A word on our f***ed up society
My mum was having quite a rant at me the other night about the trend of parading altogether-too-skinny models about. This is an industry standard, remember. I've noticed there have been some recent efforts to make changes in this. Mum tells me in one little country or another they've outlawed the whole anorexic model thing. Damn good thing at that.
Those of you who read the stuff I wrote as I set out on the mission of writing this blog know how I feel about vanity. Sure, I've got some of my own, but I can't fathom the things many will do for someone else's ideals of 'beauty'. I use this term loosely because what passes for beautiful on the catwalk just isn't.
Here are some of the disadvantages of being an anorexic catwalk model:
1. If you don't eat, you die
2. The average guy, if that's who you're trying to appeal to, actually prefers a woman with flesh on her bones and some curvy bits to grab
3 If you don't eat, you die
4 The clothes you're advertising hang off you in strange and unnatural ways because you are a hideous deformed creature of ribs and skin and nothing else
5 If you don't eat, you die
6 In a few short years age will catch up with you and you'll have nothing left but a few ribs poking out, and a complex about your looks
7 If you don't eat, you die
8 You get to see your family fearing for your life because of points 1, 3, 5, 7, 9 & 11.
9 If you don't eat, you die
10 Some stuck-up designer bitch is still going to tell you you're too fat anyway
11 If you don't eat, you die
Okay, there's probably more, but you get the drift. Being an anorexic model has mostly downsides. Sure there's decent money, but generally you have to sleep your way to the top for that, and if you do it in such a malnourished state, chances are you'll come out of it needing a hip replacement or something and won't be able to walk down the runway, anyway.
Don't ask me who it was, but I hear one poor girl who had spent rather a while recovering from anorexia returned to work only to be criticised for the tiny bit of weight she'd regained and it sent her straight back to hospital. Make no mistake, the skinny model trend is downright dangerous. It needs to stop, and it needs to stop now. Not just for the models themselves, but for the kids who fashion themselves after the unhealthy images they see and follow down the path of throwing up their meals and wasting away.
I've never been a fan of making laws to stop idiots hurting themselves. Idiots, after all, will be idiots and natural selection should be left to its own devices. The fact that there are things in place to allow stupid people to live and breed is astounding. But anorexia is one of those things that strikes in the formative years. Generally teenagers get sucked into this bizarre affliction and by the time they're out of that confused fuzz that we all went through, they're already half screwed by the disease. So here, I think outlawing the practice of putting models through all kinds of revolting torture for the sake of a very skewed, Picasso-esque vision of beauty (one that was never meant to be literal, for f***s sake) is absolutely necessary.
Even adults get these insecurities, especially if the 'fleshless is beautiful' crap gets fed to them their whole lives. Do I get a bit down about my spare tyre? Sure. I exercise, so you can punch it and it doesn't really move (which is kinda cool), but I suspect the only way to flatten it would be to stop eating altogether. Me, I have the strength not to give in to my insecurities (and no strength to resist an awesome donut), so I'm safe. But for the kids who cry themselves to sleep over some bitchy designer who wants them to be that little bit thinner, or the kids at school who won't give them five minutes peace, do what I do and refuse to indulge the media by buying magazines full of this imagery or the products advertised with it.
Those of you who read the stuff I wrote as I set out on the mission of writing this blog know how I feel about vanity. Sure, I've got some of my own, but I can't fathom the things many will do for someone else's ideals of 'beauty'. I use this term loosely because what passes for beautiful on the catwalk just isn't.
Here are some of the disadvantages of being an anorexic catwalk model:
1. If you don't eat, you die
2. The average guy, if that's who you're trying to appeal to, actually prefers a woman with flesh on her bones and some curvy bits to grab
3 If you don't eat, you die
4 The clothes you're advertising hang off you in strange and unnatural ways because you are a hideous deformed creature of ribs and skin and nothing else
5 If you don't eat, you die
6 In a few short years age will catch up with you and you'll have nothing left but a few ribs poking out, and a complex about your looks
7 If you don't eat, you die
8 You get to see your family fearing for your life because of points 1, 3, 5, 7, 9 & 11.
9 If you don't eat, you die
10 Some stuck-up designer bitch is still going to tell you you're too fat anyway
11 If you don't eat, you die
Okay, there's probably more, but you get the drift. Being an anorexic model has mostly downsides. Sure there's decent money, but generally you have to sleep your way to the top for that, and if you do it in such a malnourished state, chances are you'll come out of it needing a hip replacement or something and won't be able to walk down the runway, anyway.
Don't ask me who it was, but I hear one poor girl who had spent rather a while recovering from anorexia returned to work only to be criticised for the tiny bit of weight she'd regained and it sent her straight back to hospital. Make no mistake, the skinny model trend is downright dangerous. It needs to stop, and it needs to stop now. Not just for the models themselves, but for the kids who fashion themselves after the unhealthy images they see and follow down the path of throwing up their meals and wasting away.
I've never been a fan of making laws to stop idiots hurting themselves. Idiots, after all, will be idiots and natural selection should be left to its own devices. The fact that there are things in place to allow stupid people to live and breed is astounding. But anorexia is one of those things that strikes in the formative years. Generally teenagers get sucked into this bizarre affliction and by the time they're out of that confused fuzz that we all went through, they're already half screwed by the disease. So here, I think outlawing the practice of putting models through all kinds of revolting torture for the sake of a very skewed, Picasso-esque vision of beauty (one that was never meant to be literal, for f***s sake) is absolutely necessary.
Even adults get these insecurities, especially if the 'fleshless is beautiful' crap gets fed to them their whole lives. Do I get a bit down about my spare tyre? Sure. I exercise, so you can punch it and it doesn't really move (which is kinda cool), but I suspect the only way to flatten it would be to stop eating altogether. Me, I have the strength not to give in to my insecurities (and no strength to resist an awesome donut), so I'm safe. But for the kids who cry themselves to sleep over some bitchy designer who wants them to be that little bit thinner, or the kids at school who won't give them five minutes peace, do what I do and refuse to indulge the media by buying magazines full of this imagery or the products advertised with it.
posted by The Mad Shillelagh | 10:36 pm
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