It’s understood that photos of women intended for publication are occasionally/sometimes/often/always altered so as to “improve” them. This can be anything from improving skin complexion to lengthening legs or shrinking waistlines. It’s pretty much common knowledge and for the most part goes unnoticed, although it occasionally rises to the level of controversy, as in the case of Katy Couric several years ago.
Are such alterations done with similar frequency to photos of men? I don’t doubt that skin complexion/shading gets tweaked regularly, but what about major physical features, e.g. leg length, waistlines, or muscle mass?
For me, the first four results from that first search aren’t about improving the appearance of the women - they’re referencing the IKEA scandal where they photoshopped women OUT of the image entirely.
There was a bit of controversy in the 80’s when a poster of a shirtless young man was airbrushed to give his abs the distinct outline of a johnson. Can’t look it up at work now but I’ll see if I can find it later.
I recall Andy Roddick publicly announcing that his cover on a magazine surprised him because it didn’t look like him at all. The publisher had photoshopped it to make him look significantly bigger.
There have been occasional media pieces that have brought the practice to public attention, and some people on the internet have made it their business to ID 'shop jobs as often as they can. But what I meant was that the average person doesn’t pick up a magazine and think “holy crap, they’ve 'shopped all of these pics!”
