For my final project, I decided to raise awareness by composing a blog that focuses on body image, beauty standards, and self-love. The blog is titled Life as a Woman: Beauty Standards and Expectations. There are many posts regarding the ways in which society expects women to monitor their bodies. I decided to choose this topic because it was the most pressing and relevant topic in regards to womens studies. The expectations of womens bodies not only leave women feeling insecure and unsatisfied with themselves, but it also is dehumanizing and leads to the mentality that women are only worth what they look like and how well their bodies resemble the current norm, whatever it may be. This can be crippling to a woman or girls self-worth and invalidate her emotions and personal accomplishments. My main goal was to address every socially enforced standard that women are expected to meet, and address what is wrong with the standard, respectively.First off, I decided to use blogger.com to build the blog. This is because it has many ways to monitor activity. There is a counter to track activity and a way to block my own page views from being counted. There is also the ability to see traffic sources, as well as how many views each individual post has received. Viewers are also able to comment adding feedback.In total, my blog has 238 page views. A majority of these tracked views are trafficked from Facebook and Google. Of these page views, 223 were from the United States. There are five from Singapore, three from New Zealand, two from Spain, two from El Salvador, one from Australia, and one from the United Kingdom. I am not surprised by the large amount of people who viewed my profile in the United States, because that was the target audience. However, I am surprised about the random locations, and how they found my blog. For a long period of time, I had very few page views. I waited until I felt that there was a sufficient amount of quality posts before I promoted my blog. On May 3rd, 2015, I felt as though the blog was complete enough to promote. I spent a decent amount of time composing messages to friends, family, classmates, and mutuals on Facebook, tumblr, and through the pager and discussions in D2L.

As one can see, promoting my blog increased the amount of page views significantly. After May 3rd, there was a significant spike in page views for a few days. On May 4th, 2015 my blog had 86 page views, which is the most it has had in a day. A majority of these views came from Facebook, to my surprise. I assumed that tumblr users would be more receptive of a feminist blog, but not a single tumblr user responded to my messages. A majority of tumblr users are passionate about feminism, so their silence confused and frustrated me. I also assumed that Facebook users would disagree with a blog consisting of feminist views, but I was overwhelmed with positive feedback. Another important aspect of a successful blog is design. I personally designed the background to reflect the purpose of the blog, using my own photographs and Photoshop. I wanted to create an image that would stand out and make a point. I decided that I wanted to take each expectation and standard in regards to beauty, and make what was by societys standards ugly, into something beautiful and feminine. The goal was to make women rethink what is considered beautiful by adding in elements that are already considered beautiful. This resulted in a flowery pink background with a hairy leg, fat stomach with stretch marks, acne covered face, a smiling woman, pretty eyes with makeup, and a hairy armpit. This mix of what is already considered beautiful and feminine along with what is considered unacceptable is meant to convey how strange it is that things that naturally occur to our bodies are considered gross. The blog also must be readable and not overly distracting from the content. I spent a decent portion of time trying to get the blog exactly the way I wanted it, but the image did not want to sit directly center as to display every part of the background. Eventually, I decided I would have to be satisfied with what I had managed, and the point I was trying to convey was still evident.

