Fashion without doubt is an interesting way for people to express themselves and show the world whom they really are, and what they are made of. The age we are in is one in which fashion has become an important tool for people to pass message across. The popularity of fashion and its influence in our society, especially in the minds of young ones who just wants to copy everything that they see, cannot be overstated.
Fashion, in itself, is not a new concept to man. It has been since before the Egyptian civilization. But it keeps changing with the different ages and dispensations. The definition of fashion evolves very constantly, even as one trend dies out as another comes into the vogue.
The term, “fashion” cuts across different product such as clothing, hairstyle, accessories, body piercing, footwear, and furniture etc. things that deal with our daily lives. This is what makes fashion itself unavoidable and an integral part of who we are, what we do, and our standing in the society.
Indeed, humans have an innate desire to be the best at what they do, and this includes their appearance. From school children, to parent and professionals, everyone wants to be on their best look, this is what makes fashion an integral part of human interaction.
Fashion and fashion trends are mainly promoted by celebrities and TV adverts. Celebrities are public figures, and the television is for public use. Hence, this makes fashion information accessible to teenagers and young kids. While it is not exactly evil for kids to follow fashion trends, it has to be cautioned, there has to be limits. Because there are a lot of problems that these fashion trends pose for the immature mind of these young ones.
Some negative impacts of fashion on the minds of young kids are as follows:
- Fashion is moving at a very fast pace, constantly changing, with one trend giving way for another. This has led to constant changes in our society as well. As a new trend comes we are forced to adapt and adopt it, or we become object of scrutiny everywhere we go, in schools, works, and neighborhoods. This has led to many people buying clothing and other fashion items unnecessarily. Young kids are also forced to try to get these fashion items at all costs to try to stay in-vogue. This causes many people to spend unnecessarily on things that won’t last for long. Financially dependent children start to put pressure on their parents to buy them things that are not necessary just because it’s in vogue and their friends wear them. When the parent refuses, the kids start to show towards their parent that they shouldn’t and wouldn’t do normally.
- The surprising thing with this constantly changing fashion trends is that, their adverts and promotions are done in a way that it’s difficult or even impossible for students and teenagers to ignore them. In fact, you would think that these young ones are their target audience. Many of the fashion companies sign endorsement deals with celebrities just because, they can advertise their fashion products. And this will cause many people to buy it, simply because it was advertised or endorsed by celebrity XYZ, without a clear thought on whether it is necessary for them or not. These young ones that should focus on other things will try to go all out to get these products simply because their favorite celebrity endorses it. They forget that the celebrities are paid to do the adverts, but they have to somehow part with hefty sums to get that particular product which might only last for as long as the trend lasts. They just want to wear that particular item while it’s trending, ignoring the fact that it is probably wrong for them, or they are not comfortable in it, or they can’t even afford it.
- Fashion can promote stealing and blackmailing among younger ones in the society. Although, this isn’t in any way the aim of fashion, it’s one of the ills that come with it. Young children and teenagers, because they’re attracted by the fashion trends that they see, they go all-out, and even out of their way to get it. Teenagers become rebellious and desperate for money that they result to stealing and blackmailing just to raise the money for fashion items and appear in-vogue before their friends.
- There is also the health part to all of these. Fashion is really to make people stand out, appear their best and make a statement. But there’s an extremist part to it as well and young teenagers are not left out. Many people have begun to draw tattoos on their bodies, piercing their bodies and performing plastic surgeries, all in the name of fashion! Young people also have started to follow this trend, piercing different parts of their bodies including their tongue, belly button, nose, forehead and lips, all for fashion sake. Many of them have also taken to writing and drawing tattoos on their bodies just because, they can feel among. They do this without any clear knowledge or understanding of what the health effects of these things are on their bodies, if there’s any. And they don’t even care. The carefree nature of teenagers is what these fashion companies leverage on to pass across the idea of their product to them.
