The issue of unrealistic body images for women was brought up on Oct. 22 when singer-actress Zendaya (“Shake It Up”) didn’t agree with a photo shoot that she had recently participated in for Modeliste Magazine’s November cover.

Zendaya had done a gorgeous shoot for the magazine but the magazine decided to heavily alter the photos. This resulted in an Instagram post by the star.

Zendaya published one of the retouched photos opposite the unedited version. She began to point out the differences, like how she had a completely different bracelet in the retouched photo than the original picture. The biggest change was that her waist and thighs were shaved down to look skinnier. That bothered her the most.     

Other than being known as an awesome dancer and singer, Zendaya is also noteable for being a supporter of positive body image. So naturally, when a magazine changed her body in a photo she got mad.

“These are the things that make women self-conscious, that create the unrealistic ideals of beauty that we have,” Zendaya said in her Instagram post. “Anyone who knows who I am knows I stand for honest and pure self love. So I took it upon myself to release the real pic.”

When you look at the photos, you can definitely tell that there have been major changes. This situation makes me angry because you would think that in 2015 people would know better than to Photoshop an image like that. It’s okay to use Photoshop to fix things like glare, but shaving off her thighs and stomach to make her look skinnier is just unnecessary. I agree with Zendaya all the way.

In 2015, magazines should be promoting positive body images rather than making unrealistic body types so popular. Women should love their bodies no matter what size and shape they are.

I hope this situation made people remember to look at their bodies in a more positive way and not feel bad about the way they look. Photoshopping pictures that much shouldn’t be allowed because in real life, you can’t just edit your body to get it the way you would prefer it to be.

Negative body image is a big problem in the United States, but hopefully because of people like Zendaya pushing women to have a better image of themselves, that problem can be fixed.