[geege]

I'm 5 4" and happy with my size 7/8 although I wouldn't mind getting back into a 5/6.....it's tough when you quit smoking and you love to cook and eat:0)

[Cincinatus]

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

This phenomenon is a by-product of society's enormous affluence. In past days, everyone was broadly poorer and had less disposable income to buy rich, fatty food. As we got wealthier, we used our money to buy more calories. Hence, the tendency to eat more fat makes most people chubby. Since "the beautiful" are always a minority in society, "thin" became "beautiful" because it became uncommon.

[anniegetyourgun]

"...women fantasize about a masculine ideal..."

Yes, but do we demand it in reality? And if we did, wouldn't they always disappoint in the intellect category? Perhaps the evidence behind my questions can best be seen on television news, where the ratio of good looking male to female is very troubling indeed.....

[TheFilter]

I'm genetically curvy and nothing will change that. (Note: curvy does not equal lumpy!)

I take solace in the fact that though I will never look like Kate Moss, men prefer Marilyn Monroe whether she's in fashion or not.

[mickie]

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

[JimVT]

My wife's Scot grand-dad used to say upon sighting a portly member of the opposite sex: "She's a big fine woman!"

[BlueLancer]

[Oschisms]

Body, Schmody- Give me a woman I can have a decent conversation with and who cares what she looks like.

[keats5]

My Mama always told me the skinny ones starve first in the wars.

[Hemingway's Ghost]

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.

Is it really such a mystery?

Homosexuals design womens' clothes. Homosexuals in the fashion industry seem to prefer skinny, teen-aged boys. Ergo, they design clothes that look best on skinny, teen-aged boys.

That they're then able to foist this off on the general public is nothing less than sheer marketing brilliance.

[Dante3]

Almost every how on TV exhibits women with the concentration camp look. Every female prosecutor, for example, on "Law & Order" has been abnormally thin. On "CSI" the women look like they have starved themselves. One can make a case for blatant discrimination.

[Nubbin]

Our perception of beauty has changed

I'm constantly amazed at the young men my 21 year old daughter finds attractive---feminine, "pretty" boys, with thin, lithe bodies who wear dangling earings, wax their eyebrows and shave their legs. I swear they even try to raise the octave of their voices. The ideal for young women appears to be about the same (it just appears slightly more masculine on the female)with the only difference being impossibly large breasts.

[JimRed]

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

Meat good; fat bad!

[chaosagent]

Awhile back I was flipped thru the channels and came across one of the old Beach Party movies I had drooled over in my youth. I believe it was 'Beach Blanket Bingo'. Annette, Frankie, and all the ususal suspects.

By today's standards, almost all these girls were FAT.

And what bothered me even more, was that they now looked fat to me. Even Annette!

[Physicist]

Va-va-voom bump!

[yarddog]

Ali McBeal is too skinny, Anna Nicole is too fat.

Dawn Wells is (was?) just right.

[Porterville]

BOOOOOOO!!!

[alaskanfan]

Mae West bump!!!

[oust the louse]

I am truely disappointed there aren't too many pictures on this thread...

[csvset]

Leah Remini

She appears on CBS's King of Queens.