Let's hear it for women with meat on their bones

Jewish World Review ^ | 1-31-03 | Leonard Pitts, Jr.

[SJackson]

It may be the ultimate weight-loss plan.

No diet, no exercise, no surgery, no pills. Just a little digital wizardry. Point and click here, point and click there, and unwanted pounds melt magically away - from your photographed image, that is.

This is what the British edition of GQ magazine recently did, altering photographs of actress Kate Winslet - without her knowledge or permission, she says - to give her that svelte look common to heroin addicts and supermodels. Winslet has responded angrily. "This is me," she says. "Like it or lump it. ... I'm not a twig, and I refuse to be one. I'm happy with the way I am."

Let the church say amen.

Winslet, it should be pointed out, is not what we delicately describe as a "plus-size woman." She's just a woman with womanly curves, some of which she displayed quite openly in her star-making turn as Rose in "Titanic."

I wish I had a convenient theory for when and why womanly curves became a bad thing, wish I could explain our fascination with a kind of woman who does not, as a rule, exist in nature: Stick legs, sunken cheeks, waist in to here, chest out to there.

It was not always thus. I mean, by those standards, sex symbols of an earlier era would never have heard the first wolf whistle. Marilyn Monroe was not, after all, a beanpole. And that famous pinup of Betty Grable, which, we are told, inspired the GIs to go out and win World War II, did not show a woman who had missed many meals.

By contrast, a 1997 Psychology Today article reported on a researcher who had quantified the fact that Playboy centerfolds and Miss America contestants - purported icons of feminine physical perfection - had been getting skinnier over the years.

Our perception of beauty has changed. And if you're wondering why that matters, it's because our girls are watching. Watching and learning from all this how it is they should be. Much of what they have learned has proved dangerous if not deadly to body and spirit.

Approximately 5 million to 10 million women and girls (and 1 million boys and men) suffer from eating disorders - primarily anorexia and bulimia - which are sometimes fatal. That same Psychology Today recounted the results of a body image survey of 4,000 women and men. Almost 90 percent of the women wanted to lose weight.

Score one for pop culture. I mean, one of its primary functions is to make us dissatisfied with what we are, make us want what it is selling. Right now, it's selling the canard that the average supermodel's body is achievable or even desirable for the average girl. And girls are getting sick, even dying, as a result.

There are those feminists who would argue that the solution is for men to stop objectifying women, but their reasoning flies in the face of human nature. If somebody hadn't objectified somebody else, none of us would be here to argue about it. And anyone who doesn't think women fantasize about a masculine ideal has never seen a soap opera or romance novel.

I'm not out to stop - as if I could! - the endless mating dance of male and female. I'd just like to see something done to protect our girls and women from its more insidious effects.

Continued.......

[Hemingway's Ghost]

Can we please stop with this homosexual nonsense. The vast majority of every day women are not heroin thin. That and nobody forces them to buy the clothes or look the part. If any woman does it's because she chooses to. Plenty of straight men like thin girls. That and there are plenty of curvy women out there.

I have no problem with homosexuals or homosexuality. I'm merely making an observation about an obvious, observable fact: many clothes designers are homosexual men. Do you dispute that homosexual men are attracted to men, and that their design ideas might be skewed to what they're most attracted to?

Or that the design ideas of this cadre of top-level NY designers influences clothes design everywhere? Or that it drives the high fashion industry, and thus fuels the high fashion media, or that women like to wear the latest, trendiest, nicest clothes?

[Lil'freeper]

Of course the show American Idol isn't an idication at all

Oh but I'm very much afraid that it is.

I caught an episode and was quite surprised to see two 'big' gals with 'big' voices doing quite well. They were confident, entertaining, and radiated their love of music and performing. I hope they continue to do well in the contest.

