“I Love My Body.”
I saw it on the twelve-foot-tall window poster at a local Victoria’s Secret this summer.
My first thought was, Wow, how refreshing! Victoria’s Secret is finally acknowledging that there are women in existence who are not a size two, or precisely 5’10″, with a 20-inch waist, who wear a 32 C… and these women are gorgeous and desirable, and they want to feel like sex goddesses sometimes, too!
I could not have been more mistaken.
A little annoyed, I took out my phone, snapped a picture, and quipped to the Twitterverse: When Victoria’s Secret starts featuring models with realistic body proportions, I’ll start to consider purchasing their lingerie.
Time passed, and I had all but forgotten about the “I Love My Body” poster until a few days ago when, thanks to Facebook, I realized the annual Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show was being aired. I saw multiple female friends of mine posting about their “Pink” parties, celebrating the spectacle.
But there was one status update that stood out; a friend of mine posted a link to a Huffington Post article, which detailed the diet of the Angels in preparation for the Fashion Show. The most striking quote:
She sees a nutritionist, who has measured her body’s muscle mass, fat ratio and levels of water retention. He prescribes protein shakes, vitamins and supplements to keep Lima’s energy levels up during this training period. Lima drinks a gallon of water a day. For nine days before the show she will drink only protein shakes – “no solids”. The concoctions include powdered egg. Two days before the show she will abstain from the gallon of water a day, and “just drink normally”. Then, 12 hours before the show she will stop drinking entirely.
I ate more solid food at breakfast today than the Victoria’s Secret Angels have had for the past week and a half.
Reading this article got me a little agitated, to say the least. I had to rant.
My husband asked me if I wanted to skim through the Fashion Show and see what it was all about, since, as he’s well aware, I have made the conscious decision to never, ever watch it before now. I very reluctantly agreed.
I sat on the couch, in my sweats, with a ratty notebook and a pen on my lap, ready to jot down a couple outstanding quotes or something like that. I’m really not sure what I expected, but what I got blew me away.
First of all, every Angel’s body is identical. Their hair styles are exactly the same.
It’s the most bizarre thing – the only way to distinguish between these girls is by skin color.
During the breaks, they played pre-recorded footage of the Angels preparing for the Fashion Show, or talking about each other, or performing various other tasks that made them seem like real people, despite the fact that not a single one of them could have stood, legs parallel, and forced her thighs to touch each other.
At one point, two Angels sorted through old photos of themselves.
The audience got to see close-ups of their awkward middle school haircuts and toothy grins, the Angels joking about the girls they used to be.
Laughing, one of them mocked the fact that she used to want to be a doctor or a professional soccer player. She then made fun of her friend for wanting to be a marine biologist when she was younger.
My jaw dropped in disbelief. This young woman was actually making fun of herself, and her fellow Angel, because they used to have dreams of curing the sick, researching and working with some of the most fascinating creatures on the planet, and becoming role models for aspiring female athletes everywhere.
They gave up those dreams in favor of liquid diets that put them on the brink of starvation, so they could strip down to their underwear and strut down a glittered runway in sky-high heels, very realistically an item for sale, in front of thousands upon thousands of men who lust after them, and thousands upon thousands of women who either idolize or abhor them.
One of the girls then said it. Words that will remain with me forever. The moment that broke my heart and literally brought me to tears.
It’s like a childhood dream, and little girls are gonna be looking at us going, ‘One day I hope I’m an Angel!’ And they will be! Some of them will be! Someone who’s watching this right now will be an Angel.
It was like a slap in the face. Here are two women, who were at one time so bright and ambitious that they wanted to tackle some of the most difficult career paths out there, who now want nothing more than to be revered for being as thin as humanly possible.
I went from simply disliking them for trying to convey to women everywhere that “beauty” means being a size two or smaller, to being absolutely furious at them for aiming that exact message at little girls.
According to an Esquire magazine survey of women (women!), Christina Hendricks was recently dubbed “The sexiest woman alive.”
She won this poll over Adriana Lima, who is a Victoria’s Secret Angel.
Christina Hendricks, according to her size, would never even be considered to walk down the Angels’ runway, and yet, according to the majority of women, she is far more beautiful than one of the women who is.
This is the woman for whom the term “blonde bombshell” was coined:
Based on her thighs alone, Marilyn Monroe would never have been a Victoria’s Secret model.
So how has her beauty withstood the test of time?
Could it be that real women want to emulate and look up to someone with whom they can identify, in size and looks, instead of a gaggle of impossibly thin models, who are nearly indistinguishable from one another?
I don’t have a single positive thing to say about Victoria’s Secret. I thought they might be coming around when I saw that poster this summer, but instead of changing their lineup of models to fit the (seemingly obvious) implications of the slogan, “I Love My Body,” the company swept the entire campaign under the rug and kept the waif brigade.
If you search the phrase on their website, it will yield absolutely no results.
There is nothing realistic or responsible about the way Victoria’s Secret portrays women. It’s appalling to me that an Angel can so wholeheartedly and enthusiastically encourage “little girls” to become the type of woman who perpetuates this unhealthy ideal of what a woman should look like.
I eat food. Real food. Solid food. I don’t count on vitamins and supplements for my energy; I count on burgers, pasta, chocolate, and coffee. I am seven inches too short and several sizes too big in the hips and too small in the breasts to be deemed beautiful enough to walk down a runway in my underwear and a pair of wings. I have stretch marks on my stomach and dimples under my butt and bags under my eyes, but you know what, Victoria’s Secret?
I truly do love my body!
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{ 414 comments… read them below or add one }
I hate to leave a comment to say something so simple, but wow. This post is amazing and mind blowing and sad. I actually cried. Guess I have another reason to dislike Victoria’s Secret other than their stuff not fitting!
Great article! I don’t watch the Angel fashion show and I usually don’t shop at victoria’s secret, so I didn’t know about the “I Love My Body” campaign.
it’s pretty disgusting that they would call the campaign that and then parade a group of hopelessly thin women about who, like you’ve pointed out, are only distinguishable by skin color.
I can’t imagine that their clientele is only made up of waifs. So, I’m not exactly sure who this ad campaign is supposed to appeal to.
It actually makes me even less likely to buy their lingerie.
That poster reminds me of the controversy with H&M, where they use a digitally created body and swap model’s heads onto it. They claimed it was because they wanted a body to use that would perfectly model the clothes.
They are disgusting to say the least. The company, not the women, although what they do to themselves is disgusting.
Thanks for the wonderful article on this horrible issue.
I hate the term “real women.” Am I less of a real woman because I’m a professional ballerina weighing 115 lbs at 5’10″? Real women come in all shapes and sizes. While I disagree with the way these girls get to their weight they are very much still real. They represent a segment of society where inches matter.
I’m agreeing with you about most of the article, but the term “real women” is used to essentially convey that anyone thin (whether naturally or otherwise) is somehow less of a woman. I work hard to be a dancer – 60 hours of practice a week and watch what I eat. I don’t deserve to be marginalized because of my career. I’m just as real as a woman who is a size 14.
Amen to that. I hate the “us vs. them” mentality of articles like this. I am naturally tall and slender and have been blessed with the genes that allow me to eat pasta and burgers and still work as a VS model for a year in college when I needed the money. I have two Ivy league degrees and work hard to be a good person to my friends and family. But according to this I am less of a woman because I’m skinny and my thighs don’t touch?
Can’t we all just celebrate every shape and size? I’d rather be my kind of woman than go into attack mode because a tiny segment of the population, in a field of work that empahsizes body size, curbs their eating habits to stay at the top of the game.
I think the problem lies in the fact that this small population of women serve as role models for an entire population of young girls, and the effects of media on self esteem and bodies issues is staggering.
That is the change I want to see in the world. To not have THAT issue anymore.
Brittany hit the nail on the head. This is not an “us vs. them” issue AT ALL. Maybe I should have put my proportions in the article after all! I’m a five-foot-two, one-hundred-ten-pound, size three, 34A, LIFELONG DANCER! So I know exactly what you mean, Jeny!! You look the way that YOU do because (and I know this is true from eighteen years of experience) you are doing what you love, and it causes your body to look the way it does! I’m the same way – I’ve been dancing since I was three (although I am less a ballerina and more a jazz/modern/lyrical dancer), and my body shows it.
I know that ballerinas are not out there trying to show women worldwide that *that* is the only way a woman should look. The Victoria’s Secret Angels *are.* I thought it was extremely poor foresight in marketing to use the phrase, “I love my Body,” because the implications of that are the exact opposite of what that poster shows – *every* body type is beautiful, not just this one! I know that the Body by Victoria collection was what they were trying to sell, but that phrase, in this ever-body-conscious society in which we live, has a totally different meaning.
That was my biggest problem, along with the very unnatural methods the Angels use to obtain that body shape. Not simply the fact that the models are very thin! Sorry if there was any confusion, and I hope this clears it up!
jeny, I’m with you all the way. I’m frustrating that people spend so much energy attacking certain people for the way they look. Do the models diet to be runway ready? Yes. Are their bodies naturally tall and thin anyway? Yes. (btw, I’m 5’1 and 113lb, so my grip with the industry is that I’m too short =) )
We all grew up with model-covered magazines and Barbies, but the majority of women do not look like that, so why would they be role models? I never saw those women as role models, and I don’t understand why adult women would feel threatened. Learn to love yourself for who you are and what you look like. No industry or magazine cover should influence that. Be strong enough to not need “society’s” approval. Because the truth is that VS is a lingerie company and that’s it. Who cares what they think?
I agree that the parents should be teaching girls to value themselves, but how many women actually do? How many little girls simply follow in their mother footstep slavishly falling into the trap set for them by our mass media and culture? The U.S. has the highest rates of anorexia and bulimia in the world. You think there is no causal link to ad campaigns like these?
I mean, what does Sex in the City teach girls and women but that life is a Cosmo mag all about fashion/shopping and finding a man, feeding into the same self-image problem.
I absolutely don’t think there’s a link that is stronger than one parents can override. You said it yourself; little girls follow their mothers. And if teens cannot handle SATC and Cosmo (and they probably shouldn’t be watching/reading said material anyway), then they shouldn’t be watching. And yes, the outside message of SATC is men and clothes. The inner message, good friends are far more important than men.
How many parents actually do tho’? How many mothers think these fashion models are a beauty’s ideal and so lead their daughters into the same trap?
All the money VS makes, I’m guessing it is a lot.
What about teenagers and kids, though? My good friend has a 14 year old student who had seen the VS fashion show. She came into class the next day and said how much she hated herself after watching it. Grown women may know better, mostly, but adolescents and teens don’t.
Allison, why did your friend let her 14-year-old watch it then? Did she talk to her daughter afterward? I’m not denying that these influences exist. I’m saying that there should be a stronger role model in these young women’s lives than bodies on a TV and in a magazine.
Well, it was on CBS. And, as a 14 year old, their TV choices are probably not as closely monitored as younger kids. I’m just guessing. I don’t know the exact circumstances, just that she was so down on herself about it. And I get that, I struggled a lot with body image when I was young. And nothing my mom could have said to me would have changed that. And my mom was great. But at that age, what the hell do your parents know? Unfortunately, kids care much less about what their parents say and more about the views of society and their peers.
The show was on Tuesday night at 10pm. I would not have been able to stay up until 11pm on a school night period when I was 14. Poor parenting.
I don’t know the circumstances, so I don’t judge. Maybe the mom was working late to support her kids. Who knows.
Not poor parenting. If she got her homework done by 10, she can honestly watch what she wants, within the realm of reason. Parents don’t view something on CBS as threatening. It’s not rated R, obviously. And I agree with Allison all the way about not listening to your parents when you’re 14. If you swear up and down that you totally trusted everything your parents said when you were that age, I still wouldn’t believe you–or I’d worry about you, as it is natural to disagree with the majority of things your parents say at that age. And I’m saying this as a tutor, and as a tutor, most times I fault the parents.
Nope, I think this one falls generally in the laps of society and of our male-dominated entertainment and advertising industry. They go into it in “Miss Representation”, which I highly recommend all women check out.
This is ridiculous. None of you that are (sick of the…..) Get what she is trying to say. Awesome, you are naturally thin, fantastic, good for you. Do you go around advertising that women should be skinny, and that this is an ideal way to look? To top it off laughing about being smart or having an education? Its simple, role models are making fun of education you are not. Put a full figured model on the runway. Good hell stop analizing so much. No one is attacking anyone. Do you not get that?
right, only the author was making jokes about women who wouldn’t be able to make their thighs touch, which is the thin version of a stomach roll joke. Then she followed it up by showing curvier girls and saying THIS was a REAL woman. (BTW, thin girls want breasts JUST AS BAD as fat girls want to be skinny, only difference is the fat girl has a chance if she tries)
the angel’s horrible diets and jokes about education aside, that IS an attack
You wanna know what’s funny?
http://partoftheplan.com/?s=skinny+girl
I’m a skinny girl and I DO want boobs (and a butt) just as bad as “fat girls want to be skinny.” And to be honest, I’m not sure what “the stomach roll joke” is. I don’t make fun of anyone based on their size.
And my thighs don’t touch without a lot of work, either, but that’s genetics. I’m a naturally tiny person, and there’s nothing wrong with that. I don’t starve myself to be this way. The VS Angels do.
Also, I wasn’t by any means making a joke. It was a fact; these women could not possibly force their thighs to touch, due to their very extreme diets. For almost every woman who eats solid food on a daily basis (unlike the Angels), this is not the case. That was my point in saying that. I was not attacking or mocking the Angels simply for being thin. It’s just a fact.
I never called Marilyn Monroe or Christina Hendricks “real” and the Angels “not real.” The bodies of the Angels are unrealistic and unattainable for most women in the world. That’s not an attack and it’s not saying they’re not real women; it’s a fact. I was also in no way saying that the two fuller-figured women were better people, or had better bodies. If you’ll read again, I stated plain, simple facts about them. Christina Hendricks WAS called the sexiest woman alive in an Esquire Magazine poll of women, beating out an Angel. Marilyn Monroe WAS dubbed the original “blonde bombshell,” and there is no refuting the fact that her image, in association with the entire concept of beauty, has withstood the test of time.
Not an attack. Not jokes. Facts.
Jeny,
I agree with you. A real woman is not based on size. Genetics, a creator or a combo of the two (how ever you see it) made us all different, not better or worse than one another. I do not agree with liquid diets and starvation to be an ideal, I believe in women being comfortable with their own bodies and confident enough to actually say I love my body. A real women is driven, loving and kind. Size 2 or size 32 if a gal meets these things she is a real women to me.
Thank you!! my thoughts EXACTLY. isn’t it just a bit hypocritical to mock thin girls and call them names?
I love this post. What an AWFUL message to send to young girls. Ugh.
Also, regardless of everything, their stuff is ugly and cheap looking. Shit quality.
xo
While I agree with you, here’s where you had it wrong: Victoria’s Secret was not talking about YOUR body – they were talking about THEIR body. The Body by Victoria brand in their stores. Where the underwear go no larger than a size “L”, which translates approximately to a size 10/12 unless you like to wear your panties really tight. THEIR “body” is tiny, with boobs that need 3″ of padding and butts that don’t make the “cheeky” style of panty look like a thong.
I’ll admit that I primarily buy underwear and bras there – but more and more often lately their sizes are off (last time I bought underwear there I had to return half of them because of inconsistent sizing), and I purchased a bra there just a few days ago that I’ll have to return as well. I have 3 identical bras, all a size 36C. The 36C I bought no where NEAR fits. Apparently now I’m a 36D in Victoria’s Secret bras. Whether that’s vanity sizing at work again or just poor quality, I’m getting a little sick of it. And unfortunately, I’m not sure where else to go.
You know where?
Frederick’s of Hollywood. THEY actually realize that people with big boobs also want color and variety. ( I swear I do not work for them. BUT. I did just buy some very lovely bras for my niece who is bigger in the boob-al area than I)
The panty situation, you’re on your own. But BRAS. I hate shopping for bras, so I always remember where they are really helpful, and nice and HAVE SHIT I WANT TO WEAR.
This. Up until the implant craze, Fredrick’s was the only place I could get cute bras in a DD. They don’t make their catalog into a softcore porn shoot either, they showcase the clothing not the girls wearing it, which I appreciate.
I’m old enough to remember when seeing a girl in her underwear on TV was almost totally unheard of. The VS ads and certainly the fashion show nauseate me for so many reasons. I have a 4 year old son and a 1 year old daughter & I fear for both of them growing up in a world where it’s totally acceptable to applaud & celebrate little stick girls parading up and down on prime time national tv wearing things that I think should be only been shown to consensual adult sexual partners.
Undies: Hanes for everyday comfort; Hanky Panky for lacy gorgeousness that’s still comfy.
I shop at Soma. Their clothes are well made and last. They are soft and comfy.
Check online bra stores like herroom, figleaves, breakoutbras, ….
Lane Bryant also has some great bras for 36+ backs.
I can also recommend checking out the website bratabase. It is a very helpful tool if you are trying to find the perfect bra.
