But the longer I looked, the more I wondered if image alteration might actually be empowering. For women, so often robbed of agency, was there some freedom in controlling how the world saw our bodies, consumed our bodies? My final project for that Photoshop course was my own image, edited every which way. A smile where there’d been a frown. Smooth skin where there’d been acne scars. Absence where there’d been fat and flesh. Fat and flesh where there’d been absence. Yeah, it was empowering to decide which version I preferred.