- Ideally, the kind of upbringing that people have always impacted on their fashion sense, the way they dress and how much fashion trends influences them. The way kids raised in the urban areas will follow fashion trends and be influenced by them is different from how kids raised in the rural areas or the ‘slum’ will follow and be influenced by fashion. They’ll dress and appear differently based on their level of exposure. But that’s where peer pressure comes in. the information on the mind of teenagers are formed by the things, they see around them and this influences their thought pattern. All of a sudden, they are under immense pressure to dress like their classmates and friends. They want to try to blend with the crowd. They begin to develop this fear of being left out by their peers. All of these affect the young minds of these teenagers in many ways. Thoughts like this will build inferiority complex in the teenager, especially if they start to feel left out by their mates. From fashion, peer pressure graduates into more pressing situations in their life. They gradually start also to feel inferior in other spheres of life. They are affected psychologically, and it might change the course of their life, simply because they see their mates put on things they can only dream of.
- Teenage students now pay more attention to fashion trends and fashion blogs than they do to their academics and career. They want to try to know everything there is to know about fashion, and the latest trend, while they pay less attention to their school books and activities. Ultimately, it can lead to their grades dropping. As they would rather spend more time trying to know the latest trends and strategize on how they would rock this cloth, rather than reading their books, improving their essay paper, and focusing on their career. This is probably one of the worsts effect fashion has on young students.
- Fashion can cause a feeling of depression for these young ones. As they constantly use different fashion products just to keep up with the trends, they need to have this feeling that they are actually up to date with what is going on in the fashion world. But fashion changes very rapidly. So most of the time, it leaves their feeling that they do not meet up. This makes them anxious and creates depression for them. The same goes for young kids who are under immense peer pressure to look like their mate. They don’t just start to feel inferior to their mate, they become anxious and start feeling depressed as well. Many teenage girls are also trying to appear like models. They want to appear skinny, so, they start to compromise on what they eat. They also start to experiment with their skin and their hair just to look like their favorite models, and celebrities. Also, they always forget or will choose to ignore that they may suffer acne breakout and allergic attack because of the different products they are experimenting with. Due to the dynamic nature of fashion, many times, these young girls can’t keep up with it. And they start to feel like they aren’t dressed well enough, they don’t meet up to the mark, they start to feel anxious and depression might follow. So, what fashion really does is to place unnecessary pressure on these young minds. Making them to grow faster than they should, changing their focus and distracting them from their career. It makes them do things that they shouldn’t be doing and are not taught to do, all for the sake of keeping up with the fashion trends.
Conclusion
At this time and age, and with the availability and accessibility of resources that make information accessible to all, even school kids, parents now have more works to do than ever. It is not a myth there was a time when every kid wanted to become a doctor, engineer, lawyer, scientist etc. these days, their priorities have changed. Every kid now wants to grow up to be famous. What better ways are there to do this than the fashion world? You wouldn’t blame them though. The rot of fashion has eaten so deep into our society that you don’t appear important or relevant if you aren’t fashion conscious. People’s appearance is what brings them into the spotlight nowadays, not necessarily what they have to offer.
The parents therefore have a responsibility to ensure that they watch and guard over their children. They have to be sure and ensure that their kids spend more time grooming themselves and trying to improve in their studies than they spend on the internet and on the different social media platforms. They can do this by providing the kids with the best essay writing services reviews. When they have too much information from the internet, it distracts them from their studies. They then start spending more time discovering and discussing fashion than chemistry or history, and it blocks their minds from their studies. Schools also have to be strict with their allowance of fashion items in the school. They only put the kids under unnecessary pressure to appear like their friends.
About Author: Susan Saurel works as a digital marketer at Writix.co.uk. She loves to travel and spends most of her free time flying around the planet, trying to meet new people and understand new cultures. She’s also an excellent writer providing writing services for people who need to buy custom essay. Her passion for marketing makes her eager to always share her personal experience on the job to her readers.