Keri, I shop at maidenform. Check it out and see if there’s something you like in your size. =)
There are some great points in this article. I am disappointed that VS has gotten away from showcasing curvier girls like Tyra Banks back in the day.
However, even though her diet was quite extreme for the show, it is not much different than what athletes do to get prepared for the olympics. That’s her job and something she works all year for. Again, not something I would do, but I am also not trying to walk down the runway in my panties. I think she got a lot of unnecessary criticism.
Wearing VS lingerie makes me feel sexy and good about myself, so I will continue to do so.
I am not sure what Olympians you are speaking of, but Michael Phelps has a 12,000 Cal/day diet. He is 6’4″ and 165lbs, but he doesn’t starve himself to get that way.
What these girls are doing (along with the network that aired this “special”) is glorifing starvation for “beauty” and down playing the REAL beauty in helping others in world changing professions.
Yes, I own several VS products, but you will not catch me in their stores until they make some serious changes. I agree with some of the other comments, their products are crap anyways. I have found more flattering and far better quality at other stores for half the price.
I just meant that there are extreme diets out there- both types. I am not agreeing with her diet by any means, just saying the criticism against was harsh and blown out of proportion. Sorry if that was not clear.
I definitely agree VS should go back to their more curvy ways :)
Way to make eating disorders look glamorous, VS!
My former coworker had a bulimic roommate that would keep plastic bags of vomit in her room. Like, in desk drawers, her dresser, under the bed, wherever she could stash them (I don’t know why she didn’t throw them away but apparently this is something a lot of bulimics do?!).
Which I think is totally chic in that ironic filth kind of way.
It’s a delusional thing us pukers (I’m a past-puker) do. I have no idea. It was important at the time, though.
It’s beyond crazy!
Love this article! Thank you!
Thank you, thank you for this post. My 10-year-old daughter is beginning to stress about her body (she is tall, slender AND developing lovely curves) and I am at a loss. I am trying my hardest to show her that beauty comes from loving yourself regardless of the “ideal”, but I fear I am fighting a losing battle. Interestingly enough, although I am way more than a “curvy girl”, my daughter thinks I am beautiful. And doesn’t hesitate to tell me. Now if only she could see how beautiful she is, too…
I’ve been a photographer-in-training for quite some time…long enough to recognize a very sad fact. Victoria’s Secret only loves ONE body type, and I’ll put it as bluntly as their images seem to wish me to: toothpicks with boobs.
I’m going to speak as a typical American male, so if I offend anyone, I apologize in advance. (This goes for my other half, too…sorry, hunny.)
I first saw Christina Hendricks in the Firefly episode “Our Mrs. Reynolds”, and I thought she was absolutely, positively, drop-dead gorgeous. Why? Because (with apologies to Gabriel Iglesias) she looked HEALTHY. Not anorexic, the way so many of these models look. I also had the severe hots for Jewel Staite’s character in the same series, for the same reason. Neither of them look like a hamburger will send them screaming into the night, and to me, that’s a Very Good Thing(tm).
Maybe I’m old-fashioned (and I’ll admit to a certain level of, shall we say, advanced physical maturity), but I’ve always seen the typical Renoir-type nude painting as more physically alluring than any of the Kate Moss starve-alikes that fashion designers and marketers want to insist is the definition of beauty. Why? Because they don’t look like they’re about to faint, or worse, from self-inflicted starvation. I don’t want to look at a woman and count her ribs, or worry about injuring her if I give her a hug. And where’s the beauty and romance of taking one of these so-called “Angels” on a dinner date to a high-end restaurant if they’re going to order their meal from a points card instead of the menu and wine list?
My lack of coffee is catching up with me as I try to write all these thoughts out, so I’ll close with a question, one which others are free to treat as rhetorical…or not. Why has Western society decided that it’s perfectly acceptable to teach girls to hate themselves?
I don’t want to treat your question as rhetorical Alan, but sadly, I don’t have an answer either. However, I do think if more men stated their opinion as you have, less women would feel like they were constantly being compared to this unrealistic expectation and would learn to love their bodies just a little bit more.
I think the answer is simple. It all comes down to money. Hundreds of thousands of products – billions of dollars are made on women hating themselves.
i don’t think it’s that evil.
thin women do runway because runway is about the CLOTHES no the girls, a Christina on the runway would make you say look at HER, not look at the dress.
we started looking at the runway girls and the fashion, and envy of the clothes bled over to envy of the woman wearing them, who are all skinny.
First of all, I can tell you Christina and Jewel are indeed beautiful natural looking women in real life, too. Second, Jewel was actually encouraged to gain a little extra weight to play Kaylee by show creator Joss Whedon because he wanted her to look like she enjoyed the pleasures of life, including a good meal every now and then. Can you imagine? An actress being asked to gain weight to play a part – and not for jokes or ridicule, but to look sexier.
I have to agree with your nude painting comment. 100+ years from now we will still be looking at the classical pictures of Rubenesque women that Renoir, Raphael, Michelangelo, etc painted and the pictures of these girls will be gone. I just want to look at healthy people and they do not look it to me!
Amen brother! I am a nurse and happily married to a woman with a beautiful curvy body, who is a nurse as well. Her body has carried and fed our children, and in my opinion her stretch marks are reminders of wonderful pregnancies. We do eat a healthy diet simply to be healthy, simple as that. She has no doubt that I love her body and due to that fact she seems quite comfortable in it…….as all women should. Health should be the #1 concern with your body, shape is what makes us unique. Enjoy your shape, enjoy your body! And bravo to curvy girls everywhere, you are the sexiest of all.
Before filming Firefly Jewel Staite had to gain 10 pounds because they wanted her to look like the kind of girl who downed a hamburger every now and then.
I clicked “like” but I mean LOVE. When I saw the “Love My Body” campaign, my first thought was, “Oh, but you don’t sell things in my size I guess my body isn’t one to be loved?”
Your friends had Pink parties??? For real? I honest to God thought that the VS show was just for men. I have never known a single woman’s who’s watched it.
Wth do I care what lingerie looks like on another woman. I only care about how it fits my body and whether the underwear will ride up my ass.
Their bras are crap. I bought one and loved the look but it didn’t last long at all! My Lane Bryant bras are so much better! They no longer carry my size at Victoria secret… I’ve gotten to big for their desired clientele. Whatever! Why would I buy a expensive bra to have it fall apart?
Thank you so much for voicing an opinion I have held for a very long time. I can’t stand VS and the message they send forth to young girls.
You know what’s even more terrifying? Seeing all the pre-teen girls shopping for underwear in VS with their mothers. No 12 yr old girl needs lacy cheeky underwear. Even though that is the only body type that seems to fit well into their lingerie. It’s disgusting.
I don’t know what you people are talking about emaciation is s*E*x*Y.
You are bad…and so funny!
Are you mentally retarded, or just making a joke?
I really can’t tell…0_o’
Victoria’ Secret drives me nuts! Also, I was so ashamed of Cosmo a few months back when they had Adele on the cover. She is such a beautiful talented woman and they had her from the mid chest up. I looked back through a couple of other issue’s I had laying around and all the skinny women were full page. What a great way to teach girls/woman that its no who you are or what you accomplish…..it’s only your waist size and your cup size.
Their lingerie is too expensive and poorly made. To quote Gretchen Wilson, “I can buy the same damn thing on a Wal*Mart shelf half price…”
But even if they did start carrying plus size again, I wouldn’t shop there, just because I don’t like the messages they send about beauty and body size.
Wonderful article, Mamma! I have never, and will never shop at VS. I just can’t do it. There are plenty of other lingerie stores that carry things in MY size that are just as sexy as anything VS can offer, which is great because I do have a thing for matchy, lacey, sexy, see through or any other kind of lingerie.
But I agree that the ideals they seem to present are both unrealistic and demeaning.
Thank you for this post! I, too, saw that ad campaign this summer and laughed out loud. In order to get to those measurements, I’d have to HATE my body. Instead, I am proud of what it has done (birthed a 10lb baby!) and what it will do (run a half marathon in 6 weeks). I truly do love my body! And it has nothing to do with the size of my thighs, but everything to do with my self-esteem.
Great post!!
In 2009, I lost quite a bit of weight, and got myself to a healthy size. So, I went in to VS to try on bras, and they only had limited selection in my size because I was too big. I think I was a 38C at the time.
The thing is, I got to a 36, and I don’t think I can get any lower than that because of how my rib cage is built. Still too big for their standards.
Me, too! I’m a 38B and they don’t even carry every style in that size. But that rib cage isn’t going anywhere. :)
I, too, have noticed that the sizes at VS have changed over the years. I have been a large there for years and I’ve recently lost about 40 pounds. And I’m still a large. Curiouser and curiouser. Either way, I’m done paying that much for a bra that only lasts a year before the underwire pokes out the side or breaks entirely.
Although I agree with the article and comments in many ways, I just feel like I need to add something. If you are to claim that all body types are beautiful, then you have to stop putting down the women that may be considered “waifs”. I am 5’10″, wear size 3 jeans and 34D bras, and weigh 125lbs. Every day I am trying to gain weight. I love my body, but so many people put me down for looking the way I do. “Eat a hamburger why don’t you.”
I have always eaten healthy and my involvement in many athletic activities has kept me strong and fit. But I have always been basically skin and bones. My entire life people have been putting me down for the way I naturally am, and it’s not okay for me to feel like I have to shove food down my throat for people to get off my back, the same way it isn’t okay for other people to feel like they must starve themselves.
I agree whole-heartedly that VS has some serious issues in what they stand for and what ideas they are giving to women of all shapes. I just hope that everyone can also understand that it’s okay to be skinny.
I totally understand what you mean. I’ve been dancing since I was three years old, and I have an athletic body as well. I didn’t want to put it in the article itself (because this article wasn’t about ME, it was much broader than that), but I am five-foot-two, 110 pounds, I wear a size three, and I’m a 34 A (who was a 34 C before I breastfed, but that’s beside the point).
My problem was with the fact that these girls are deemed “perfect” by so many, but there’s nothing NATURAL about the way they get to look exactly the way that they do. *That* was what my beef was with them, not the fact that the women who they choose as models are thin. A beautiful woman is a natural one, not one who starves herself to fit someone else’s ideal. That was my problem with VS. My body looks like it does because of genetics and the fact that I’ve spent the last 18 years doing what I love, which happens to be something very athletic. From what you’ve said, you are very much the same. No disrespect at all to thin women.
I hope this clarifies what I meant in the article.
Let me start out by saying I am a bigger girl, I am happy with my body most of the time and I have a husband and a family who loves me for what I am. With that said, although I don’t think Kristen wrote the article from the stand point of “us vs. them” our society is ever increasingly taking the “us vs. them” stand. I used to be able to buy bras at Victoria Secret but now I go in and I can’t even try them on because they don’t carry “those big of sizes” anymore. (I am a 42D, and I have always had larger breasts) The last time I went into Victoria Secret they didn’t treat me very kindly and it quickly became obvious it was because of my size. I have never gone back. This is not the only store that has become this way. Places I have always been able to shop at now don’t carry any sizes over a 12, but they will carry sizes down to 00 or smaller. I have not gained any weight I am the same as I have always been, but clothes seem to be getting smaller and smaller these days. It has gotten to the point that I refuse to go shopping for myself because the trip ends in tears. I’m sure some of you are reading this and thinking, “well she needs to exercise more and eat less”, let me tell those of you that I have tried every diet and I exercise daily, I also watch what I eat very closely in efforts to be able to go into a store and find something cute to wear and it actually fit. I have a thyroid problem that prevents me from loosing weight, although I never stop trying. I am not saying I hate or even dislike “skinny” women, some of my best freinds are those 00 that I was talking about. But I believe (and what I think Kristen was trying to make a point of) is that companies, such as Victoria Secret, are saying you can’t be beautiful if you are bigger than these models. They are definately saying it through actions such as their adds, their models and the fact that they won’t carry bras over a certain size. And what is really sad is that little girls are starving themselves (LITERALLY) to look this way because they are “too fat”. At some point it doesn’t matter how much a parent tells their child they are not fat, the child will listen to the media and her friends. Even adult women fall victim to this with eating disorders. Again my problem is not with these women (although I don’t agree with the ways they keep their weight off) it is with the companies that do the campaining and stock their stores with clothes that continue to shrink. The next time you go shopping check the sizes of clothing and think about it.
If it makes anyone feel better, I haven’t been able to find a 0 or even a 00 in stores for years. As someone who has always been tiny and accused of being an anorexic (hang with me for a day, you’ll see I love food – it just doesn’t stick), I find it just as hard as plus size women to find clothing in stores. I think the market is recognizing the plus size women, perhaps largely due to the “Real Women Have Curves” rallying cry and have expanded their plus size departments, or opened free standing stores to accommodate this niche. What hasn’t happened (and probably won’t) is a store devoted to true sizing (how about pants sold by waist/length not a “2″) and marketed to the lower end of the spectrum.
Honestly, it’s embarrassing and a little shameful to be a grown adult trying to find work appropriate clothing and being told point blank “go try the juniors department, and if that doesn’t work, grab an XL from kids.”
Thank you VERY much for writing this post.
As a man, I’ve never been a fan of the “stick” look for a woman. I have no problem with a woman being fit or in shape, but I also want her to eat and be comfortable in the skin she has.
As a father to a beautiful daughter I worry about this all the time. I want her to be comfortable with her size and shape, whatever that ends up being.
Sadly, Vicki’s Secret will continue to rake in billions off of the hopes and dreams of young women (and men) everywhere in hopes that shelling out their hard earned dollars on this crap will someday make them as “good” as these women.
I wouldn’t let my daughters shop in Victoria’s Secret if THEY paid US to shop there.
To all those women who are naturally skinny: It is 100% okay to be who you are. Women come in ALL shapes and sizes. It is NOT okay to base an entire culture around making people who are NOT skinny feel inferior because of it!
(posted by a very average sized woman)
“To all those women who are naturally skinny: It is 100% okay to be who you are. Women come in ALL shapes and sizes. It is NOT okay to base an entire culture around making people who are NOT skinny feel inferior because of it!”
I love this so much. LOVE THIS.
I cannot get over the fact that aside from the crazy liquid diet, she doesn’t drinks for more than 12 hours – plus the show prep, plus the show. that is NUTS.
It is NUTS! I am now going to watch simply to see if anyone dies or collapses on stage.
in the army some guys and girls do things just as ridiculous to prep for their weighing and pt test.
my friend went saltless for 2 days to lose retained water, had no food for 1.5 days, then plain noodles for dinner the night before (for energy) so he could wake up at 5 am and sprint 2 miles in 11 minutes while still being under the army’s “fat” standard (soldiers get kicked out for it). And we didn’t do it for LOTS of money, only 35k a year.
ps- army standard for a 5’10″ male under 22 is 165 lbs.
i THINK a woman got up to 180 (for hips/chest weight)
I’ve never seen the fashion show and only own one of their bras because i found it on the lawn after a concert and it makes it look like I have boobs. I shop there because I love their Love Spell fragrance, that’s it. Other than that, I don’t do Victoria’s Secret because I’m too fat round the middle for the undies and too small on the top for the bras and dn’t believe in paying that much for underwear.
I agree with the first part of this… it’s sad how only one body type is considered “sexy” by mainstream media, and that already-unusual body type must be “improved” with unhealthy exercise and diet to is absurd.
But I don’t really see how idealizing the bodies of Christina Hendricks and Marilyn Monroe is any different or better. Those body types are still unattainable for most women, and the implication is that naturally thin women should aspire to look like them because it’s more “real.” Hourglass figures weren’t necessarily healthy for all women who maintain them in the 50s, and they aren’t now either.
My point is that shaming all women who are tall and thin may feel good on some level but calling their body type “disgusting” presumes all kinds of things about those women and their life styles. We should remember that there is no one ideal body type, so changing the ideal to something certain women identify with more doesn’t fix the problem.
Like I said to Kelda, above, it was not at all that I was idealizing one over the other. I do not at all want to idealize ONE type of body, because that’s ridiculous and *unnatural*. The unnatural part was my problem with what they portray. I am short, petite, and small-chested, and I STILL have a huge problem with what they want us to believe is the *only* way women can look if they want to be sexy.
I also never used the word “disgusting” in the article, because that’s not at all how I feel. If these women had earned these bodies through genetics and a diet that was realistic and healthy, that would be one thing, but look at them – they are all precisely the same height and have PRECISELY the same body type, and they did that through a liquid diet (which I find pretty unrealistic…don’t know about you), with which they needed prescription vitamins to even keep up their strength on a daily basis. That means that what they were drinking was not giving them all the nutrients they needed, and that is *completely* unnatural.
Again, I by no means wanted to idealize the bodies of Christina or Marilyn over anyone else; I merely wanted to point out the fact that *they* are considered beautiful, too, and they got their proportions by (I assume) much more natural means. I just wanted to point out that VS calls only one body type beautiful, while, according to the rest of the world, beauty comes in SO many different forms!
