "Observing web archives: The case for an
ethnographic study of web archiving." (2017).
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within the audience.
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The phrases; Tall, dark and Handsome' for men ‘sexy faces and bodies ‘for
women are all creations of the media.
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Within the media and social interactive spaces and
internet sites, what is more, favorite is not a journal on some world discovery but on
pornographic content and the Do(s) and Don't(s) to having a sexy body, attractive figure or face.
Moreover riding on this nudity ideology the rise of technological skills that can
manipulate pictures to yield a perfect body is also a substantial effort that has transformed the
ideological opinions of many people. With the aid of Photoshop and cropping, one can at the
comfort of his or her house amalgamate picture parts to constitute a figure that it is idealistically
perfect.
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More emphasis is placed on enhancement of reproductive parts and on the masculinity
tone and frame for men and the feminine aspects of a woman. Such is the rise of the perfect body
ideology and these platforms with the efficiency of a faster internet service can post such photos
on the web and have then gone viral in seconds. The objective in mind is always the sexier, the
better; such mind concepts are a consequence of what the media has created as sexy and what is
as not. Nudity has further been revolutionalizing from an intimate idea to a contemporary public
concept that seeks to embrace one's true identity and character. Though the media much
6
Ogden, Jessica, Susan Halford, and Leslie Carr. "Observing web archives: The case for an
ethnographic study of web archiving." (2017).
7
Ogden, Jessica, Susan Halford, and Leslie Carr. "Observing web archives: The case for an
ethnographic study of web archiving." (2017).
8
Phillips, Christian. "Self-pornographic representations with Grindr." Journal of Visual and
Media Anthropology 1, no. 1 (2015): 65-79.
6
emphasis has been placed on nudity as an aspect of one true self and the shame and sacredness
that one’s rode with it thrown out of the window.
Connected with the idolization of nudity, there has also courtesy of the media arisen the
issues of medical body parts replacement and surgical procedures that have sort to reshape a
person's biometrics to mirror a perfect image. With the media's insistence that certain body parts
are more popular or sexually preferable when they assume specific dimensions, then medical
procedures to enhance or reduce these dimensions have been on the rise. Methods such as
Liposuction, Breast enlargement, Botox, Penile enlargement amidst others are indicatives of how
eroded the sacredness of the human body has been affected.
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The mere fact that an individual can
incur life-threatening procedures that are expensive to comply with the popular perfect figure,
then there indeed is a negative impact on the contemporary ideas of bodies and sexuality.
As the saying goes the greatest colonialism is that of the mind.
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Media and digital
platforms have not only shaped the ideas revolving the idealism of the human bodies and
sexuality for good but also for the worse. Media is one of the platforms through which a lot of
adult content both legal and illegal has been transacted. Pornography has become a site readily
available on the internet and had its insinuation even in the mainstream media. So advanced has
the Pornographic content developed right form live sessions to recorded ones, with varying
9
Ghaznavi, Jannath, and Laramie D. Taylor. "Bones, body parts, and sex appeal: An analysis of#
thinspiration images on popular social media." Body Image 14 (2015): 54-61
10
Newman, Nic. "Mainstream media and the distribution of news in the age of social discovery."
Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, University of Oxford (2011).
7
choices ranging from heterosexual material to same sex. These sights have substantially
corrupted young minds into living in a fantasy world of ecstasy and pleasure. The objective
sexual reasons of procreation and marital pleasure have had the latter emphasized without
attachment to anything marital. Sexuality no longer is an aspect of the human propagation
system but one of achieving happiness or attaining certain favors.
Further, the media has portrayed the use of human sexuality as a tool of trade or leverage.
More emphasis has in the contemporary world, with the rise of the film industry, adult content
has also managed to chart its way and in most cases being used positively or negatively. More
films tend to showcase actors engaging in the trade of sex as an act to unlawfully gain some
physical advantage or leverage against some other within the plot of a movie.
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Statistics indicate
that more of television content including adult unrated content is more popular than those
without.
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Genres such as soap operas are likely to have more viewers than regular television
content. It is somewhat saddening that some of the reasons people are attracted to this kind of
materials are to explore how sex has been applied as a tool of deceit, betrayal, and love. The
multiplicity of utility in matters sexuality is pervasive within the film industry. To add more,
even the selection of the cast within a particular film with a specific parental advisory limit is
also deliberate. Actors and actresses with what would be referred to as sexy bodies are enrolled
to play scenes that contain sexual notions, whereas the less sexy is relegated the evil attached
11
Phillips, Christian. "Self-pornographic representations with Grindr." Journal of Visual and
Media Anthropology 1, no. 1 (2015): 65-79.
12
Phillips, Christian. "Self-pornographic representations with Grindr." Journal of Visual and
Media Anthropology 1, no. 1 (2015): 65-79.
8
roles (such as witches or murderers). That done in an extended period tends to slowly erode the
concept of human sexuality from its objectives to be a tool available for economic if not leverage
purposes.
Conclusion
Having analyzed the place of mainstream media and digital networking in impacting the
contemporary ideas on human sexuality and bodies, the following findings are arrived at; social
media has led to the rise of the idealistic perfect man and woman with perfect bodies for greater
sexual appeal. Media is a dominant platform that has transformed the concepts about human
sexuality positively or negatively by focusing on some aspects of it and not others thus idolizing
some and mot others. With the media’s continued efforts to influence the trends that shape
human thinking and ideas about sex, the community is bound to change, since the transformation
of the society is linked to the transformation of the mindset.
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References
Csordas, Thomas J. "Embodiment as a Paradigm for Anthropology." Ethos 18, no. 1 (1990): 5-
47.
Ghaznavi, Jannath, and Laramie D. Taylor. "Bones, body parts, and sex appeal: An analysis of#
thinspiration images on popular social media." Body Image 14 (2015): 54-61.
Newman, Nic. "Mainstream media and the distribution of news in the age of social discovery."
Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, University of Oxford (2011).
Ogden, Jessica, Susan Halford, and Leslie Carr. "Observing web archives: The case for an
ethnographic study of web archiving." (2017).
Phillips, Christian. "Self-pornographic representations with Grindr." Journal of Visual and Media
Anthropology 1, no. 1 (2015): 65-79.

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