The Bigger Picture : Alesha – Look But Don’t Touch

In a new BBC Documentary ‘Look but Don’t Touch’, Alesha Dixon, formerly of the girl band Misteeq, has set herself a mission. In an attempt to expose the effect that celebrities, media and airbrushing have on young girls in society, she has set out to find a magazine that would be willing to put a photo of her completely untouched-up on the cover. Over the course of the programme, she also chatted to children from her goddaughter’s playgroup about what they thought was pretty and what they didn’t like about themselves. (One little girl thought size 14 was too big and another didn’t like herself because she was brown.) Alesha also tracked the progress of an 18-year old girl who, having lost a lot of weight, was getting breast implants to get her boobs back, as well as a woman who wanted to get touched-up photos done of herself for her fiancé before their wedding.

As with all of these types of documentaries, there’s not much wrong with the core idea of it : shallowness + negative body image + unhealthy idealism = bad, appreciating real beauty + liking yourself + not buying into celebrities = good.  It is sad to think that in Fiji, within 3 years of first getting television 12 girls out of 100 had Bulimia. Little girls reading Heat or Mizz think they are fat and ugly. This kind of thing does sadden me, but the programme didn’t altogether convince me that Alesha had the answer.

The main reason that I found her thesis dettached from the whole point of helping young girls with crippling self-confidence is that Alesha is not only drop-dead gorgeous, but also went through the entire programme in full glamourous make-up while being treated like a celebrity. Her crusade was against air-brushing, and eventually she did find a magazine willing to display her ‘untouched’ photo on its cover. But she still had a stunning red gown, full make-up and her hair done by a stylist. She also had a professional camera-crew, lighting and a wind machine. And to add to the absolute shame of the tall, stunningly attractive girl having her photo on the magazine, they put her up on a billboard in central London. While it was up there, she asked a few passers by what they thought. Of course, they all barely noticed and thought she was beautiful in it. So, the point is, you see – they barely notice the absence of air-brushing. But all that tells young girls is that, if you are beautiful and rich you don’t need airbrushing. I mean, if every spotty 12 year old who felt low had a couture gown, a team of stylists and a wind machine she would probably feel like a princess, but most days, she just feels like an ugly girl.

Alesha had help during the programme from her good friend, Cheryl Cole. Amid air kisses and gleaming smiles the two dolled up stunners talked about what they don’t like about themselves. Cheryl doesn’t like her legs. Alesha has some scars and big feet. But they said that when magazines point out that they have cellulite, it helps the normal young girls out there. Just like when they see Kate Moss with cellulite, they are reassured. But far from being this reassuring sisterhood of ‘we’re all flawed’ this just reinforces that physical flaws are important. And no girl looks at Kate Moss or Cheryl Cole and thinks that although they have been repeatedly voted the sexiest or most stylish women in the world, the fact that they have stretch marks on their left leg makes me feel like i’m ok. By focusing on the fact that even the most gorgeous celebrities have hang-ups about air-brushing and flaws may make them seem human, but it also sets the bar even higher. Not only now are you feeling less than the goddess women, you aren’t even near the top of the pile of mortals anymore. I realised, it’s not about the air-brushing and the idea of perfection. Even if you remove the inhuman flawless aspect of it, they are still drop-dead gorgeous and people the world-over desire and envy them. They have trainers, make-up, fans, clothes and tiny waists/long legs/nice boobs. A stunning made-up girl without air-brushing is still a beauty on a pedestal for most nprmal people, and I think the programme sort of missed that, well, a lot to be honest

So even though the central idea didn’t really work for me, my friend and I did get chatting about the whole reason why girls get so sucked into the whole culture of wanting to look like celebrities and what it is we aspire to. The 18 year old girl who got the boob job had a lovely family, good job and handsome boyfriend. He couldn’t understand why she wanted to get surgery. She wanted breasts like Posh Spice. She wasn’t doing it for him. She wanted to be ripped open and have silicone stuffed into her chest and be able to look in the mirror and think she was like Posh Spice. But more than that, she wanted strangers to look at her. She wanted people she didn’t know to admire her.

It’s not just in body conscious women we see it. Young girls today are a lot different to what they were in the early 1990s. (the golden days, you might say.) We watched those films where kids snuck off to cummer camp and had bonfires, we wanted to be the only girl on the basketball team, we watched Saved by the Bell and wanted to hang out on the beach and drink milkshakes. We liked the Babysitter’s Club. Today, my little cousin and her friends love Hannah Monatana – a programme about a 12 year old who leads a secret double-life as a pop star. The star of this show, Myley Cyrus, is 15 and has recently done a racy Vanity Fair photoshoot featuring her and a sheet. Another popular favourite is High School Musical. While more innocent, this still has young teenagers dressing ike adults and being adored up on stage. Young girls today want to be older, have pretty clothes and hair, be famous, recognized and perhaps most disturbingly, fancied. The core needs of young girls has always been to be pretty and popular, but gone are the days of wanting to trick the adults, have sleepovers and have play tricks on boys. Now young girls want to skip a decade or so.

It’s all much more sexualised, and in a very public way. The young women aren’t doing things to make themselves feel beautiful or make their partners happy, and the little girls arent trying to stay out late, go to sleepovers and kiss the boy next door. Girls and women are doing things because being recognised and being adored or admired for being beautiful or flawless is a good thing. Unfortunately, Alesha’s quest did not do much to fix this. It simply changed the degree of perfection to which young girls aspire. In a sense, at least when there was air-brushing we could tell ourselves that she can’t be that beautiful, it’s all digital. But on a 10 foot billboard in London we can see that Alesha is just beautiful. So forgive me if I am hesitant to say that a boundary has been broken with this programme. All I saw was a woman who could use her celebrity status to make a TV documentary and who had long legs, lots of make-up, confidence and contacts. All the girls who aspire to be like celebrities but aren’t naturally beautiful aren’t taking fromt his that natural beauty is ok, they are taking from this that to compete with natural beauties such as Alesha and Cheryl they need help. They need fad diets, make-up, fake tan and in extreme cases cosmetic surgery. And so the cycle continues: girls seeing beautiful people on tv, wanting their lifestyles, and making themselves miserable trying in vain to be like that. Touch-ups or not touch-ups, that is not going to change anytime soon.