-Kristen
My daughters don’t have VS or Marilyn Monroe bodies; they have their own bodies and are good with them. They may not be perfect (according to some standards), but they are perfect for them and who they are. I’ve been buying panties for them from VS for several years because they have the kinds they both like. I have some from them, too, but in an XL. We also buy our bras from them because they fit. We don’t buy the outrageous kinds, just the simple ones that do the job. The picture you posted above in your article makes me sad for the models. They look anorexic. We have never watched the runway show, and never will. Just a thought, but they probably have to be “thin as a rail” before tv, since it “adds 10 pounds”. I absolutely don’t agree with how they get to that size. Hopefully none of them will have serious medical problems to come because of it. My last comment is that people need to read your story twice and all the comments afterwards before commenting, so you don’t have to keep repeating yourself.
Like CC, this frightens me more than anything on behalf of my daughter. I will do whatever I can to protect her from this imagery and messaging. I still remember clearly when my best friend, who was more sophisticated than I was, referred to someone as having a “good body.” I had never before thought to rate myself or others as having “good bodies” or not a good body. Seems that if you can walk, run, hug, and use fine motor skills to write and feed yourself, you have a good body, right?
Thank you. This post is something all women need to read every so often to help keep ourselves in check. For the most part, I am happy with my body. I feel confident, sexy, and powerful… In my size 10/12 jeans, 34ddd chest, slightly jiggly arms & all. I exercise regularly, eat healthily, but this is my size. I refuse to feel bad for being me. I buy bras at VS, but haven’t been able to buy a pair of undies there in years… They’re teeny! Guess when you look at “their” version of a Large, you know why.
I love my thighs. They’re jiggly and soft and comfy and they like each other. They’ve never been separated (that I can remember) and are bestest friends.
Those poor VS models have thighs that have never met! They must be cold and lonely.
Personally, I prefer my body. My kids know when they’re getting big mommy hug. My husband knows that he’s always got a soft, warm spot to cuddle. And even if I am fat and 40, this confident, curvy woman has plenty of men that wish my marriage wasn’t so happy :)
The models can keep their wings, I want nothing to do with them or their products.
I love you so much for this!! PERFECTLY put!!
-Kristen
ditto that kristen- love you girl
This right here is the reason I love this site so much! I was nodding in agreement the whole time. I don’t shop at VS because I think it’s disgusting that my 11-14 year-old students do. And because I feel huge and out of place just walking into that store.
I want to hug you. Be my friend!
Hugs! And thank you so much for the kind words!
Absolutely LOVED this article
Awesome article! They are the few, the sick, the not realistic. I am grateful that my size doesn’t define me, that a wonderful man loves me (and others have to, even at my heaviest) and that my kids think I’m awesome. Sure I want to look good, but if means putting aside my real dreams and risking my health, which I have fought so fiercely to save (breast cancer), then NO THANKS! I think I will definitely not shop at VS even for perfumes. Not until they acknowledge that all women are beautiful.
I just want to echo what other people said — thanks for this article! It’s stuff like this that makes me fearful for my daughter. Now granted, she’s not yet two and so I have at least a few years before this affects her, but it still worries me. How can I teach her to love herself when she doesn’t look like what society dictates is beautiful? Some people naturally look like that, and that’s great — but for the rest of us, we need more variety in advertising, for the health of our children.
And for what it’s worth, I *also* worry about educating my son — how can he possibly realize that not all women are this thin with this kind of advertising?
I think the biggest issue for parents of daughters is the complete air brushing of reality. They are being presented with idealized norms—fake lashes, ass enhancing pants, push up bras, hair coloring, lip plumping, teeth whitening. Half of this is at the grocery store and toys r us (bumpits and cleavage enhancers, wtf?)
I have three daughters, each with a very different build. I work to focus on strength, ability and humor—pretty and smart are after thoughts. We hammer into them that it is in pursuit of a competency that they show their mettle, yes, they may do it in boas and sparkly shoes, but we are trying to create a broader lens through which they view the world and themselves.
Loved this!
I couldn’t agree with you more! But remember to keep in mind that not all skinny girls only have aspirations to be modles but have the right to love their body regardless!
As for the diet thing it all varys on the persons metabolism. My boyfriend who stands at a healthy weight of 168 at 6″2 has to drop weight all the time for boxing and wreaking. It’s all a matter of circumstances.
I just wish there could be more campaigns about the diversity and beauty of all women. Shapes, color, size, age.
Amen and amen! You are so right on!
this article is amazing. i sadly smiled in agreement the entire way through. for the greater part of six years, i struggled with an eating disorder that defined my life. every meal, every bite, every mile ran, and every pound lost. and even then, at my lowest weight and absolute unhealthiest, i still didn’t resemble these women at all. it wasn’t until that finally registered, that this ‘perfection’ isn’t actually real [they've surrendered their diets, dreams, bodies, and entire lives to this image. which is then altered and airbrushed and edited] that i realized i can love my body, just the way it is. i can love the fact that i’m plural inches too short for the runway. i can love the fact that i could still probably rock a training bra. i can love the fact that my thighs touch [and probably always will]. i can love the fact that sure, my stretch marks are ugly, but they are also a reminder of the pain i put my body through. and i can love the fact that, although my booty isn’t quite model-esque, my boyfriend still really loves it.
once again, thanks for this amazing piece of writing.
I do not agree at all with your post! First of all would you buy lingerie from a story who’s window had fat woman with rolls flopping over the waist band of the panties? Hell no, it is marketing, plain and simple. Second, uou talk about how these woman could have been pro athletes…pro athletes have crazy diets and workouts they do to prepare for a big game, this is just getting primed for the big event! You judging these girls for being too skinny is ko different than someone discriminating against you for being fat…if you ask me, you are just jealous! Leave them alone, and if you don’t have something nice to say…shut the hell up!!!
Would that apply to you too, Lyndsey? It sounds like this article touched a nerve. They are not being judged for being skinny. The point is that they starve themselves to look that way and are being upheld as role models. A smart, healthy woman should be the ideal (emphasis on smart)…and they come in a big range of sizes. If my daughter is going to worry, let it be about her grades NOT her size.
Exactly. Thank you so much for saying this. Yes, my point was that the value of a woman should come from so very much more than her looks and body type.
Actually, if I am deciphering your comment correctly, you missed the point. It is actually less about the fact that the models are thin, though it is troubling that more women of all body shapes and sizes are represented across media campaigns, and more about the fact that they are glorifying how they got there.
Starving yourself and not drinking to get to a standard of beauty deemed necessary to model VS clothing is not a message any child (or teen or woman) should be subject to.
And yeah, to answer your question, I WOULD by lingerie from a store whose front window featured a “fat” woman.
So I guess that theory may be a little off…
This is why I love you so much.
But, making fun of someone for wanting to be a doctor or marine biologist is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. Way to make young girls think it’s OK to act like bimbo.
PREACH IT, GIRL!
and FYI the “I love my body” campaign is in reference to the ‘body’ by Victoria line! Before you rant…get your facts straight!
I know what the “Body by Victoria” collection is. I just think it was very poor planning on the part of Victoria’s Secret to call their campaign “I love my Body,” when, I would think, the implications of that phrase being printed on a twelve-foot-tall window poster would be that ALL women should love their bodies, regardless of height, shape, or size.
Second, there’s no jealousy. If you want to talk about getting your facts straight, you need to know who I am, and apparently, what I look like. I am five-foot-two, one hundred ten pounds, I wear a size three, and I’m a 34A who used to be a 34C, before I breastfed my son, who is now almost two.
Olympians do not, in general, obsess over the LOOK of their bodies; their performance and physical strength are their focus. The comparison is a little off. Michael Phelps eats 12,000 calories per day before big meets because his body literally DEMANDS it for the feat of strength he’s about to put it through.
I’m not talking talking about a lingerie model with “rolls of fat.” I’m talking about one who eats actual food. One commenter mentioned Tyra Banks, who used to be a VS model, but definitely could not be anymore. There are still men clamoring to see her in her underwear, but she is too big to model for Victoria’s Secret now.
I have nothing against naturally thin women, and if you’ll look into my blog, or even my bio on this article, you’ll see that I *am* one. My problem with Victoria’s Secret is that they only ever mention *one* type of “beauty,” when there are millions of women everywhere who don’t look like them, but want to be represented in the media, and even in lingerie ads, and touted as just as beautiful as any Angel. The unnatural manner in which the Angels obtain this look, as well as the fact that they never acknowledge any other body type, height, weight, or even hairstyle as being attractive is what I have a problem with.
Well said!!
This exactly.
I don’t think she was ranting. I think she was sharing facts. Total fact sharing.
And I know Kristen. She’s a dancer with a dancer’s body. She was pointing out that the diet is unhealthy and unrealistic.
Thank you! I have been big my entire life and have had my struggles. It took my 40+ years to be comfortable in my own skin but I am, for the most part. I worry about my 6 year old daughter though. I think she is perfect just the way she is and we are raising her to have great self-esteem but I have already heard her express feeling fat. 6! I don’t EVER want her to look at those VC models as any kind of role models!
I do 100% agree with your frustration over this “I Love My Body” Campaign, it is seriously mind boggling that VS can pass this off as some sort of “helping women” advertising. It’s completely insane.
That being said, I have worked in the corporate world for places like Victoria’s Secret/ lingerie/ fashion, not in advertising but for art departments. As much as I would love to hate VS for this horrible stereotype that younger/every age women have to subject themselves to, thinking this kind of beauty is simply “obtained if you work hard enough at it”… The American people don’t buy it.
Advertisers try and try again (also, I’ll loosely say try, they don’t try very hard) to put models that are more athletic looking or more curvy into their catalogues. It doesn’t sell. It doesn’t sell because women WANT to look like these, literally, unbelievably skinny women. They don’t want to BE like the curvier ones. These companies don’t exist to “cure” the American people of their body issues… they want to sell and make money. That’s what it’s all about. It’s not about hurting women and ruining their self-esteems, it’s about making money. They put the larger women up there, and guess who sells the most items? The skinniest of the skinniest women you can imagine.
To be honest, the companies can’t change unless the public changes first… unfortunately that is the real world. And articles like this can REALLY help explain and jump start people into understanding this struggle! I highly commend you for putting your opinion out there and hope one day we will all be subconsciously choosing the curvier models over the anorexic ones :)
I totally, 100%, agree with this, and it’s a very unfortunate truth. It will take an enormous shift on the part of the general public to change the look of the models that we see on runways, posters, commercials, in magazines…on and on and on.
It’s very sad to me that this is what “they” say is the absolute epitome of beauty, when, LOOK at all these comments! All this feedback! Brittany has said time and time again that she wants to be, and wants this magazine to represent, the change we want to see in the world, and I hope and pray that this is even the slightest nudge in that direction! Thank you so much for reading!
I’m the mother of an 8 year old girl on the brink of her ‘tween’ years and I feel your frustration but I see my tremendous responsibility in helping my daughter grow up with a positive attitude about her unique, beautiful body without buying into the images that she will see in the media that are, many times, so contorted and photoshopped. I know we could easily go online to see ‘before & after’ shots from numerous magazine shoots and feel quite entertained by the illusions that we so often see everywhere (with both men and women).
I grew up with a mother who battled with her weight constantly (and has literally been dieting my whole life, even to this day). She has terrible self esteem and it’s very deep seeded with many emotional issues but she and my father told me every day that I was beautiful growing up. Even when I had goofy permed bangs or a haircut that made me look like a boy. I grew up to be a confident, self respecting young woman without any huge body image insecurities and I would attribute it to those powerful words . It would be nice if a lingerie campaign would advertise that women of all shapes and sizes are beautiful, but I feel like having the same pressures in the society and culture when I was growing up didn’t really hold much merit in the scheme of things.
I think the best thing women can do for each other is take the time to celebrate each other every day. I have met some really amazing women in my life…of all shapes (some who even make a living as models) and at the end of the day, the cellulite that we may or may not have on our thighs just doesn’t matter. We spend a lot of time sizing one another up (literally) and too often we miss out on the pleasure and possibility of really knowing one another and gathering strength and inspiration from each other.
I want my daughter to feel as beautiful as I see her and that’s a gift that only the women in her life can give her, not a commercial or bra campaign. I’m sure the older she gets, the tougher it could turn out to be but for now, I’m pretty confident that my daughter will be educated enough to realize her unique self with guidance from the badass women in her life.
Well said. My wife ran out of a Victoria Secret’s store crying several years ago, because they did not have anything in her size. She has never stepped inside one again. Guys struggle too. We are told that we are to have ripped abs and glistening muscles in order to be sexy. I might have to write an article like this based on a mans point of view. Thanks for sharing and keep on rockin’.
I would love to read that! My husband does not look like any male model out there, and I can’t tell him enough how hot I still think he is. Guys definitely feel the pressure, too!
If you write it, we’d love to feature it:)
I will get right to work on it!
Got a rough draft ready. How do I submit?
Thought everyone here might like this link. This is how women used to really look!!
http://www.retronaut.co/2011/11/vintage-weight-gain-ads/
I love those ads. They give such a good perspective on our obsession these days with being thin. FANTASTIC! Thank you for posting this :)
Awesome!!! Thanks for posting those articles! They just sum up how stupid this whole media obsession is. Whatever we are ‘supposed’ to look like now, it will be something else in a few years. I have for many years, disliked my body as a result of having this crap rammed down my throat as a child along with having an anorexic and bulimic mother who sadly passed away age 60, weighing about 5 stone and having developed permanent brain damage after her body eventually started rejecting solid food completely. At her lowest she was just 4 stone. so, to avoid getting any more screwed up by these things… these are some things I do to get by….
on the rare occasions that I actually watch it, since it’s so full of mind numbing crap, During those 3 minutes of adverts, I simply turn the TV off or turn down the volume and ignore it. I quit buying any magazines, even the ones that appear to be about health and fitness are essentially just there to sell beauty products. I rarely shop high street so I never feel awful trying something on in an over lit changing room and will never again find myself running out of the store tearful and ashamed. I shop thrift and ebay and modify second hand clothing. It no longer subject myself to comparing myself to vacuous models and celebrities. They don’t even need to exist on my radar, by not paying any attention to it…it simply isn’t there. It is just made up and put there to fuck with us so we part with money. Sorry VC and the likes of …. but really??? do you really think we are ALL that fucking shallow and stupid? As for these Angels…. well, especially when it comes to discussing their dieting tips, they should shut the hell up and stick to what they are apparently good at… which is strutting around like a wind up doll and not so much talking.
… admittedly not my best ever contribution to a blog. I am rather tired so it probably wasn’t the best time to start ranting here ;)
… I should have probably ended with this before as I left it sounding like I am a total nut job with nothing but body issues which is not the case. Despite various issues along the way, I am doing fine now, I have avoided following in my mothers footsteps and instead of becoming consumed by overwhelming self-loathing and so on….I learned to be strong and have also learned to love myself. I am now a professional Belly dancer… I am only 5ft tall and I do indeed have curves and a bit of wobble, but all the dance training means I also have dangerous thighs ;)
A shimmy, is of course based on the way a woman’s hips naturally wiggle when she walks so it just wouldn’t be right without a bit of wobble to wiggle!!!
I could never and would never dream of being be a VC angel but they probably wouldn’t make very good Belly dancers either so perhaps there is some sort of balance in the universe. I think all women should be celebrated whatever their age, shape or size but I think it is very sad and worrying that there are women in this world who are willing to risk their health and damage their bodies purely so that the company they work for can make profit. . . but hey it’s all ok right, cos of course as the poster clearly states ‘they love their bodies’ Hmmm, maybe a little irony there?
i agree some models are way to thin ,but no one wants to see someone walking down the runway who can’t even fit into the clothes. size 2 is beautiful and size 10 is beautiful.
You are totally right. What I was trying to get at is that *natural* and *healthy* are beautiful, no matter WHAT size or shape that may be! Thank you for reading!
I think that people are forgetting that people aren’t either rail thin or very large.
Most of us fall in between.
It doesn’t have to be one extreme or the other.
Bravo for your article. Victoria’s Secret to me is just another word for Anorexia Nervosa. I wore a size 2 once….in the 7th grade. And then I got my period and boobs and even in high school running track, cross-country and being on the dance team, I was extremely thin (for me) and weighed 135 lbs at 5’3″. My dad was career Army and used to buy into this weight-height ratio bullshit and told me that I needed to lose about 20 pounds. I told him that short of lopping off a boob, that would NEVER happen. Unlike my mom and one of my sisters, I think I’ve always had a healthy attitude about my body. If I don’t like it, it’s up to me to work to change it….but I count my inches not my ounces. And I like that I have hips and cleavage. It certainly wasn’t my pelvic bones jutting out that attracted my husband. He likes my curves. I like them too.
Thank you so much! And I totally agree…bony hips did not land me a husband! Things like my wit, my athleticism, and my drive to become someone who contributes and tries to better society DID.
I guess I just don’t get why it’s not “okay” for people to be disgusted by the way VS treats women’s bodies and women’s sexuality. Why it’s not okay to say, “hey, why is there ONE body type – that represents the minority at that – represented in your campaign. Regardless of their ad campaign is SUPPOSED to be about, it’s about luring people into buying their product. That’s MARKETING, right?!
