I wanted to applaud Ms. Story's well written and insightful article on Dec. 6 drawing attention to the media's portrayal of women. The travesty that a young girl at some point believes the lie that she is somehow less because she doesn't measure up to a popular media propagated image has destructive implications far more then we realize.
I just wanted to encourage the men in our community to rise up and take a stand in supporting and encouraging the women in our lives. We can certainly do more to control the exposure to harmful media within our homes, but we can also speak truth to the identities of the women we know -- encouraging them in their inherent beauty and character; encouraging them in their passions and pursuits as women of strength that are changing the world around them.
Let us no longer be passive, gentlemen, but take a stand against this subtle form of slavery that is putting women into the bondage of an artificial, false image of beauty. And let us not delay -- our mothers, wives, sisters and daughters have a lot of world changing ahead of them.
Matthew Byrd