Kimberley Locke

and Frenchie Davis

But you're right. The lion's share of the contestants I saw in that episode were reflecting a rather unhealthy trend. Pop culture demands that hip men look and act weak and effeminate. Hip women be shaped like children, or boys, but be as agressive as a man (using the feminazi definition). I won't buy into it and don't mind issuing a bit of scorn to those who do.

[Skooz]

My wife once heard somewhere that Marylin Monroe would be considered too fat to model, according to today's standards. Whenever Marylin is on TV or her name pops up in concversation, my wife makes that assertion.

Any society that thinks Marylin was fat is borderline insane. Marylin was, physically, absolute perfection.

[TracyPA]

Zsa Zsa Gabor said as you age, the choice is your body or your face. Put on a few extra pounds, less wrinkles. Get too skinny, your face suffers. Zsa Zsa chose to have her face look good.

[Skooz]

. The vast majority of every day women are not heroin thin. That and nobody forces them to buy the clothes or look the part. If any woman does it's because she chooses to.

While your statement is true, it is beside the point. The media crams the heroin-junky look down America's throat every day. It is thus romanticized as the ideal look to which all females should aspire. Perfectly healthy and attractive little girls look into mirrors and fret that they are "too fat," and have to "go on a diet," so they can look more like the anorexic bulemics on TV, movies or in magazines.

That is unhealthy and also unattractive.

[jjm2111]

If the homosexual clothing designers did not design clothing that women found attractive, women would not buy it. Women like the clothing.

Contrast this with the homosexual inspired male clothing that you see in GQ, Maxxim et. al. How many straight guys do YOU see (outside of NYC, LA, and SF) walking around in things like leather pants and shirts with ruffles? Even in NYC it's not THAT common. Straight men (generally) don't like wearing those types of clothes.

Homosexuals and women have similar taste in clothing. How many guys can attest to their girlfriends/wives coaxing them in to wearing more outlandish and/or exotic fare? The way homo designers design clothing and their attraction to men have nothing to do with one another.

[Skooz]

Yeah, but look at Catherine Bell on Jag -- she's pretty robust.

And absolutely breathtaking. I think that's the point.

[Skooz]

My wife thinks I dress like a slob and care little about my grooming because I don't wear the trendiest fashions and spend hours primping in front of the mirror.

She says she can tell a homosexual a mile away because he is impeccably groomed, his hair is perfect and his clothes are trendy and fashionable. Her implication is that if a man looks good to her, he must be gay.

[Physicist]

Va-va-voom bump!

[ravingnutter]

These things that are culturally driven are cyclic. Thin is "in" and chubby is "uncool."

I've got a T-shirt that says "By the time I am thin, fat will be in", LOL!

[Desdemona]

My wife once heard somewhere that Marylin Monroe would be considered too fat to model, according to today's standards.

Maryin wore a size 12. In those days, though, the clothes were much better looking.

[gnarledmaw]

Your husband is right. "Bone cancer" flashes through my mind every time I see her.

[jjm2111]

While your statement is true, it is beside the point. How is it beside the point? I look around my office and many women my age (twenties) do not fret over the heroin chic look and actually make fun of it. I think this "Women are too thin" stuff is way overblown.

[gnarledmaw]

Youre right on the money. Fashion designers prefer little boys and wish the world to prefer them too. If there was a PC Cleaver of the Day award, Id vote for you.

[geedee]

I wonder if anything could help Pee Wee's latest flame...

[mickie]

No, it was not poor Karen, RIP my dear.

[Inkie]

Who was it that said "You can never be too rich or too thin"?

A rich, thin person.

[Inkie]

Catherine Bell is beautiful, but she is only voluptuous on top. She has long, slim legs and no hips. So, she is the ideal figure of the modern age.

[Skooz]

It is my contention that many, many young women and girls are twisting themselves in knots striving for an unattainable standard (which doesn't appeal to most men, anyway) based upon the ideals established by the popular media.

That is my only point, and I believe it is inarguable.

[Rebelbase]

Ow!, My eyes!