Obviously VS is doing okay financially, but wouldn’t it behoove them to make products that fit EVERY size? Must be they are in cahoots with other manufacturers who make products that are supposed to make us “better,” i.e. looking like underfed, dehydrated “super models.” A natural size 2 is a natural size 2. THAT is not natural.
And yes, I would rather buy underwear from a store that had models with “fat rolls.” I would feel a fuck of a lot better about myself and giving my money away to corporate America.
Exactly! I totally do not understand why, from a marketing, money-making standpoint, their sizes STOP before many women can fit into them. If they were trying to be an elite, exclusive company…maybe (and that’s a HUGE maybe) I could understand a little better. But they’re not. They’re trying to make themselves accessible to EVERYONE. So why not include sizes for more than 15% (totally just pulled that number out of my butt to exaggerate) of the population?
Also, I’m naturally a size 2 to 5 (depending on the brand). I eat what I want and try to stay decently healthy, but this is just the way my body is made. You’re so right…THAT is not natural, and that was EXACTLY what my problem was! Natural is beautiful. Healthy is beautiful. Those two look entirely different on every single woman. This is not what “perfection” looks like. Hell, there IS no empirical standard of perfection – just look at the comments on here! So why are they doing this?
AMEN! Thank you for this post!
I agree wholeheartedly, that Victoria’s Secret is messed up!
I never watch their events on TV and I even fast forward their stupid commercials so that my children or husband might not see them.
I am curvy and I’m not always happy with my body probably because of the way the world has tried to push “their” ways on me.
I do not shop there either and plan on keeping that way.
Sick of it all, actually.
Kohls sells a fantastic bra for less anyway….
I have often wondered who VS thinks is buying their lingerie. I don’t know about other women, but this advertising strategy of theirs just doesn’t do it for me. When I see their 12 foot tall ads at the mall, I get angry. When I receive anything in the mail from them, I get livid. Not only do they support a single body image (as do many other advertisers), but they insist on putting these women on a 12 foot tall poster, often in seductive poses, and prance them around on a stage in their underwear like they are the quintessential expression of beauty.
Girls are growing up too fast with poor body images because they, like most, want to feel pretty, and this is the definition of pretty they get from all directions. Sure when I was a kid, there were Barbie dolls and Shera, and many other women with body types I’d never have. However, these characters were not licking their lips in a pair of underwear while looking at me with bedroom eyes. They were also not plastered like this on giant posters at the local mall. The message for young girls has often been “skinny = pretty” it has now expanded to include “sexy = pretty” and “provocative = pretty.” This scares me. I want the message for my daughter to be “you = pretty,” and that is it.
As a Victoria’s Secret employee, I think that it’s wrong for you to base your opinion of an entire company solely on what the models look like. This article just makes you seem like a person with a very rude personality. I, myself, am not skinny in the slightest way. I’m 5’1″ and weigh 165 lbs. Does it make me hate Victoria’s Secret as a whole? Of course not. The models are naturally slim and obviously they work hard to be the way that they are. They may have a different diet than we do but I’m sure that they’ve been eating healthy for so long that it seems normal to them, just as eating fast food and fattening foods seems normal to us. Think before you speak, and before you judge. Be the bigger person.
I’m very sorry you feel that way, and badmouthing the company as a whole (employees included) was absolutely not what I wanted to do.
My problem is the way that these women are touted as the absolute epitome of beauty. There is simply no variation whatsoever in the way they look, save for their skin and hair colors. I don’t think it can be denied that a week-and-a-half-long liquid diet is not natural for anyone. I understand eating healthy, but these women are put on an extreme diet that I doubt would be recommended to anyone else. The comment from Huffington Post even says that Adriana Lima is basically propped up, if you will, by vitamins and supplements. That means that the shakes they are having her subsist on for nine days are not giving her all the nutrients she needs. It’s hard to justify that as being healthy.
I know multiple women who work at Victoria’s Secret, and I was a little concerned with how they would take this article. The women that the company should be featuring in their ads, in my personal opinion, are women who look much more like their employees. Their sizes vary greatly, but they are always well-dressed, coiffed, and put together. The employees, in my experience, have always been realistic sizes.
Again, I’m sorry if I offended you. The issue I have is with the fact that only one, very specific, body type is touted as beautiful by them, when so many other women with such different bodies are dying to feel beautiful themselves…and they ARE. They should be touted as beautiful, too!
You are wrong. Companies live and die by advertising. We do NOT see you (the bigger person) in those ads, do we?
That’s just business 101.
If my company runs an ad for cars and puts KKK members in the driver’s seat… we get what’s coming to us. Don’t we? Or should we NOT be accountable for the message we put out there? The very well, well calculated messages that cost VS millions of dollars.
And I wear their bras. But after this? I will NEVER spend $50 on a bra again. Ever. Why? Because of the advertising.
It has ZERO to do with the great people that work there. You should really talk to someone at corporate and tell them you’re afraid of the mess they’ve made.
An advertising campaign and the models used in said campaign are a company’s public face to the world; that’s what advertising is at its base. If VS wants to be seen as more than clothing to be worn by these models, they need to show us that. The fact that they refuse to speaks volumes about their corporate outlook, and acknowledging that in no way makes anyone rude, unless you redefine “rude” to mean “something you don’t like or agree with.”
VS’s clothing isn’t even remotely representative of the sizes most women need to wear. Some of that is courtesy of bra construction just being a giant cluster, but a lot of it is the choice that VS has made to market its goods to a clientele made up of women who fit a certain, very narrow range of sizes. It’s a business decision that has served them pretty well historically, but that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t feed into a stereotype that the only way to be beautiful is to be someone who fits into that range of sizes. And that stereotype is flat-out unhealthy for a lot of women: We’re born to fit different body types, from super-curvacious to long (or short) and lean, and ALL of those body types are beautiful and worthy of being clothed in something glamorous.
Well said Laura!!! :)
Great article. We definitely need to celebrate healthy women of all shapes & sizes!
It’s extremely sad that those models were making fun of careers that require intelligence and hard work.
Glad this webmag is working to remind people that beauty comes in many forms.
I do agree that articles like this really need to emphasize that naturally skinny is fine, it’s the starvation-skinny that’s a problem–otherwise, our slender ‘sisters’ can feel alienated, as I saw in comments. I know some high-metabolism gals that are tired of the “eat a sandwich” comments.
I’m very fortunate and love my body–it helps that I have a body like Marilyn’s and hair like the VS girls, LOL. ;p
Also, I wanted to add something: I was just talking to my husband about this, and told him that, since he’s a guy who likes a gal with some muscle tone, I was wondering if he’d still find me attractive if I were built like a VS angel. Then I said that was also a ridiculous question: most hetero guys I know wouldn’t kick a VS angel out of bed. BUT, as my husband pointed out, it isn’t that they DON’T find the VS angels attractive, the point is that they don’t ONLY find VS angels attractive. Most guys I know think that most women out there look good – and the more they get to know them, the more attractive they find them. Kind of like how most women I know wouldn’t object to having a guy with a six-pack and chiseled arms, but that isn’t the only type of guy they’re attracted to. I guess my point is that men, in general, are attracted to women, in general. All different types. So maybe we should demand that the media take a cue from the guys and expand their definitions of beauty.
I love this perspective!
Yes! Awesome!
I don’t watch a lot of TV, and I’m usually up and running during commercials, so I only recently saw a VC spot. The one thought I had during it was that every one of those girls looked exactly the same to me, and that although they were pretty, I didn’t want to look like a single one of them. And this is totally apart from their body type, which is just stupid.
The irony in this for me is that the last time I tried on some of their cheap crap, I noticed that my local VC store has the most flattering lighting of any fitting room I’ve ever been in.
This really bothers me of the perception of having to be ridiculously thin to the point of being unhealthy to be considered beautiful in this industry. I have a friend that is a professional photographer and an artist. I wanted to model for him for art. I am 5’6″ I weigh 130lbs, wear size 27 jeans and a bust size of 34DDD, and he told me that I needed to be slimmer… FOR ART????? Wth?? Seriously, and apparently he said if I wanted to model for anyone else too that they would have to use photo shop if I wasn’t going to get slimmer. In my opinion, there is no perfect body for art. Any and every body is perfect for art. It really upsets me that a lot of people out there believe that you need to look like the angels, even for art……….
WHAT?? Are you still friends?
That’s just the industry. I’m 5’1.5 and 108 pounds. I am still considered a plus sized model because of my body shape. This limits my jobs and photos. I really feel like a lot of these comments come across as being jealous and hateful about the Angel Models. Yes, they are a role model, but I would rather my one year old daughter look up to a VS than not because they promote a thin body image. I know I will probably get chewed out over it but I feel like its a good image.
I think I would rather my kids look up to people who want to be healthy on the inside, and not have it be about vanity. Unless my goal is having them stick their fingers down their throats after every meal, of course.
Well, I’m more upset that even in art, photo artists want this slim body. I understand the fashion industry but it really disappoints and upsets me when the same is wanted in art. Art should have no boundaries. I can’t even formulate a good way to express how upset this makes me. I don’t think that I am fat, or skinny, and I am not jealous of these women at all. I’m just sad that society seems to want this as the norm for beauty and every cell in my body is screaming at the thought of it affecting art!!! UGH! That’s what is getting to me……. It’s just so widespread and depressing :/ We are all beautiful and so different. There shouldn’t be just one body type to idolize. It’s not even realistic, everyone is different.
Heh not really, but for other reasons….
I’m having a hard time trying to put what I want to say into words, and I’m not quite sure if this will come out the way I am intending it.
I feel like a lot of the comments on here are attacking the VS models because they have an unobtainable body type, and instead we should support more variety in women. While I absolutely understand this point, I think this opens up a whole can of worms in regards to what influences children and whether or not this is a bad thing.
How many boys grow up idolizing sports figures and what to be a professional athlete? My husband wanted nothing more in life than to play in the NBA… he’s a 5’10, stocky, Jewish boy with absolutely no athletic ability. Just like most girls will not grow up to be an Angel, most pee-wee quarterbacks, who want nothing more than to play for the NFL, will not grow up to be the next Aaron Rodgers or Tom Brady.
If everything in life was an even playing field — representing ALL body types in a lingerie fashion show, ALL sporting levels on a professional team, ALL intelligence levels in medical residencies — we’d just have a whole lot of mediocrity going on and no real success in anything.
Instead, we learn growing up that we all have talents and things we can achieve, and find a niche that requires the skills that we do have. I’m perfectly fine with the fact that I’m too short, too fat, and not nearly disciplined enough to be a model, because my talents are better suited in developing new therapeutics for pediatric cancers… and my husband is now a-okay with the fact that he will never play for the Sixers, because he’s an excellent fit for his chosen career as a radiologist.
Perhaps the problem isn’t that we need more variety in models and a change in size, but that we need to do a better job of teaching children what is and is not obtainable for most individuals. I have no problem at all with putting practically impossibly thin, beautiful, self-confident women on a pedestal (or in this case, a runway) and admiring them for their skill set, as long as we accept that we can’t all look like that — isn’t that the definition of a supermodel?
Why can’t we, as a society, look at a bunch of scantily-clad, identical woman, observe them, and move on, without making a ruckus about how they exclude so many other body types? Is our self-esteem really so low that if we don’t see someone who mimics us, we feel unworthy? I’m pretty happy with the way I am, but I feel no need to see someone who looks like me prancing around in underwear, just like I suspect most of the Angels would probably be a very poor fit as biochemists. Not everyone out there can do everything, and that’s okay. In fact, it’s better than okay — it’s great that we are each unique individuals!
I actually see a lot of your points, and I think I get your perspective, and it’s a good one.
My problem with the situation is this…because of the constant standard of beauty across the majority of fashion and beauty advertising, our self esteem IS that low.
And that is the problem. The problem isn’t that they are gorgeous and thin (which they are), the problem is for all our lives, we were told that THAT is what beauty is.
Marketing and advertising spends all their money reinforcing a goal in which the majority of women will not reach, and for girls, teens and even adults, it can be damning.
I think it’s amazing you have that kind of self confidence, but don’t discount the fact that many don’t, especially for the younger generation. I could barely survive the bullying then, I KNOW I couldn’t survive it now.
It’s a different world out there OMG I AM MY MOTHER.
This:
“I’m perfectly fine with the fact that I’m too short, too fat, and not nearly disciplined enough to be a model, because my talents are better suited in developing new therapeutics for pediatric cancers…”
and this:
“I have no problem at all with putting practically impossibly thin, beautiful, self-confident women on a pedestal (or in this case, a runway) and admiring them for their skill set”
Firstly, this was a wonderfully written response and I by no means want to take away from that. My only issue is that we all look at those models and think “discipline” and “skill set”…. But it’s none of the above. Yes, they happened to win the genetic lottery in the physical sense. But medically-supervised starvation?! That’s not “discipline” or “skill.” That’s just scary.
I dunno. Anyone who’s gone on even a normal diet can tell it takes discipline.
Perfect.
And in response… enjoy me in my Walmart bra. It was $10. Fits great.
http://brittanyandmeredithlive.com/2011/12/13/were-redefining-sexy-yall/
You ladies are so gorgeous. For real.
Gorgeous! Love your blog ;)
Amazing article!! It is so sad that young girls look up to these models and think that is how “normal” women look.
while I do not promote starvation…..this is their job……when I did runway at 5’10, 125 pounds, B cup I was asked to lose ten pounds……I did it, I became Vegan for a few years then I became ill, very ill, I dropped my agency and was just a normal student full time at 29 I still was thin at 148 but then felt the pressure to model again, somehow my rump turned Naomi Campbell, this time I chose 34 DD as in plastic surgery, because thats the highest size a Victoria Secret bra would go…….yes take it from me I was influenced but I consider myself a well educated woman…. now at a healthy, exercised, fit, curvy 160 pounds I don’t look back at my choices but am very glad I never succumb to eating disorders like partner models did……I am a proud size 8-10……..so I have been on both sides of the fence………..
Seriously, look at those poor women. They are skeletal. People think that’s attractive?
I love this post Kristen! :) Awesome job…although I love Victorias secret…love it. like im addicted to it…I do hate the message they do portray. I love their bras and yes they make me feel amazing…but its totally MY BODY! and I love it just the way it is:) Thanks for posting you are a beautiful and amazing woman!
I agree with all my heart that the way the VS models get thin is absolutely disgusting. It is by no means healthy, and I have never understood how someone could consider it okay to do that. I don’t understand how liquid diets and detoxing are considered healthy. You are STARVING yourself, that’s the only reason you look thinner. People who are naturally thin, you’re lucky. But everyone can look good and feel confident if they work for it. Exercise does wonders for you physically and mentally.
With that said, I do shop at VS often. I am a petite woman, but I am not perfect. I am 5’4″ and 125 lbs. I don’t look like a model, and I’m not ashamed to admit that I need to workout more often. I may not look perfect in the eyes of the media world, but I rock what I buy from VS because I’m proud of who I am. And when you’re confident, other people see your beauty as well. Trust me, my boyfriend loves it when I come back from a VS shopping trip.
Now for the “I Love My Body” poster. At first glance I thought the same thing, that the poster would be advertising women of all sizes. And I was disappointed to see that wasn’t the case. But then I looked closer at the poster. If you look at the close up of the poster, under the word “Body” in smaller print, it says “By Victoria”. Being a frequent VS shopper, I am very familiar with the different lingerie collections at VS. One of them being “Body by Victoria”. There’s also PINK, Incredible, Angel, Miraculous, Very Sexy, Gorgeous, Unforgettable, The Nakeds, Glamour, and BioFit. So this poster wasn’t actually advertising women, but the Body collection. I’ve obviously already stated my distaste for the emphasis on the need for a “perfect” body, so I’m still standing by that. I’m just pointing out the actual meaning behind that slogan. It was merely referring to loving the collection.
I have my degree and heath and wellness and also was an employee at Victoria’s Secret while in college. While I understand lot of your points I know that being a healthy weight is one of the most important parts of having a healthy self confidence. It is totally important to be within your BMI. We shouldn’t tell our children its okay to be overweight if you are happy with your body because its not! I don’t see skeletons when I see the models. I see there ab muscles! These women were blessed with their height. Other than that they have put in the hard work. As a professional I can promise you they don’t get their body by starving themselves 24/7. If they did do this their body would lose the muscle tone they do have. The diet that you are looking at is 9 days out of a whole year. Victoria’s Secret is all about making the customer feel beautiful and that is what their products do for me. I have worked with customers who literally cried in the dressing room because we found a bra for them that made them feel beautiful. Maybe we should focus on the health more then the weight of 9 models.
I’ve got to agree. We should be celebrating healthy bodies. It’s a trick, though, to get overweight girls and boys to feel that they need to address their weight without making them feel like they’ve got nothing to offer. I like that stores are making clothes and swimsuits for plus-sized people that aren’t just ugly tents.
But you realize, just because somone isn’t thin, they still can be completely healthy, right?
I understand that you don’t have to fit into a size 2 but all research points to the same conclusions. Just as I mentioned with the BMI previously. It is set up to give a range for a healthy weight that is actually pretty large for your height. If you are above or below this you are dramatically increasing your chance for diseases like diabetes, stroke, and high blood pressure. While you may be healthy today I promise it will effect your heath down the road.