I found information in numerous ways. First off, I am an active user on tumblr, which is full of feminist articles. I made a blog off of my account specifically for compiling potential posts. I also found articles based on things I had found previously. I was successful in finding some articles I wanted, but not so much for other articles. It was frustrating when I remembered a perfect article for the blog, but had no way to track it down. I feel as though I sufficiently tracked down important articles to share, despite forgetting relevant ones that would have been a nice addition. In total, there are 19 published posts. The first post I made addressed who I am, and why I made the blog. It tells viewers my name, where I am from, and that I am enrolled at UW Online Campuses in a Womens Studies class, and that the blog is my final project for the course. The next post consisted of me addressing my background and the point it was meant to make. I stated that it was supposed to take things that are considered ugly and make them sugary and feminine. I thought it was important to point this out to anyone who may have been confused by the background. I was surprised that this post was one that had high levels of traffic.As a precursor to another post, I brought attention to a video called Womens Ideal Body Types throughout History produced by BuzzFeed. This video demonstrates the changes over time of what is considered beautiful, by casting different models to play the ideal. This post brings us to the following one that addresses the changes in beauty standards every decade in the United States, for the last hundred years. I believe that this is one of the most important posts, because it really opens a persons eyes as to how quickly ideals for beauty change, and how trends are randomly dictated by the media. The post displays that a woman would need to completely change her body every ten years to keep up with beauty standards, and how that is completely unachievable. It also demonstrated how each year, the idea of beautiful is becoming skinnier and skinnier, to a point in which is not healthy. I felt it was important to include this post because people may not realize how quickly ideals change. This post had the most pluses or likes.Lilian Bustle, a fat burlesque dancer, addresses body image in the next post. She is unapologetic about her size, and is happy to admit she is fat and beautiful. I found her video to be inspiring and important, because many people associate fat as a bad thing. I think it is important to demonstrate people being okay with their bodies, so others can feel okay in their bodies too. Bustle also addresses the studies conducted that demonstrate that the more diverse bodies a person is exposed to, the more they prefer diverse bodies. It is important to remind people, not just women, that fat is not the worst thing a person can be. BuzzFeed produces two more relevant videos regarding sizing and one size fits all clothing. In the first video, several women all try on clothes that are one size fits all and react to the way each one fits on their body. In response to the video, I address that one size fits all clothing is a myth, and that the creation of these clothes often result in women feeling bad for not fitting into a one size fits all. This is because it reinforces that we are all supposed to fit into a mold. I think it is important to remind women that bodies are never going to fit into the same mold, and that these one size fits all clothes do not reflect that a persons body is not a good body. I decided to write about this because I have personally felt insecure as a result of one size fits all clothing. The second video concerns the sizing of other clothing. Clothing sizes vary so drastically that it makes finding clothes stressful and even upsetting. This is an issue that every person I know has dealt with. Its important to address Americas obsession with size and the social affects it has on women and other people. The following four posts are surveys I built in SurveyMonkey. Each one pertains to different aspects of beauty standards and what they imply. I wanted to collect the surveys to understand the severity of womens negative body images. I wanted this information for myself, as to thoroughly understand the importance of each post I made. I also intended to post the results online for those who took the quiz to see how their responses assimilated in accordance to other responses. For a majority of the quizzes, the surveyed people were from 30-39. The results are as follows:QUIZ ONE:Age: 30-39 (44.74%)Ethnicity: White (92.11%)Do you think you are beautiful? Sometimes (52.63%)What do you like most about yourself: EyesWhat do you dislike the most about yourself? : StomachAre you satisfied with the way your body is? No (73.68%)Would you alter your body if you could? Yes (76.32%)On a scale of 1-10, rate the importance of Body Image to you: 8 (39.47%)QUIZ TWO:Majority Age Group: 30-39 (48.39%)Aspect Majority dislikes about themselves the Most: Stomach (58.06%)What the majority believes is their biggest problem: fat (67.74%)Who affects your body image the most: Me (64.52%)How often majority worries about their looks: (38.71%) Sometimes. QUIZ THREE:Age: 30-39 (52.78%)Are you Happy with your Body Image? : Somewhere in between (61.11%)Hours Spent working on Majoritys body image a week: An hour to 3 hours (47.22%)How often majority spends feeling bad about their body: Sometimes (47.22%)Majoritys money spent