More and more celebrities are speaking out against Photoshop

Take off a few pounds here and an inch or two there on your latest photograph?

Most of us wouldn't mind at all. But for a growing number of celebrities — people for whom posing for photos is an everyday occurrence, whether they like it or not — the answer increasingly is "Absolutely not."

Last week, actress and singer Zendaya called out Modeliste magazine for digitally retouching photos used in the magazine's November cover spread, expressing disappointment that images of her body had been altered for the layout.

Zendaya wrote on social media that she was "shocked when I found my 19 year old hips and torso quite manipulated. These are the things that make women self conscious, that create the unrealistic ideas of beauty that we have."

The magazine later pulled the issue and says it now is working with Zendaya to publish "the complete un-edited and authentic images" from the shoot.

Zendaya isn't alone in opposing digital manipulation of her magazine and advertising images. The still-small but vocal roster of celebrities who have come out publicly in opposing retouched images that don't reflect their own physical reality includes Kate Winslet, Keira Knightley and Lady Gaga.

Cortney S. Warren, an adjunct professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas and the University of Nevada School of Medicine, says celebrities' increasing willingness to oppose photographic falsity is a positive trend and a sign that the public is "getting more savvy about the negative consequences of idealized media images," particularity for women.

"We have a lot of evidence that having idealized images is damaging to young girls," says Warren, a clinical psychologist and author of "Lies We Tell Ourselves: The Psychology of Self-Deception."

Girls and young women often try to "emulate the idealized women they see in the media," Warren says. The problem is that digital retouching can alter photos of those women to an unrealistic degree, tempting girls and young women with an impossible-to-attain ideal.

Today, Warren says, "more people are aware that they would like at least an honest ideal, as opposed to the completely fake ideal that nobody is ever going to attain, because nobody looks like that, ever."

"We know that when (girls) see those images, they can be very damaging, because girls in this culture grow up learning that their physical appearance is the No. 1 determinant of their value as a human being. That is the message they are learning, and that idea is very specific. it's very thin, it's very young, it is an objectified, sexy, thin, young, predominantly white girl."

Exposure to digitally created, unrealistic media images is "the biggest predictor of body dissatisfaction," Warren adds, as well as "one of the biggest predictors to eating disorders."

"So, the more we dispel that, the better it is for our young women. Your value isn't determined by how you look."

Of course, even among celebrities, "the norm is certainly still going to be a lot of Photoshopping," Warren says. "So I think we're seeing the exceptions."

"Still, it's great that we even have exceptions," Warren says, and if their voices help to "increase awareness that media images are all edited, I think that's very healthy."

— Contact reporter John Przybys at jprzybys@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0280 or follow @JJPrzybys on Twitter.