I think, though, that it is the glorification of a very specific body type that we’re mainly upset with. Bodies come in different shapes and sizes. I can be within my BMI at 5’6″ and 150 pounds (on the large end of the BMI equation, but just sliding in there). But that puts me nowhere near a size 2, and honestly? Getting much below 145-150, as an adult, requires a very strictly monitored diet and a good deal of caloric restriction to maintain. And even when I did make it to 140 in college (courtesy of a nasty break-up), I didn’t look anything like those models. As I mentioned above, the way I am built, I have small boobs (barely a B cup) but a large rib-cage that will always stick out beyond my boobs, requiring a 38 in any bra I buy. Until I had a kid, my hips and waist didn’t have much variance. So while I was healthy, I *still* didn’t look like those women, and clothes *still* didn’t fit me in a way I was happy with, and that’s where I (and several of the other commenters here) take issue: I was healthy, within my BMI, active and fit, and I *still* hated the way my body looked. I loathed it. I’ve gotten over it – I’m much more accepting of my body than I was 10 years or so ago – but the fact that no one out there is ever built like me (not models, not Marilyn, none of the “feminine” stereotypes put out there) really enforced to me that I do not have an acceptable, attractive, feminine body type. I bought into that and spent a good deal of time not liking my body for reasons that I could not help (mainly, that damn ribcage). And for that reason, I think perceptions of health and beauty ought to converge. I was healthy, but I never felt beautiful. Ever.
Alright but I didn’t want to get harsh. I am short, am a size 4, have a ghetto booty, the only boobs I have are from my push up bra. We all may not have the bodies that we want to have but come on we were blessed to have the bodies that God gave us. It is our responsibility to love them but that includes keeping them healthy. I am sorry you have never felt beautiful but maybe you should have more of an attitude of gratitude because you body enables you to do everything you do. Get over it. Think of all people who are born with disabilities who cant even walk or maybe are born without a limb and you are complaining about rib shape. Its just sad.
Um…I am over it, thank you. I *bought* into that – past tense. I am very appreciative of my body and what it can do, and what it has done. I fully realize that it is within my power to adopt this attitude. My point was that I spent a lot of time in my late teens and early twenties feeling badly about something I couldn’t change. Good for you for getting to acceptance before I did. Some women never get there at all. And promotion of only certain body types does not help.
I have to disagree, it is not ‘totally important to be within your BMI’. Most people — doctors, nutritionists, and fitness experts included — acknowledge that it’s not a good indicator of a person’s health. To give you some perspective, most athletes will be considered ‘overweight’ or even ‘obese’ based on the body mass index; this is because they have so much lean muscle mass, so they may be a high weight, but their body will obviously vastly differ from someone the same height with a different percentage of body fat and muscle mass.
I personally know of many people, both men and women, who are considered ‘overweight’ or ‘obese’ based solely on their BMI, and yet they are completely healthy individuals. They don’t have any cholesterol issues, no blood sugar issues, their blood pressure is great, and they regularly take part in physical activity; some of them even participate regularly in marathons, they’re in such great shape.
On the opposite end of things, I also know many men and women who would fall under the ‘underweight’ category of their BMI, but they are also completely healthy individuals.
I do think it’s important that we embrace health — that’s just it, health. But health isn’t necessarily based on appearance, nor is it based on a number.
I just have to point out that Victoria’s Secret never made the claim you think they did. “Body by Victoria” is a line of lingerie sold by Victoria’s Secret and the poster saying “I love my body” was referencing the bra the models were wearing in the picture. It says it right on the poster. Not that your argument was wrong, because you’re absolutely right about models being too thin. I just have to be that person you know? Good article otherwise!
Oh, I know. I’ve had that pointed out to me multiple times, and I obviously should have put in the article that I know what “Body by Victoria” is. I just can’t believe that NOBODY in the pitch meeting for that slogan realized that in a world that is SO body-conscious, this phrase, even meant for just the “Body” line, and nothing else, carries so many implications with it that would cause women to look for multiple different body types in the advertisements.
I don’t think it’s fair to blame the models on this. They are probably in it for the paycheck, caught in a system that forces them to be skinny for pay. A lot of models are recruited from vulnerable situations- a lot of people that parade in their underwear or exploit their bodies are recruited from poor neighborhoods. Blame the patriarchy. There’s a survey in this article, a survey of women, that says they find a curvy woman to be the sexiest of them all. Then who finds the models attractive? Men. Our culture. That’s what we should be looking at.
You know her husband was probably thrilled to get to watch hot chicks on tv :P
If I don’t tell you this enough let me say it now, plainly and publicly, I love your body. I also love your beautiful mind. You are so VERY sexy to me! I am very proud of you!
Your loving husband
Andy
Now *that* kind of statement is sexy.
He’s so cute. This is why I love him :) Hehe.
And I know for a FACT he would find me sexy no matter what size I was. He watched me bring our son into the world, and as I’ve seen mentioned so many times on here…that’s amazingly bonding, and I don’t want to call the act of childbirth itself “sexy,” but it does make a woman much more sexy to her husband in many (I hope ALL!) cases.
I love this post so much. So so much.
You nailed it!
from a man`s perspective : this whole “must-be-slim-madness” really makes it difficult for both men and women, most of us men don`t even appreciate that type of body, it`s just not feminine anymore, but try and go tell your perfectly normal shaped girlfriend the truth – that you desire her and her body – she won`t believe you :-(
hmm it’s not true for all men… my dad prefers skinny women with no trace of pudginess. I’m not fat, but to my dad he’d probably think I am a bit so just because I don’t have a flat stomach. When I was younger I was chubby and he’d tell me to do sit ups, jokingly yet a bit seriously. I’m surprised sometimes at who he says is fat because I look at the same person and I definitely don’t think see it. I love my dad and he is a great guy, but this whole skinny thing is one of the not so great things. No one is perfect, yet we are in our own ways :)
I just feel like it must be mentioned- it doesn’t matter WHAT the “I Love My Body” campaign was supposed to be discussing, i.e. the Body by Victoria line of undergarments, it appeared as though it was promoting a single, minority body style. If VS pulled the campaign so soon after it started it is because they realized that what they meant and what it appeared they meant were 2 different ideas. As somone who used to work as a sales clerk for VS (ohhh back in the day high school jobs…..) I can say that those advertising campaigns are supposed to have a long, long shelf life.
Amen Sister!
I read something similar in “People” magazine… Why is this so called “diet” being celebrated?! It’s pretty scary when you need to be followed by medical professionals because of (basically) anorexia forced upon you by your job. Do all the Angels go straight to the hospital for IVs after the fashion show??
Wonderfully written post, and Andy’s comment above brings it home.
I have a positive thing to say about Victoria’s Secret: Their panties and sports bras are functional and comfortable. They make a good product, and one that happens to fit my body, so I buy it from them.
It would be nice if they showed women with different body types, but there’s something we have to understand about modeling: These women have to look perfect from EVERY angle. They’ll pose M. Monroe or airbrush Tyra Banks, but a random model? She’s got to get it right. The models are chosen to be the same height as each other because otherwise the image would look unbalanced. That’s probably why their hair’s done that way too. If they DID choose models who were different heights, we’d all be going “Huh… There’s something off about that picture.”
Still, mocking each other for wanting to be doctors and scientists? That’s dumb and toxic. Why not have them acknowledge that they can’t be models forever and let us listen to their plans for subsequent careers? I went to an ivy league school and there was an ex model in my chemistry lab with me.
I went into Victoria’s Secret a while ago because I saw a cute bathing suit in the window. I was looking through trying to find my bra size, (which is a D). One of the girls working the floor asked if I needed anything and I told her what size I was looking for and she scoffed (not even kidding!) and said “ummm… we don’t carry D’s.”
OUCH.
They don’t carry….Why are they even open?
THANK YOU! Exactly. Yes.
I am not a big girl, I am not a small girl. I’m just right, I have never shopped at Victoria secret because I always assumed the sizes wouldn’t fit me (same problem at lasenza and lavie en rose). But you know, this article has just strengthened my resolve to continue suporting businesses who do support the average size ladies
I was just having this discussion on Farlk yesterday when someone posted this link to pics of old burlesque dancers (some barely SFW): http://www.life.com/gallery/23224/image/91904202/classic-burlesque-we-aim-to-tease#index/0
The truth is fashion industry has completely screwed up the perception of women are supposed to weigh, incredibly. I saw a couple guys on Fark saying that a 6’3″ 140 pound woman would need to “hit the gym and lose a few pounds.” Oh. My. Gawd. According to a BMI (Body Mass Index, yes I know it has flaws) calculator, a 6’3″ 140 lb woman would have a BMI of 17.5 and be squarely in the “underweight” category. Her weight should be between 148 and 199 pounds.
When I was a teenage girl reading the X-Men, Storm (Ororo Monroe) was listed as being 5’11″ and weighing 127 pounds (she still is). A woman that size would be a bean pole, but she is usually drawn as being full figured. Can you imagine what a mind screw that is for a 13 year old girl?
This is a nice link for what women really weigh, for example one woman who is 5’8″ and weighs 150 pounds in listed as “normal” under the BMI: http://www.flickr.com/photos/77367764@N00/sets/72157602199008819/
I do not begrudge women who are either naturally or through their profession slender, but when the public image of what all women *should be* is screwed up that badly, something needs to be done. I mean there is a reason anorexia is a disease of developed countries that has seen a massive surge in recent decades.
This comment is awaiting moderation still….
“They go out on the runway smiling, because they’re doing what they love.”
They go out there smiling because they are being paid to and they are being told they are goddess being worshiped for their looks alone. But when their career is over at age 25, what will these women have but a body with health issues and (for many of them) a drug habit? What happens when they start to age and wrinkle? Well, here’s plastic surgery to the rescue. More money wasted.
What I am reading is a lot of rationalizing trying to ignore this:
“Anorexia Nervosa Statistics (US)
According to the first nationally representative study of eating disorders in the United States, which appeared in the February 2007 edition of Biological Psychiatry, 0.9 percent of women and 0.3 percent of men reported suffering from anorexia in their lifetime. On average, the illness lasted 1.7 years.
Here are some anorexia nervosa statistics from various other US organisations, which were all obtained from their corresponding websites:
National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH):
Somewhere between 0.5 and 3.7 percent of females suffer from anorexia nervosa in their lifetime.
Approximately 0.56 percent of anorexia sufferers will die each year, while 5.6 percent will die each decade.
The mortality rate among people with anorexia is 12 times higher than the mortality rate for all causes of death among females aged 15-24.
An estimated 5 to 15 percent of anorexia and bulimia sufferers are male.
Academy for Eating Disorders:
Nearly 50 percent of anorexia sufferers recover, while 33 percent show some improvement and 20 percent continue to be severely ill.
National Eating Disorders Association:
Of all the mental illnesses, anorexia has the highest mortality rate.
2 in 5 new cases of anorexia are in girls aged between 15 and 19 years.
The number of cases of anorexia increased significantly between 1935 and 1989, particularly in women aged 15-24.
Only one-third of people with anorexia in the community receive mental health care.
The Renfrew Center Foundation:
1 in 5 anorexia sufferers will suffer related complications such as suicide attempts and heart problems that lead to premature death.
An average woman gains 25 lbs during pregnancy, while restricting anorexics gain an average of 15.8 lbs during pregnancy.
The average birth weight of babies born to purging anorexics is 4.9 lbs.”
Since my post is still awaiting moderation and I don’t think anyone can see it:
I was just having this discussion on Farlk yesterday when someone posted this link to pics of old burlesque dancers. The truth is fashion industry has completely screwed up the perception of women are supposed to weigh, incredibly. I saw a couple guys on Fark saying that a 6’3″ 140 pound woman would need to “hit the gym and lose a few pounds.” Oh. My. Gawd. According to a BMI (Body Mass Index, yes I know it has flaws) calculator, a 6’3″ 140 lb woman would have a BMI of 17.5 and be squarely in the “underweight” category. Her weight should be between 148 and 199 pounds.
When I was a teenage girl reading the X-Men, Storm (Ororo Monroe) was listed as being 5’11″ and weighing 127 pounds (she still is). A woman that size would be a bean pole, but she is usually drawn as being full figured. Can you imagine what a mind screw that is for a 13 year old girl?
For example a woman who is 5’8″ and weighs 150 pounds in listed as “normal” under the BMI. That’s healthy.
This is not about girls empowering themselves with beauty. This is a setting an unrealistic standard that pressures girl women into unhealthy decisions.
Sorry, I replied in the wrong place.
thank you for this post – it is all to familiar for me and heart-breaking that it is so devasting to all of us girls who have beeen and are still dealing with this horrible disease- God Bless anyone that has to go thru this ordeal–
That flickr stream is shocking, It is so unbelievably screwed up!
Thanks for sharing.
..Re: The BMI link. Yes, there are some pretty screwed up labels of what ranks of “overweight” and “obese” there, which the pictures illustrate which shows why the BMI is flawed, but I used it as an example of what real women actually weight as opposed to the model’s lies in magazines.
I remember as a teen comparing my body to Cindy Crawford’s body and thinking, “There is no way in hell she weighs 115 pounds. If she does not weigh 130, I will eat my hat.”
I completely agree that our admiration of such contrived and unnatural beauty is grotesque, but I find it hard to believe that others find it unbelievable that an Angel would choose being an Angel instead of a doctor or marine biologist. I think any human being, given the chance, would drink protein shakes nonstop if it meant being one of only seven women in the world who are universally envied and sought after. Would I rather strut down a catwalk in front of an audience of rapt admirers or end up like the majority of graduates working at Target because I can’t get a job as a marine biologist? I mean, the answer seems obvious. I think the point isn’t that these women gave up something others consider more valuable, the point is the reason they have achieve it is disturbing. Instead of recognizing a healthy female body as beautiful, we honor women who have gone to such extreme lengths to alter their natural selves it could almost be considered mutilation.
To be completely honest, I actually don’t envy them at all. I like food too much to envy them. Also, I would have no desire to be that “sought after” (ogled, really), even if I did look like them. So I can definitely see your point, but I disagree; not every woman in the world would trade places with an Angel if she could.
However, thank goodness you saw my original point, and the part of the VS franchise that I have such a huge problem with: the completely and totally unnatural way these women end up looking like they do.
I would do all those women and some of you who left comments!
I get what you’re saying, and I’m glad you love your body…that is wonderful. But so many times I hear people tell girls to love their bodies when frankly they shouldn’t. Obesity is an epidemic and being FAT is not ok or healthy. If you are curvy and healthy, then I’m downright jealous. Before I had kids I was naturally as thin as those models. More so becuase I didn’t have the muscle they do. And people accused me of being anorexic or unhealthy, when the truth is I ate over 7000 calories a day and couldn’t put on an ounce. All I wanted was to look like a woman instead of a boy. Its unfair to judge skinny people and embrace being overweight. It shouldn’t one or the other, we should strive for healthy. It doesn’t matter what our body’s look like, we should care that we are healthy. I’m not skinny as the models anymore since I had kids. My boobs are the pancake boobs because they are small and saggy, I have stretchmarks showing my 60+ pounds that I gained each pregnancy. I haven’t tried to lose weight but I’m down to 132 at 5’7″. And women tell me they ‘hate’ me for being skinny. People think that fat people have it hard….its harder to be skinny. Lets stop criticizing people for their bodies and start embracing health!!!
I totally understand what you mean, and I am realizing now that I should have mentioned my own proportions in my article. I am getting a lot of comments accusing me of having an “us vs. them,” or “curvy vs. thin” mentality, and that isn’t the case at all
I have been a dancer for eighteen years, and I have the body to prove it: I am five-foot-two, 110 pounds, I’m a size 3, and a 34A. (Used to be a 34C before I breastfed.) I get told to “eat a sandwich or something” all. The. Time. I know exactly what you’re talking about.
Actually, if you go to my blog and read “The Envy of a Skinny Girl,” you’ll see what I mean…I go through my own body issues. Tons of them. And I’m completely jealous of women who actually look like women, too. I wear scrubs at work, and they make me look like a twelve-year-old boy. But still, I have stretch marks all over my thighs, hips, butt, and stomach. My belly button looks super gross and weird since I was pregnant. I have NO BOOBS anymore. I have had to make the conscious decision, on a daily basis, to say “This body is mine, and I love it.”
I’m sorry if it seemed like a curvy-vs-thin issue; that is not my problem with Victoria’s Secret, by any means. I didn’t include my own size in the article because I wanted to make it broader than that. My problem with VS isn’t with the thinness of the models, by any means. My problem is the fact that their figures are not at all obtained by natural or particularly healthy (and DEFINITELY not realistic) means, and yet these models are the women that we are supposed to emulate? We’re supposed to hold them in reverence for that kind of beauty, above any other kind?
That was my problem, and I’m sorry if I created any confusion about this.