yearly on beauty products: $121+ (42.42%)How often does someone else make you feel bad: Equal between Never/ 1-2 times (30.56%)QUIZ FOUR: Age: 30-39 (38.10%)Has anyone ever told you that you are too fat: Yes (73.81%)Has anyone ever told you that you are too skinny: Yes (28.57 %)Have you ever done anything unhealthy intentionally to change your body: Yes (52.83%)Have you ever felt ugly because of the color of your skin: Yes (19.05%)Has someone else made you feel ugly because of the color of your skin: Yes (23.81%)The results of these quizzes are unbelievable. Women are overwhelmingly concerned with being fat. When asked what part of their body they hate the most, 21 of 38 people mentioned their stomach or fat. Meanwhile, only two people mentioned serious health issues like my endocrine system or the arteries in my brain. These type of comments make me realize how incredibly sad it is that a majority of women are concerned about frivolous things involved in aesthetics, like how much they weigh. We are so obsessed with the appearance of our bodies that we forget to place our main concern in our health. This is directly a result of social standards and displays exactly why raising awareness of standards and promoting self-love is important.There were several aspects that surprised me about the quizzes, however. First off, there was no correlation between feeling ugly because of your skin color, and being a person of color. I believe this is a result of lack of data, because only a very low amount of people were not white. In many cases, people of color are ridiculed for not having fair skin, not only in America but worldwide. Another thing that surprised me was that most people feel that they are the ones who affects their body image the most. I find this interesting because it is sort of a trick question. People believe that they are mainly affecting their body image, but in reality the standard in which we judge ourselves is always from an outside source. This proves that people have internalized beauty standards so much, they believe that they arent from outside sources.Another important point I decided to make was in the post You Cant See Lifestyle in a Photo in which I address societys criticism in which sure fat women are beautiful, but are they healthy? I think its important to address that a photograph does not indicate how a person lives their life. Those who are innocently concerned over her health or her influence on other people are being judgmental. It is a double standard. A person would not say the same about a photograph of a thin, small person regardless of how they live their life. The goal was to be critical of those who claim that loving your body is promoting unhealthiness, when in fact most models must live on restrictive and unhealthy diets to sustain their weight. The point being made is essentially that self-love does not promote unhealthiness or romanticize obesity. Bringing attention to a social media campaign that promotes acceptance of stretch marks is the goal of the next post. In most cases stretch marks are stigmatized as ugly and women spend money on creams and surgeries to rid themselves of something perfectly natural. #LoveyourLines brings attention to how common these are. Several women in the survey reflect on their concern about their stretch marks, so I find that this post was incredibly relevant.There are several posts that promote acceptance of self and address the fetishizing of women. The video of Amina Turrell strutting her stuff in LA makes an outstanding point. Self-love in plus sized women is so rare, a News Station thought it made a story! The Body Essay Project also acknowledges several standards that each woman feels being imposed on her. It also makes a point to desexualize the female body, and humanize women. I believe this post was the most effective, because it had the highest number of individual page views. Body hair is perfectly acceptable on men, but not on woman, according to society. I felt it was important to address body hair because most women spend large amounts of money on hair removal and are ridiculed if they have any hair other than on your head. Shaving takes time and is uncomfortable. Women should feel comfortable with themselves and not feel like they have no choice but to change their body. I address body hair in two posts. In the first post, I summarize the history women and shaving in the United States, as well as four reasons that people should stop stigmatizing body hair. The second post I made about body hair is in regards to advertisements and sexism. Many people didnt feel there was anything wrong with the Veet ad, so I thought it was important to acknowledge the blatant sexism. I also thought it was a good opportunity to point out how corporations target women and make them insecure about their bodies in order to sell a product. Everyone knows that images in magazines and in the media are Photoshopped. Yet, a majority of women strive to be this literally unachievable standard. I thought it was important to demonstrate the incredible change in Photoshopped imaged, by posting time lapses of imagines being changed. Each minor change adds up to an image that barely resembled to before picture, instilling the idea that women need to be completely flawless to have worth. I found that it is incredibly important to acknowledge that not only fat bodies are ridiculed. I dedicated a post to thin-shaming, in order to acknowledge that regardless of size, women receive