To be honest I don't think us brits ARE surprised at it. In fact we've had a lot of these articles before. I think the media are starting now to try make a point about airbrushing so that young people don't see pictures in mags as how they want to be. Radio 1 did an interesting post on their site where a selection of the DJs etc chose a part of themselves they disliked and then they got it photoshopped lol. One guy for example who is bald got given hair... it's just the media trying to get the message across really that it IS fake. Plus media here always seems to give the same news over and over if they are running short of stories ;)

My girlfriend lives in Germany and explained that it's very common to have to send pictures with their CV as people will hire based on looks quite often?! When I first had a CV sent to me at work whilst we were hiring people, I was shocked to get a picture from someone - I'm thinking hey we just want you to work for us, I don't want to date you!!

P.S - we're in Europe too!

in austria (europe), it's also common to send a picture with your application, but I've not heard of someone airbrushing their picture - yet. but, I also haven't thought of someone hiring/not hiring me because of how I look like. these things make me sick, I'm not less smart/hard-working... just because I don't look like a model/actress. BUT, studies have shown that good-looking people generally tend to earn more and also sell more, so I guess most people are shallow sometimes or oftentimes.

I don't really like those airbrushed pictures, even though I'm SO used to them. I think that a few wrinkles don't necessarily mean that a woman is less attractives/beautiful. I'm generally more drawn to woman who are older than me and I have to say that I would prefer most "older" actresses (sarah jessica parker, jodie foster, catherine zeta-jones, diane lane....) over the younger ones (lindsay lohan, kiera knightly, ...). I'd rather be with lorelai gilmore/lauren graham than with rori/alexis bledel. I would really prefer it if media would cut down the airbrushing a lot!! 

"Normal is not something to aspire to, it's something to get away from." ~ Jodie Foster

"And I don't care if Kim Cattrall is the oldest, she's the hottest ;)"

word. & her voice? *swoon*

i'm not sure if airbrushing is less common in the UK than the US. i think it's mainly covered in the british media as something "those crazy image-obsessed yanks" do (hey, we have to have something to make us feel intellectually superior, right? :P) but really we're just as guilty of focusing on image...whatevs...i can't wait 4 this movie!

~i'ma pull ya closer, keep ya nikes on...u know how we do!~

Yup. I find myself rolling my eyes more and more frequently at the headlines in tabloid newspapers over here. Heaven forbid they actually print real news for once :P

Pages are dedicated to natural photographs of celebrities looking like crap in magazines like Heat where they get slagged to bits and now they get slagged to bits for being photoshopped. They really just can't win.

Not that I read Heat. *ahem*