Yeah I’m 5’8″ and 100 pounds and some people hate me just because I’m thin. And when women come up to me and say I’m lucky I’m so skinny and they wish they could be like me I actually feel really bad…..I just feel bad wondering if my thin body, which is naturally just like that, is going to cause other women to potentially get eating disorders. Like just me being thin and them saying they want to look like me is causing me to somehow promote being thin without my intention of doing so. It actually makes me feel bad about myself as a person sometimes….that just being thin is both making people hate me and potentially helping to induce people into having eating disorders. And I’m really tired of people coming up to me and commenting on how thin I am. Is that seriously ALL THEY SEE when they look at me? If someone tells me I’m beautiful, I will take the compliment, and not necessarily feel like the comment had to do with how thin I am….but a lot of the time they don’t say “You are beautiful.” they say “You are so thin, I wish I was that thin.” and it feels like all I am to a lot of other women is my body size….that’s all they see…..it’s like I’m not even a person to people. They just see my weight.
I know exactly how you feel. I was hated in school by other girls because i was thin and have a chest, I had girls calling me anorexic and i was like?? I wouldnt have a chest if i was! Also in a restaurant some lady in the girls bathroom asked if my breasts were real! My family is very lucky when it come to genetics, not all people are, some have to work to stay healthy. I wish people would base what is healthy on themselves and not on what other people are.
Well I don’t personally have much in the way of boobs and I don’t think most really thin people do. I have a pretty flat chest. I know that there are a few people who are naturally really thin though and still have pretty large breasts. It’s too bad that people will assume they are fake though. I guess that’s one thing I don’t mind about having small boobs….no one assumes that they’re fake(and they don’t get in my way I guess either ever)…..but people assume other things are fake about me sometimes like my hair since I’m a blonde and that’s kind of rare when it comes to it being natural(not to mention my hair is curly on top of that and sometimes people think that’s fake too).
AMEN! If all my children ever dreamed to be was a VS model, I would greatly quetsion where I went wrong in nurturing their creativity and brilliance!
Not that I am discounting anything you are portraying or saying here. I get it, we should create a better “idol” image for our younger girls as to not promote unhealthy eating or lack thereof. BUT I am “curvy” and I easily shop at VS for lingerie, bras, panties or whatever I feel like purchasing there. And I like it and feel good in it. And I hope really they aren’t really aiming it at “little girls” because I have absolutely NO reason to take my 11 year old into VS…and she has no reason physically to be in there either. But again I get your point.
I think the part of them changing their dreams to be angels being said is very unfair as my 11 year old started out wanting to be a marine biologist when she was 8, but now she aspires to be a ballerina, model and be a fashion designer. Life works that way — dreams, goals and what makes you feel whole changes. Last year I was dead set on med school. Now I am enrolled in beauty school and I am happy, fulfilled and not going to med school…probably never will.
Also wanted to make a note about the “same hair”. There is a reason for that. Photo shoots and runway styling. People, like me, are going to school to do just those things. Create that hairstyle. And I actually just learned the EXACT technique for the Victoria’s Secret hair at school and with the company that does that technique. It’s actually extremely popular, in high demand and has even made such an impact on the beauty industry that salons are opening up simply for this particular style & technique. One I know off hand is The Drybar. So I think that was more of a snide, snarky, unfair (whatever you want to call it) comment because people are getting paid to create hairstyles that are all exactly the same and people are becoming students for the same things.
I’m not saying at all that changing one’s aspirations in such a way is a bad thing. The fact that they mocked the change in aspiration was what broke my heart, as well as specifically aiming their message at (in their words, even) “little girls.” As though they are the EPITOME of what young women should look like. In my latest blog post, I actually talked about how I wanted to model/act around the age of thirteen. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that in and of itself. It’s the unhealthy habits that often go with those careers that is frightening. (Honestly, if you have to be overseen by medical professionals for as long as these women do to make sure you have EXACTLY the right amount of calories in your diet and fat on/off your body, it’s likely going to give you some body image issues. Or at least it would for me.)
Similarly, I don’t have a problem with the hairstyle. To be totally honest, I think it’s beautiful and flattering, and I WISH I could do that to my hair, but my hair isn’t even to my shoulders yet. My problem is the way that they ignore (or at least totally do not acknowledge) women who look ANY different. You will never see an advertisement (or at least, you won’t until there is a huge societal shift) for VS in which the women look like anything but what is pictured above. The fact that they expect us to so revere such a specific body type, which was obtained by such an unnatural diet and supplement regimen and isn’t AT ALL realistic for any woman not in the same profession, is my issue with the company and its image.
Excellent article, thank you! VS has hit an all new low with their “I Love My Body” campaign. There is so much they could have done with it, so much GOOD that could have come out of it, but instead they created cardboard cut-outs of models and practically told girls everywhere that their body ISN’T one to love since they do not look like those cut-outs. VS chickened out, or perhaps never even saw the potential, from making a bold and positive statement for girls everywhere to see . The message VS sends, and quite deliberately promotes, is grossly irresponsible and all the more insidious because they do it in the name of profit. Girls are being taught lies for the sake of some company’s pocket book. And those falsities are only re-enforced every time they open a magazine or flip on the t.v. and thus become ingrained in them as truths. How to protect and prepare our daughters for society’s onslaught against their individualism and self-esteem?
It’s the messages broadcasted by companies like Victoria’s Secret that drive the self-esteem of girls like me into the ground. I’m 15 years old, 5’1″ and 145lbs. I’m not a small girl, and probably never will be.
For the first ten or so years of my life, I didn’t give a hoot about my appearance, or what others thought about me. Now, sometimes, I’m driven to tears by what I see in the mirror, or when my clothes don’t fit right. I know it’s stupid to want to be as “perfect” as these models, but in this day and age I live under the shadow of all these expectations.
Sometimes, I just wish things could be different, like in the days when being chubby was considered a sign of wealth, and good health.
And I don’t hate skinny people… I just envy them.
First thoughts: wonderfully written, very informative and empowering. Second thought: why do you have a self-proclaimed “skinny girl” as a Curvy Girl Contributor????? Completely discounted the article for me. Nice try.
FYI, I was referencing this line in particular “She’s a skinny girl, but that’s totally genetics, so you can’t hate her, okay?”
My immediate reaction to this comment was disappointment.
I am disappointed that you would discount every powerful word from this woman’s article because she isn’t Curvy enough.
We actually have women of all sizes writing for this site. I’ve learned hard and fast that Curvy women don’t have the monopoly on low self esteem and negative body image.
As women, mothers, sisters and friends, we should all be campaigning and supporting a movement against the cycle of body hate.
THIS.
Yup. There it is. Right on, B.
Isn’t saying that someone is too skinny to be a Curvy Girl contributor just as discriminatory as saying that someone is too fat to be a model or shop at VS?
Yes, it is. And I’m *well* at the high end of the curvy girl spectrum.
I think that was supposed to make me feel better about my curvy body when it fact it made me feel fat :(
I HATE my curvy body!!!!
That sucks. I LOVE mine! You should, too.
I loved this article. I used to model when I was younger. I aspired to being thin. What did that give me, a hideous eating disorder that has destroyed my teeth and my self confidence more dwindled then it already was. I do not watch VS I can not find very many bra’s to fit after two kids and breast feeding now that I am a 38 F. At least none that are sexy. They do not make very many items for CURVY girls as they like to market curves? what a joke. I boycott them even more now!!! I am so SICK of seeing their commercials and the last thing I want is my daughter idolizing to be anything like them. I wish curves were more appreciated like they were in the days of the pin up girl or even greek goddesses. Back when you were not found attractive unless you were curvy and had meat on your bones, that skinny would have been seen as sickly.
@ Mandi :
Well I don’t think it would be nice to go to a time when thin people would be considered gross and sickly…since some of us are just really thin and not sick and it wouldn’t feel good to be considered ugly because of that. I don’t agree with the skinny focus, despite the fact that I’m super thin, but I wouldn’t want it to go in the total opposite direction either and make skinny people then feel unloved. I think that women of all sizes should be appreciated and considered beautiful. And they really should have sexy products for women with a larger bust size, etc.
I want to see a world were all sizes are treated equal, both thin and curvy, full-figured, etc.
I also dislike that they are all skinny and all the same size. Despite the fact that I’m very skinny myself(5’8″) and 100 pounds….I honestly hate that they are all thin. It doesn’t help anyone. The reason why it doesn’t help super thin people either is it makes other people resent us and sometimes be mean to us out of envy, which isn’t a nice experience, and it’s made people make assumptions about the health of skinny people due to the fact that because all these models are skinny, it pushes women to sometimes starve themselves to be that way….which is why people make assumptions about my health and the health of all other skinny people. So it pretty much backlashes on us.
I also just hate how it makes women feel bad about their bodies. I think it would be okay for them to have 1 or 2 really thin models since yes, some women are just like that and so they are representing part of real women…..but they also need to have models of other sizes to incorporate other real women.
I come from the other end of the spectrum..I don’t like Victoria’s secret even more now for this. I never liked their Barbie models. I mean I’m by no means curvy, I’m a typical marathoner, short, thin and no boobs..I can’t show at VS bc even their miraculous bra does nothing for me..I’m stuck with the girls section of target.
I think that a company built on trying to make women feel sexy is doing the opposite by casting aside women that would probably look better in those undergarments than a woman that is waif thin…I mean I wish I had some curve but genetics didn’t give me that..
to the author:
yeah, i’d fuck you.
Decidedly creepy. Not going to lie.
creepy, maybe. honest, yes. complimentary, definitely.
Well, at least you’re honest.
and according to 2 other posters, i’m sweet?
wasn’t exactly what i was going for, but oh well
awwww, that’s sweet.
You’re so sweet!
LOL… It doesn’t sound like you “love your body” at all, Miss Curvy Girl Guide Contributor, otherwise, you wouldn’t dedicate an entire article to how upset you are that Victoria Secrets models are skinnier than you. If you really loved your body, you wouldn’t give a f*ck and this lengthy article complaining about the portrayal of women by Victoria’s Secrets’ models wouldn’t even exist.
I’m in one of the “difficult career paths” that the Angels gave up (i.e. electrical engineer), and I can tell you for certain that an Angel will make way more money than I ever will over my entire lifetime. I think everyone aspires to work less and live more. Who are you to judge how someone earns a living in order to achieve what they want out of life? If some girl wants to obtain an “Angel’s body” in order to one day become an Angel, she should do it…. but look around… Going off of this country’s obesity numbers, there’s not many people who have that kind of self-control and motivation. Most women are going to really enjoy reading this article, because most women are fat.
And what about all of the other questionable career paths that have an impact on one’s health? Anyone who plays sports, anyone who sits in an office all day, anyone who has a high stress job, etc. While these people aren’t starving themselves to make a living, they certainly are negatively impacting their health in one way or another, just as Angels are. When are you going to write an article about your complaints concerning these career paths? Answer: You won’t… because you’re a “curvy” woman and what concerns you most is that people who choose not to be “curvy” are becoming successful because of it.
If you want to look at previous responses to some of these comments, I’m actually not curvier than the models. I’m a very athletic woman who has been dancing for eighteen years. This has nothing to do with jealousy, or any hatred of myself.
I make the conscious effort every day to look at myself and say, “This is my body. I choose to love it.” My problem with Victoria’s Secret is that this is the exact opposite of what they encourage. This was not totally on my own behalf. This was on behalf of every woman out there who hates herself a little more every time she sees a Victoria’s Secret ad. Check out the other commenters above. I am not alone in disliking Victoria’s Secret while also loving myself.
It appears, as well, that you have an issue with my body (when, obviously, you haven’t the slightest clue what I look like), the bodies of the Angels, or your own body. Which one, I couldn’t care less, but don’t project any issues of your own on me. Similarly, if *you* “didn’t give a f*ck” about it, why would you take such issue with me, and my thoughts on the matter?
My concern in this matter goes far beyond myself. My heart breaks for the women who left comments above; the ones who hate their own bodies. The ones who feel completely left out of society’s current definition of “beautiful.” The ones who ache for their daughters, who will grow up with this “standard” and “ideal” of what a woman should look like. The aspiring models who starve themselves and make themselves completely ill because they try to fit this image.
This was for the women who are so incredibly beautiful, even though they look nothing like a Victoria’s Secret model.
I hate it that the point of this article was so lost on you.
You are wonderful. I just wanted to say that. I wish I could hug you right now.
I’ll consider myself hugged! Great post!! xoxo
Agreed!!!
Wow! This is a very powerful and well-written article. I’m glad to hear someone speak up about how the media influences it’s standards as to what is beautiful and what is not. The media is all about making money, really beautiful woman are about loving, caring for and being a part of wholesome living.
Great article. Thanks. Sally
If Victoria’s Secret really did want to promote loving our bodies, they’d sell merchandise that FITS our bodies. All of them. Not just the twig-with-titties bodies that are their preferred model type.
I’m a plus size, but even at fighting weight I’m well-endowed. Five years ago I went into a VS and was told they didn’t have my size in the stores but I could go online. Last year I learned that they got rid of their plus-size line altogether and it’s now at Lane Bryant. I was very pleased at this, since (a) I’m not about to buy a bra without trying it on, and (b) the staff at Lane Bryant does not look down its collective nose at big girls.
I was cheering this article. Thank you for posting it!
A truly inspiring article, even for us men. Good thing i’ve never aspired to become a VC Angel!
Connor! Thank you!
THIS GUY, ladies and gentlemen, is 100% responsible for that WONDERFUL head shot on my bio!! You’re friggin awesome, Connor!
You are right. An average BMI is way more beautiful and healthy. Nothing like curves that bring along the implications of decades of diabetes and heart disease. While I am sure the BMI of an average Angel is probably around 15 or 16 (and thus underweight). As for the Angels comment, would you rather them cure disease if they dislike what they do? Would you rather them struggle through a life of mediocrity as an underpaid and likely failure in the limited world of women’s soccer? No, you are right, overweight and mediocre is the way to go. ‘Merica.
I missed the part in this article that I wrote where I said that being overweight and mediocre is the one and only alternative to being an Angel.
And I really don’t want to defend my own size, again.
My 10 year old daughter doesn’t know a thing about the Angels because that is not something I would let her watch! I must say though, that I would rather her feel pressured to be thin, than to not care if she gets fat. Not because of looks, but because of Health. There are SO many diseases that come from obesity and I get tired of whining from women who act like nothing negative should ever be said about being overweight. Hello?? The number one killer in America is heart disease. I want my precious daughter to eat healthy and exercise, which will naturally keep her from being fat, and to believe that what is on the inside is what makes her beautiful. Which is why she doesn’t watch or participate in beauty pageant/ modeling type events.
I should have emphasized the words “healthy” as well as “natural” in this article. I actually work on a cardiac floor at a local hospital, and I see the deadly effects of heart disease, obesity, and diabetes every single day. I understand completely what you mean.
The point that I’m trying to get across, that it seems as though a lot of people missed, is that it’s not one extreme or the other! That’s why the BMI range by height is actually very wide. Either extreme is just plain unhealthy, and I don’t want to seem to encourage either.
I couldn’t agree more with Kristen Schinsky. I love your Victoria Secret blog. It is awesome to have people like you outing the true feelings that we women have towards waifdom.
I have been blogging for a long time. I am a mother of 3 FORD boy models. I know what they look for. The extent of what some of the young girls do to look the way they do is extraordinary.
In fact lets not forget that these ANGELS are little girls. I would bet most of them are barely 17 because lets face it, models at 25 are pretty much washed up.
I have been in the health and fitness business for decades. I was on the TODAY show for 14 years. I train celebrities of which two have been super models, Cindy Crawford and Claudia Schiffer. I still train Julia Roberts but all along I have seen this crazy image that stings our society in how women should look. It makes me sick.
I am including a blog that I wrote about bodies and my journey for someone to see.
I salute the distaste for Victoria Secret. It is shameful for a company to continue to project this body image crime for its audience. I think it is sick and irresponsible.
Thank you
Kathy Kaehler
Fitness Expert and Celebrity Trainer
It is an incredible honor to get a comment like this. I am speechless with thanks.
Thank you so much for reading, and for giving your professional opinion like this. It means more to me than you could know.
- Kristen Schinsky
Here is one of my blogs from http://www.kathykaehler.net It is so hard for women to finally get to a point in their life when they feel comfortable with their body. When teens are being shown how to look, moms are killing themselves to get their bodies back after they have babies and then the desire to look 25 years younger when your 50 year old body is naturally going in the other direction. WOMEN are screwed. Hard to win when you are blasted on every magazine, billboard, movie theater and tv program. This is what I had to say a few week’s ago.
Wearing a fat suit.
As long as I have your captive attention since the dressing room incident I thought I would share my latest thoughts. For the last three years I have been on a trip that I like to call “Pause, while I put on my fat suit” It is fascinating when I recall the reckless years of running around, eating what I wanted to, staying up late, exercising one day and getting the results the next and I thought back then argh…I wish my body looked like this or I wish I was thinner or I wish I could still fit into my jeans from high school. What was I thinking? Now at the youthful age of 48 I have spent the last 1095 days trying to make sense as to why my body is not responding to absolutely anything that I do.