negative comments about their bodies. In several cases, people use negativity towards skinny people to be body positive towards larger bodies. I found that it was important to include this post to ensure that everybody felt represented, and to reinforce that all bodies are good bodies. The final point I make on my body image blog pertains to white washing. The media constantly is white washing women of color, reinforcing racism and the idea that women are only beautiful if they are white-passing. Representation is one of the most important parts of self-acceptance, so I found this post to be necessary.In conclusion, I feel that every post on my blog properly covered most issues involved in womens beauty standards and body image. I covered body hair, white-washing, stretch marks, size shaming, and tested the importance of these issues by conducting surveys. There are many ways in which I feel I was successful with this project. My friends, family, and peers all had positive feedback. I feel as though I promoted well, and my blog made all the necessary points. I was expecting only 15-20 people to take each of my surveys, and to my surprise it was in the 30s and 40s for each. I believe that my design was unique and stands out. My posts are simple but communicate important points. My blog is light-hearted and informative, which is important in getting people interested in the project and interested in feminism.Despite my success in some areas of the project, I feel as though I could have improved in many areas. Although my blog had sufficient online promotion, I had intention to hand out cute cards with my blog URL on it in hopes that it would stimulate peoples interest and increase my page views. I made a second error in promoting by accidentally linking the mobile version of my blog on Facebook, which led to some confusion. I am not displeased with the page views I had, but I wished for more. I also did not realize until much later that references to our assigned text should have been provided. I also wish I had more than two comments of feedback. I had intention to reread the Body Project, in order to do a thorough analysis of the book, and make points about how it influenced me. It simply just didnt get done. I did use a video we discussed in one post, but I believe that is the only aspect of the course I involved, other than addressing that it was the reason I initially created the blog. I also realize now that my resources are not scholarly, which may decrease my grade significantly. These mistakes are due to my own error in not thoroughly reviewing and understanding instructions before building the blog. I had difficulty centering my background, and I spent a decent amount of time tinkering with it to try and show all aspects of the image, however I eventually gave up. As mentioned previously, I also knew some relevant articles I found that I could not find, which was frustrating. I spent a decent amount of time searching for them and alas came up short. I think a majority of my problems could have been solved with one simple answer: time. If I had started earlier, I could have accomplished more. I procrastinated. I assume that projects will take less time than they do, and I pay the price. I also decided to work alone, which could be considered a pro and a con. There was no need to consult others about decisions, and the blog took the direction I desired it to. On the other hand, I am solely responsible for the blog. Not only this, but it is important to know how to work together with other people, which is something I did not gain any experience in on this particular project. In my opinion, these pros and cons level each other out, in terms of having a partner. I also feel as though I missed a few subjects on the blog that I did not find sufficient information on or did not have the time to compose. I did not cover ableism, eating disorders, or acne. These are all important body issues that did not appear in the blog, that I regret not addressing.While reflecting on my classmates blogs, I found that some of us used the same information. I find it interesting that my classmates and I were drawn to the same articles, and I wonder if this is a result of accessibility or a result of the material we were taught in class.To conclude, I found this project to be not only incredibly relevant, but I also learned a great deal about raising awareness and promoting myself. I also learned a great deal about building a blog, gathering information, and using online formats. I find that my opinions are usually pretty strong and that sharing them publicly is important not only in finding new information to educate myself, but also in providing information to people who may not be exposed to the same information or who have different opinions than myself. I will end this project by sharing the quiz results and my analysis on the blog, and informing those who are interested that the results and analysis are now provided.

Works Cited:http://womenandbeautystandards.blogspot.com/https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/RP8MSQF https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/TLC27M8 https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/FLSL6MS https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/RBKTB6Whttps://www.surveymonkey.com/user/account/www.facebook.comhttps://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=8628895316118836664#overviewstatsEach Topic is respectively cited in each post in the blog.