In my thirties I had established a very healthy lifestyle. I ate well, I exercised daily and did that on a consistent basis. I had babies (twins) and got back into shape. Had another baby and did the same and just when I thought I had the ball rolling with my body and getting back into the swing of it POW!!!! You are hit with complete and utter chaos. Abandon ship is echoed through the hollows of my bones. If there was an ejection button I would have hit it 3 years ago. Hot flashes, night sweats, your kids calling you crazy, hair falling out, good mood, bad mood, bad mood and this unusual sense of complete and utter blah! “You just won a million dollars!!” oh well…(that didn’t really happen)
What finally took the cake and brought me down was putting on the fat suit. And this is where my story begins.
I remember training Kris Jenner, momager of Kim Kardashian, etc…, about five years ago. I had not yet purchased my ticket for the crazy train and was going along nicely. Kris obviously had her ticket in hand when she came into my gym one morning and was in tears. It was 5am so I knew it had to be something bad, I mean how long could she have been up it was still the crack of dawn. She sat down on the bike and began telling me through the tears that she went to bed a size 6 and woke up a size 12. How did that happen? As a trainer I knew that couldn’t happen, it was utterly impossible.
Can you see where I am going with this?
The incredible change that can seemingly occur overnight had now happened to me and it is still happening. For someone who is very active and chooses to eat wisely, moderately and cautiously it will blow your mind when you experience waking up in a fat suit. How can I continue to work so hard and my body just goes in the other direction.
Don’t get me wrong when I use the phrase waking up in a fat suit. I have complete compassion for those who are suffering with weight gain for whatever reason. We didn’t come into this world overweight so whenever the crossover from ideal body weight to tipping the scales happens I have an understanding.
With menopause a woman can experience a weight gain of about 5-10 pounds per year during this transition. This transition can last anywhere from 3-5-10 years or more. HOLD ON…are you serious. I will be well over 200 pounds if this keeps up. What can you do?
There are lots of things you can do and there is nothing you can do, hormonally speaking. The decision is yours. A wise physician told me that nothing identical to your own bodies hormones will ever be enough to take you back to your youth without putting you at some type of a health risk. Our bodies are programmed to meet this passage with a hiccup and hopefully lead you out to the other side. Recently, two women crossed my path and they both used the word patience. They too also experienced the fat suit and by the looks of them today, they left it in a dressing room somewhere.
I guess I will embrace my new layer for now. I am doing everything that I can. I eat well, I exercise almost everyday, I ride my bike up a super steep hill and the most importantly I lift weights. It is imperative to keep up with the amount of muscle you have or you will lose it. This can be one of the main reasons for the weight gain. So pump the iron gals. I also have my glass of red wine, I have 4 people who love me dearly, I love what I do as my profession and I care deeply about helping people live a better quality of life.
It is time for me to exercise the word patience. Be kind to your body. Let it do it’s thing and I believe that in due time I will be telling my story of the fat suit to someone else.
IF you want to read more of my blogs visit my website http://www.kathykaehler.net
I hope someone at Curvy Girl sees my stuff as I am YOUR GIRL to voice what we are all talking about.
Thank you so much. I love this. It doesn’t matter what you look like, the pressure is never gone, and a woman my size can have just as many body issues as absolutely any other. There is no such thing as “too skinny to contribute to ‘Curvy Girl,’” as a few women on here have told me.
-Kristen
What’s with the bio line, “She’s a skinny girl , but that’s totally genetics, so you can’t hate her…” Completely negates your piece. What on earth does your skinniness have to do with anything? Why do you think this is an important detail to include in your bio? And why perpetuate this horrible stereotype about women hating each other for being skinny, or what they “are”. You are disgusted by the Angels for pursuing skinniness, implying its ok to “hate’ them, but you’re so quick to mention your own, don’t hate me.
I think you might be as confused as they are.
The thing is, no matter what I said or did not say about my size, it was going to come up in this article. It is very evident by the number of people who have called me everything short of a cow in the comments, saying I must be jealous.
Looking back, yes, I would change that line in my bio, and I’m working with Brittany on doing so. I just had no idea how else to address this issue.
Yes, I am a petite woman writing for a magazine called “Curvy Girl Guide.” Nothing about that negates what I wrote. I’m a genetically small woman, but, if you read my post, “The Envy of a Skinny Girl,” you’ll see that I have just as many body image issues as any woman of any size. As Brittany mentioned above, “We actually have women of all sizes writing for this site. I’ve learned hard and fast that Curvy women don’t have the monopoly on low self esteem and negative body image.”
What disheartens me is how many women (and they are ALL women) who are so quick to tear me down, calling me ignorant, fat, and jealous, telling me I must be so miserable with myself, telling me I should “get my facts straight.” Why can all the curvy women who write for this magazine brag about loving their curves, but I should not even dare mention that I’m small, or, heaven forbid, that some days I actually like my body?
I don’t hate these women; I never once said I hated them. I am disgusted by the fact that they are held up on a pedestal as the epitome of a beautiful, perfect woman, and yet, nothing at all is natural about the way they obtained that look. If you need to be closely monitored by a doctor to make sure every single ounce of fat is proportioned perfectly to your muscle, then you are not on a healthy diet. Not to mention the fact that nobody but the Angels have access to the resources that got them to their exact size and shape.
Also, I never called the models confused. I just don’t like the message they send to women.
I’m just as confused as any woman about my weight, sometimes!! Sometimes I feel like my thighs jiggle too much, and sometimes I wish with all my heart that I could have boobs, and a nice curve through my waist, and a big butt, like I did before I had my son, so that I would actually look like a woman, and not a 12-year-old boy!
Yes, the line at the end of my bio needs to be changed. Especially for this article. That was a mistake on my part, and I regret writing it like that.
Like I said, I had no idea how to address the issue, since, quite obviously, it is SO VITAL that all the readers know exactly what my proportions are.
Seeing how easy it is for you to tear me down for the flaws that you instantly see in me from a single sentence I wrote makes me sad for you.
Great job! I love it!! =)
Being a grad student, I’ve shopped some place other than target once all semester. I also don’t have a working TV. So I had no idea this was the current ad they are running. And it makes me sad. I love my body! but I certainly don’t look like they do. And I have no desire to, either!
It’s ridiculous that people would even dare mention in the comments that you must be jealous or unhappy with yourself to write such a thing. And it’s rude. They have clearly grossly misunderstood your intentions. If those girls want that as their job and they are happy, go for it, I suppose (although it doesn’t look or sound healthy!) Is my body perfect? nope. But there’s never been a day in my life were I’ve wanted to be that skinny for that cost. It’s obviously not about jealously or personal body image issues. But haters gonna hate, I guess. I’m just glad my parents raised me to be confident in my body AND to achieve high educational/life goals. The quotes you wrote about mocking their goals as children made me want to cry.
I don’t shop there anyway given their prices and the general assumption I had that they don’t have my bra size (which seems to have been confirmed by other comments here), but this makes me less inclined to shop there in the future.
I enjoyed reading your article. I shared it on FB and some of my friends have shared it on theirs after reading it on mine. Awesome!
Thanks for a thought-provoking post. Somehow, I never noticed before what you pointed out about just how incredibly narrow VS’s idea of beauty is. The Angels really are all exactly the same size, shape, height, etc. It’s crazy. It made me think about recasting the VS campaign with other women who are famous for their beauty and sex appeal … Imagine that print ad featuring Beyonce, Salma Hayek, Gwenyth Paltrow, Katherine Heigl, Alicia Keys, Scarlet Johanssen, Eva Longoria … That print ad with all the models lined up would be *completely* different! And those are all famous, thin celebrities — I’m not even pushing the envelope and suggesting athletes (like Hope Solo or Venus Williams) or older women (Diane Keaton, Helen Mirren?) or non-famous women.
You know you’re looking at an extremely narrow vision of beauty when it makes Hollywood look wildly diverse!
I couldnt agree more with Kristen.
At first I had no idea what to say back to all these people commenting and saying that these models were healthy and naturally skinny. (after being photo-shopped to appear that way.) I am a 22 year old, 5’8″, 125lb woman. I have been told that I am underweight and should gain around 10 pounds to be the “healthiest” I can be. I wear a size 5-7 in pants (blessed with nice big hips). I would be considered a “plus-sized” model because of my size. If I am UNDERWEIGHT and considered PLUS SIZE… there is something definitely UNHEALTHY with these models. A person has to consume the right amount of nutrients and if I am doing that by eating a normal diet, there is no way they can be “healthy” if they are on a liquid diet and being followed by medical personnel to make sure they dont fall over from nutritional neglect. If I am the size I am, would a person my size that weighs the “healthy weight” not be even plus-sized but considered HUGE?. Im not saying being obese is any better for health, but this these models do NOT show what an AVERAGE, healthy, beautiful woman looks like. It may sell, but it is also hurting the image of what a beautiful woman must look like. And I believe that is what this article is getting at.
The fact that you had the gumption to write an article llke this earns you the utmost respect even if a reader doesnt agree with the message. Standing up for what you believe in is admirable. Having your own opinion is admirable. Even if you were extremely obese and could only sit at your computer and write to support yourself I would not assume that you were jealous. The size of your body does not stop you from being able to write an article on your own opinion about weight standards. For any of these women who dont like this article or like this post you can go ahead and stop reading.
Moving on to the Victoria Secret body image. I am one of the twigs with tits. I am this way through my genes. I grew up not caring what my body looked like. While i do love my body now it doesnt define who i am. I am 5’8” and weigh 130 and has C cup boobs. i have never had an eating disorder. Unless you count being able to out eat and impress almost anyone. When i have children my body will not look like this and i will love it, because its my body not because of its shape or lack of. This is why the article was written. So that my neices and daughters will realize what it means to love your body at any shape. Not because anyone is jealous or wants to hate on anyone.
You are my new favorite person. Thank you, thank you, a thousand times, thank you. That was exactly the point I was trying to make.
Meh, it’s all true but VS is not all bad. They have great underwear and I do feel very hot in them. They are very comfortable and good looking all in one. And I do enjoy the shows. I mean, it’s a little heartbreaking to see their bodies when you’re only 5’5 and actually has hips but.. I still like their attitude. That they have energy when they’re walking down the runway, doing V-signs and playing with it without trying to look like a dead zombie because “it’s fashion”. Also I love the creations they wear and all the colors and shapes.
However, yes, the ideal they send out to women can be seen as awful. Though I think smart girls will hopefully realize, sooner or later, that all women can’t look like that and that doesn’t have to mean that you’re less unattractive!
Meh, it’s all true but VS is not all bad. They have great underwear and I do feel very hot in them. They are very comfortable and good looking all in one. And I do enjoy the shows. I mean, it’s a little heartbreaking to see their bodies when you’re only 5’5 and actually have hips but.. I still like their attitude. That they have energy when they’re walking down the runway, doing V-signs and playing with it without trying to look like a dead zombie because “it’s fashion”. Also I love the creations they wear and all the colors and shapes.
However, yes, the ideal they send out to women can be seen as awful. Though I think smart girls will hopefully realize, sooner or later, that all women can’t look like that and that doesn’t have to mean that you’re less unattractive!
Will that be before or after they have added to the largest rate of anorexia and bulimia in the world?
People forget, this is not just about self esteem, it’s also about health.
You all are forgetting one very important thing: VS discriminates against the slender girls with large breasts, too.
I’m 5’8”, about 150 pounds, and I naturally wear a 32GG. Where the hell is my bra, VS? Oh, right, you don’t have anything above a DD–and those only for band sizes 34 and up.
They don’t even love the body type they idealize.
As a guy and a father of a beautiful little girl turning 5 next month, I have to ask: What drives this? Where does it get decided that this look is the ideal? Does the industry feel that this is what attracts men? Does it feel that this is what all women want to be? It feels like this emaciated look has kept coming back with a vengeance since the flappers of the 20′s. I thought this was going to be put to bed after the “Dove” campaigns, but I guess not. I’d like to know what seems to be the motivation for this so I can explain it to my daughter who has just entered her “princess” phase and is starting to ask questions about Barbies shape!!
What actually drives it is fashion designers need female bodies that are literally clothes hangers. That a designer can use to display his work the best, which means skinny and flat that the fabric hangs correctly on any of them.
But because that is what is thrown in front of us by the media all the time, that is what has become the standard of beauty. And the fashion industry makes a LOT of money off women being made to feel insecure abotu their bodies.
I went into the Body Shop one time and was just looking to pick up some mascara. Well by the time the salesgirl was done with me, I felt pale and splotchy and oh my Gawd I had to have make up and power and rouge and lipstick and eye shadow and…
Then I walked out of the store and realize what had been done to me.
Tell your daughter that images like Barbie are not real. They are just an intermediate step between a Cabbage Patch doll and reality and if anyone tells her that she should look like Barbie, they are asking for the impossible and lying in order to get something from her.
Well, at five, that maybe too complex. Just tell her anyone who says she should look like anything but the beautiful girl she is, is just wrong.
I agree with this article. I actually posted that HuffPost article to my FB page when it came out. But I have quite a few other perspectives. Women who hate these models because of what they represent are part of the problem. Every woman is unique with different qualities. Body size and type should never be used to judge. Don’t hate me because I’m fat (I’m curvy but I’m actually a bit unhealthy as well) and I won’t hate you because your thighs don’t touch. And if you read the eating and fitness regimen of other people who use their bodies to make money they also do crazy thing leading up to their primary event. We just don’t like the primary event for these women.
Also, about them all being uniform. They are clothes hangers. They have to be uniform. It’s part of the job. Once again, we don’t like that this is a job – using your body to sell clothing. But it’s a job and they’re good at it. VS is successful. And although they don’t sell past the D cup size there are quite a few sizes that they do sell.
VS can’t be that successful in making us all want to be an Angel if their top model can’t beat out an hourglass tv star. Those sexiest competitions and the bombshell designation? All have to do with body type and the willingness to do what you have to be desired by people you don’t know. It’s the same as what VS does. “Look at me – you want to be me.”
Interesting and well written… I would agree with you on some points and some I don’t. There are a lot of men posters out there showing off their bodies and how they look and i don’t see them as role models. I’m a cyclist so there are times i stick to a specific diet, it sucks and very boring but it’s needed to excel in my sport. Another friend of mine is a body builder and he eats high protein, low fat, VERY boring diet. When we’re peaking for events we have to eat very specific diets so that we can be the best at what we do. We eat real food as much as the next guy.
My girlfriend is the most beautiful girl i know and she’s not a VS model and i’m glad she’s not :)
Kristen, I’ve read your replies to others who brought up similar points to mine, and I know that we’re mostly on the same page. I applaud you for being a healthy, active dancer. Most of my comments are not aimed specifically at you, but at the troubling comments of many of the women on this page.
I’ll start with the Angels mocking each other to for childhood career ambitions, as I don’t really see that as something to get in a tizzy about. Looking back, I laugh at myself for wanting to be a dancer, figure skater, artist, singer, writer, princess, engineer, and astronaut at different points in my life. The model who laughed at herself for wanting to be either a doctor or a professional soccer player… I’d look back and laugh at that, too. How silly we were as children, finding careers at totally opposite ends of the spectrum and deciding those were our top two choices. It’s funny to look back and see how far we ended up from those goals. Do I mock myself for wanting to be an astronaut? Of course. I suck at science and I never would’ve made it. Is it wrong for me to laugh at myself for that (or for my siblings to laugh at me for that), even though it’s a laudable career goal? No.
Of course there are little girls that are looking at the Angels saying, “I hope I’m an Angel someday!” These women get paid thousands upon thousands of dollars to dance around in their underwear. I can see how, in their minds, a couple weeks of protein shakes and peeing every 5 minutes because you’ve had no solids would be worth that. Hell, if I had the height, I might be up for a few thousand bucks that way. Maybe some of those little girls will come to the same conclusion when they hit adulthood. The majority won’t. Little girls who see this and want to be Angels will probably move on to the I-want-to-be-a-rocket-scientist dream the next year, no harm done. For those who hold on to that dream and decide to follow through with it… that’s their choice. One thing I’m always struck by when I watch the VS Fashion Show is that the Angels look happy. They go out on the runway smiling, because they’re doing what they love.
It’s the job of runway models to be super-skinny. Is it sad? Sure. Is it unnatural that they would go to such extreme measures to look the way that they do? Of course. But that’s their job. As other people have brought up, Olympic athletes put themselves through absolutely insane training regimens and push their bodies far past normal or even healthy limits for the sake of their sports. Ballet dancers and figure skaters regularly experience career-ending injuries in their 20s or 30s because they’ve pushed their bodies to the brink and they just can’t handle it anymore. Professional athletes are rarely lambasted for the lengths they’re willing to go to, because they’re doing it for something they love. Runway models do the same thing. Is it healthy in either case? No. But it is socially acceptable in one and not the other for reasons that escape me.
Victoria’s Secret, to my knowledge, has never said their models are the only standard of beauty out there; that’s just what their particular company chooses to endorse. That’s their prerogative, as a business. Lane Bryant uses all larger women in their advertisements, with nary a teensy woman to be seen. Should they be lambasted for emphasizing a certain type of body over all the others? Of course not. It’s their prerogative as a company. Yes, I miss the days of slightly curvier models in VS catalogs (whatever happened to Doutzen Kroes?!), but I understand that they can make that choice if they want to, and I don’t hold it against them.
All of you ladies lamenting this skewing of the media toward very thin women, let’s not forget that this image of society-created beauty is nothing new. As is the broken record-esque mantra of ‘curvy women ROCK’ advocates, heavy women were considered beautiful in the Renaissance because it was a sign of affluence. When they weren’t posing for nude portraits that showcased their soft fluffiness, however, they were laced into stays in an attempt to create the conical Elizabethan shape that doesn’t even exist in nature. Victorian corsets created that ever-popular hourglass shape for the low-low price of internal organ damage. Jane Austen’s famous heroines hit that sweet-spot when corsets—and waistlines—were out and it was all about the boobs. The Civil War era welcomed back the hourglass. The Flappers created the straight up-and-down look, and then waistlines came back into fashion. Waif-thin was in with Twiggy, then out again with Madonna. It’s a never-ending cycle. Super-skinny is in right now. It’ll be out again soon enough.
It’s interesting to me that so many of the women here say they’d rather buy lingerie from a store with fat women on the front than skinny ones—not just heavier women than your average supermodel, but women with “fat rolls”. How is that better than an emaciated model? Yes, we all come in all shapes and sizes, but waxing philosophic about putting overweight women in storefront windows is not a solution to the problem. At a time when obesity is a problem that is just as widespread as eating disorders, if not more so, holding up women with fat rolls as some sort of idealistic role models is just as irresponsible as VS promoting only waif-thin women. If we’re really trying to promote the idea of healthy bodies, we also need to talk about taking care of ourselves. No, all-liquid diets are obviously not healthy, but neither is having a stomach that hangs down over your undies and passing it off as okay because you’re a ‘real woman’.
Truth be told, most of our ‘natural bodies’ are unhealthy regardless of size. As a society, in general, we make poor food choices and we don’t get enough exercise. Naturally, I’m 5’5 and 133 pounds. Even with measurements of 38-28-39, this puts me at the upper end of the healthy BMI range for my height. Am I happy with the way I look? Generally, yes. Does that mean I’m healthy? No, not by a long shot. Being an extremely poor college student, I eat a lot of ramen noodles and sneak in some produce when I can afford it. As an extremely busy college student, I can’t tell you the last time I exercised more than once in a two-week time span. If you were to look at my body, you’d think I’m fairly healthy, but I’m not. While I like my natural body just fine, my commitment to slowly becoming healthier will require exercise and eating habits that will result in toning up and dropping pounds. It’s not a body image issue; it’s a health issue.
My point with this is that self-esteem isn’t everything. While it is perhaps irresponsible of the media to fixate on one type of woman, it’s equally irresponsible to say ‘love your body’ like it’s the equivalent of ‘you’re perfect just the way you are’. Most of the time, you’re not. Medical problems that result from being overweight or not getting enough nutrients through an unhealthy diet are rampant (again, Kristen, I know that you’re healthy and you aren’t trying to promote being overweight as a substitute for looking like a VS model, so this isn’t directed at you). I propose that instead of attacking Victoria’s Secret for their preference of teeny-tiny women and worrying ourselves into a tizzy over society’s idea of beauty, we shrug it off, take care of ourselves, and thank our lucky stars we don’t have to wear corsets every day.
“They go out on the runway smiling, because they’re doing what they love.”
They go out there smiling because they are being paid to and they are being told they are goddess being worshiped for their looks alone. But when their career is over at age 25, what will these women have but a body with health issues and (for many of them) a drug habit? What happens when they start to age and wrinkle? Well, here’s plastic surgery to the rescue. More money wasted.
What I am reading is a lot of rationalizing trying to ignore this:
“Anorexia Nervosa Statistics (US)
According to the first nationally representative study of eating disorders in the United States, which appeared in the February 2007 edition of Biological Psychiatry, 0.9 percent of women and 0.3 percent of men reported suffering from anorexia in their lifetime. On average, the illness lasted 1.7 years.
Here are some anorexia nervosa statistics from various other US organisations, which were all obtained from their corresponding websites:
National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH):
Somewhere between 0.5 and 3.7 percent of females suffer from anorexia nervosa in their lifetime.
Approximately 0.56 percent of anorexia sufferers will die each year, while 5.6 percent will die each decade.
The mortality rate among people with anorexia is 12 times higher than the mortality rate for all causes of death among females aged 15-24.
An estimated 5 to 15 percent of anorexia and bulimia sufferers are male.
Academy for Eating Disorders:
Nearly 50 percent of anorexia sufferers recover, while 33 percent show some improvement and 20 percent continue to be severely ill.
National Eating Disorders Association:
Of all the mental illnesses, anorexia has the highest mortality rate.
2 in 5 new cases of anorexia are in girls aged between 15 and 19 years.
The number of cases of anorexia increased significantly between 1935 and 1989, particularly in women aged 15-24.
Only one-third of people with anorexia in the community receive mental health care.
The Renfrew Center Foundation:
1 in 5 anorexia sufferers will suffer related complications such as suicide attempts and heart problems that lead to premature death.
An average woman gains 25 lbs during pregnancy, while restricting anorexics gain an average of 15.8 lbs during pregnancy.
The average birth weight of babies born to purging anorexics is 4.9 lbs.”
Since my post is still awaiting moderation and I don’t think anyone can see it:
I was just having this discussion on Farlk yesterday when someone posted this link to pics of old burlesque dancers. The truth is fashion industry has completely screwed up the perception of women are supposed to weigh, incredibly. I saw a couple guys on Fark saying that a 6’3″ 140 pound woman would need to “hit the gym and lose a few pounds.” Oh. My. Gawd. According to a BMI (Body Mass Index, yes I know it has flaws) calculator, a 6’3″ 140 lb woman would have a BMI of 17.5 and be squarely in the “underweight” category. Her weight should be between 148 and 199 pounds.
When I was a teenage girl reading the X-Men, Storm (Ororo Monroe) was listed as being 5’11″ and weighing 127 pounds (she still is). A woman that size would be a bean pole, but she is usually drawn as being full figured. Can you imagine what a mind screw that is for a 13 year old girl?
For example a woman who is 5’8″ and weighs 150 pounds in listed as “normal” under the BMI. That’s healthy.
This is not about girls empowering themselves with beauty. This is a setting an unrealistic standard that pressures girl women into unhealthy decisions.
“My point with this is that self-esteem isn’t everything. ”
Oh. My Gawd.
Yes, I can tell you from experience yes it is. If a girl does not believe in herself, trying to make her way in this world is much harder. And if her faith in herself is based on how she looks, then a massive part of her being is based on other people opinion of her, which makes her a very screwed up person.
Agreed! Self esteem IS EVERYTHING. It affects everything we say, everything we do….EVERYTHING.
I love the “it’s equally irresponsible to say ‘love your body’ like it’s the equivalent of ‘you’re perfect just the way you are’. Most of the time you are not…”
Sorry, what? I did not know she had access to all our medical records.
And I don’t see anyone here holding up obese women as an ideal either. It’s a strawman argument, that because we are critical of one extreme, we must be in favor if the other when that is not what is being said at all. “Healthy” does not equate to unnaturally skinny or unnaturally heavy, but the natural zone that a woman genetic dictate somewhere in between.
I spent about one of my later teen years bulimic, and got down from my doctor prescribed minimum weight of 150 to 130. I stopped menstruating and lost breast tissue. And I still hated myself becuase I did not look like these models because it simply was not in my bone structure to. It took therapy to the core self esteem issues and get me out of that destructive cycle.
Becuase someone believing in themselves is makes all the difference in the world in how they treat their bodies, minds, and souls and how successful they are in the world.
Kipling, have you ever talked to successful models? I have a friend who went to college for fashion and is now successful doing runway modeling for small-scale designers. When she goes out on the runway, she’s happy. That’s what she loves. Sure, she’s being paid to, but that doesn’t negate the fact that she genuinely loves modeling.
Please don’t descend into the absurd. Obviously, I don’t have access to all of your medical records and I don’t claim to. I’m also not saying that self esteem isn’t important. I was saying that telling a teenage girl “don’t worry about, you’re fine the way you are” can be just as irresponsible as prominently displaying images of women who are much thinner than she is. If the girl is overweight, she’s not fine the way she is. If she’s within a healthy BMI but never exercises, she’s not fine, as it puts her at serious medical risk. I don’t object to the idea of boosting a girl’s self-esteem, but I do object to the idea that the way to go about it is with a hearty, “just love your body.” If she leads an active, healthy lifestyle and is worried about her weight or how she looks, then by all means, reassure her until the cows come home. But the “love your body just the way it is” mantra doesn’t fit everyone, and to have the attitude that women just need to be encouraged to be happy with the way they are is irresponsible, even if the women are neither obese nor dangerously thin.
““Healthy” does not equate to unnaturally skinny or unnaturally heavy, but the natural zone that a woman genetic dictate somewhere in between.”
Yes and no. Just because a woman is at a healthy weight for her height and build doesn’t mean she’s healthy, and that’s my point. When I was 15 pounds heavier than I am now, I was still within my BMI’s limits, but that certainly didn’t mean I was living a healthy lifestyle. I ate crap food and barely exercised. Just because a woman is at a weight that her genetics dictated doesn’t mean she’s healthy, even if she’s within a healthy BMI. Now, I think we want the same things—for women to be able to feel good about themselves and not give in to society’s pressure to look a certain way, but I also worry that the “love your body” slogan encourages a passive approach to taking care of yourself. Instead of just telling girls and women that they look great the way they are, wouldn’t it be better if we could do it while cheering each other on for reaching fitness goals or triumphing in making healthful eating choices? Shouldn’t it be our goal to love ourselves for being the best we can be? Maybe all of you Curvy Girl writers are in great shape and wholeheartedly support being at a healthy weight AND living a healthy lifestyle, but all I see in your ‘About’ section is about self-worth. That’s great. I love that you’re telling women who don’t look like runway models that it’s okay; I just worry that without emphasizing or even mentioning the importance of active, healthy lifestyles, your message is getting warped.
That warping is where I’m betting so many of the comments coming in saying Kristen must be fat and jealous are coming from. It reminds me of an episode of House where a woman had this tumor so big the doctors thought she was heavily pregnant, and she just said, “No, I have CURVES. This is the way a woman is SUPPOSED to look.” I know that your message isn’t like that, but all too often the “I’m a real woman, and I love myself” argument comes from women who are just plain overweight. Without any emphasis on being healthy PHYSICALLY in addition to being healthy mentally, this website can be badly misinterpreted, and that’s a shame, because I’m sure that wasn’t your intent.
Wow! It is obvious that no one has actually MET a VS model to KNOW what she’s really like inside or if she’s married and has one or two children who she adores and takes care of. I find their husbands must be very unique men who have great trust and probably really know their wives. I sense some Jealousy here. Yes, I do buy their lingerie (my husband began buying stuff for me years ago) and I’m not model skinny nor ever was. I have had 4 children and they’re all grown. My one daughter works for VS and is also a model. It’s a shame that models who are people, not just sex objects, have such a terrible reputation just because of their job choice. Not everyone who buys VS lingerie are super skinny models, but people (men, women, and its) who want lingerie that FITS (they actually still measure you) and lasts longer than common every day lingerie.
I have actually had different experience with their stuff. It’s always fit wrong and been very poor quality. Give me Gap Body ANY DAY over VS. But, I’m glad you’ve had better luck! :)
I went to VS about a decade ago and they measured me. That happened once, and never again. Also, the quality of the bras that I’ve ordered from them recently was sub par. Within a week, four bras had underwires that snapped. Since I’d bought those bras at between $35-50 PER BRA less than a year before, I was very unhappy. Now its true, the emergency bras that I purchased at Wal-Mart didn’t last very long either (though they fit better). But since I’d spent a total of $14 for two of them, I wasn’t as peeved when their underwires snapped.
If you have issues with their products you should let them know. Seriously. My daughter worked at their Flagship Store in Soho and she returned stuff that fell apart. It’s the only way for them to know their stuff is faulty. My daughter was one of their best bra specialists and ever since she measured me, everything fits great, BUT when I went to another store near my home in the mid-west, their people were terrible and the girl had NO CLUE how to fit me for anything. It was very disheartening. But, these are their employees and not the fault of the models who are the advertisements for the clothing.
That’s a good point, Julie. I have to admit it didn’t occur to me to take them back, as I’d had them for almost a year. But I can recall having other bras of theirs, in high school and college, which lasted for two or three years before the stretch gave out. I just assumed that the quality of their materials had deteriorated. I’ve already thrown them away, but I probably should have returned them. It could have been a bad batch of underwires, since I bought them all at the same time.
I am everything those models are not, physically…I’m very short and very round. but even more than the borderline self-abuse (starvation diets? Seriously?) I am severely distraught by the way they seem to have thrown away their minds to be treated as butcher block displays. And they seem to revel in that! Give me a woman who is soft to hug and intellectually stimulating any day… by which you may infer what you like; I fail to understand how anyone could perceive a deliberately vacuous stick as sexy.
I have only gone into VS once for myself (several times when I was younger with my mother; she wears VS religiously). I will preface by saying that I am NOT a stick figure (last time I checked, 36C, 32 inch waist, and 42 inch hips at 190lbs and 5’9”), but I was on the high school track team as a thrower, so I worked out regularly and at the time was 38-29-36 (sewed my own clothes a lot, so I had it memorized). When I went into the store, I was looking at a rather expensive bra (though they all are up there in price), yet the sales associate acted as though someone like me should be grateful to have her wait on me. All the associates looked identical, and after that I refused to set foot in another VS again because they were all really rude to me.
I was recently on a social network site, and noticed that several people were posting positive comments on photographs of a girl that looks like one of the national geographic pictures of Ethiopian children. This girl that refuses to eat more than a granola bar per meal is getting compliments while another female who had curves was receiving less than a quarter of the compliments (the anorexic looking one really does refuse to eat…even when she is getting sick due to starvation. All the while having a college dining plan). I was REALLY bothered by this for the obvious reasons (girl starving herself is receiving reinforcement in the form of compliments) and the less obvious one: has culture really trained everyone (with some exceptions of course) to think that this is beauty? To think that a female who, honestly, looks more like a prepubescent child than a woman is more beautiful than the one where you know that she is of a consenting age? Those models, while I do respect their commitment (honestly, I love meat too much to ever diet like that), I cannot see as beautiful. All I see when I look at them is a woman who has starved and punished herself all for the sake of fashion…it’s a little sad when you consider it.
“I think the problem lies in the fact that this small population of women serve as role models for an entire population of young girls, and the effects of media on self esteem and bodies issues is staggering.
That is the change I want to see in the world. To not have THAT issue anymore.”
I totally agree,I also think there is a difference between naturally svelte women and girls who have to eat nothing but a shake for a month and drink a damn gallon of water everyday.I’m a curvy person I have been curvy even when I was fairly thin it’s just the way my body is made.Just like some women are prone to being svelte.it’s genetics. But I have to admit that it is a little bit annoying that the ONLY person I see that has a body like mine is Christina Hendricks.Curvy girls tend to speak up about things like the love my body thing about VS because WE don’t have any people like us represented in the media but skinny girls do.Us saying something about that isn’t implying that thin girls aren’t “women” or are unattractive.But we get pissed off that there is nobody to represent us,I’m about a size 16 and a 18 up top and I don’t see hardly anybody with my body type,and I can’t even imagine what it’s like for the larger BBW girls.They have virtually NOBODY in the media that is glamorous or famous to look at and relate to.
ok i was an anorexic when i was 13 yrs old and i still struggle with thinking i am fat (which i just lost 35 pounds so far from fat_)- also i was married to a man that told me at 95 lbs i was fat and ugly for 35 yrs — i have just in the last three years figured out that i am beautiful no matter what my body shape is and what is inside is the more beauty than i could ever have in a body shape — i know kristen personally and i love all of her inside and out – she is married to my wonderful son who is a beautiful person too. i think men now a days do not know what inside beauty is — men (well guess women do too) look for the body as the most important thing that represents beauty — wrong wrong– i have blue eyes that some would kill for but since i am not a vs skinny girl it does not matter- well guess i will stop rattling on– i love you kristen and i am so proud of who you are and thanks for making my boy so happy and my lil logan – huggggs all
We love you, Mama Linda!!! Thank you so much. We miss you!!
oh must i also say that i am a 64 yr old grandma that is a country dance teacher and can out dance alot of those skinny little young ones seven fold -( just a little true humor)- and i have a lot of guy friends that love me to death because i am who i am —
You can out-dance me in country dance, that’s for sure! And you’re right, you have amazing blue eyes. :)
thanks sweetie – give that andy and logan a special hug from me ok – huggggs
I am a curvy woman (ok, I’m fat at the moment) and I find Victoria’s Secret lingerie fits me perfectly! However, the real problem is that studies show that consumers don’t want to look at fat women modelling products. We have all become used to airbrushed photoshopped models. You are 100% right in your perception that the models all look the same- because they’re airbrushed by the same graphic designer! People need to be taught that images in magazines are not real- they’re photoshopped. Kids need to learn that just as people don’t talk like robots, women don’t look like models! I feel sorry for the models and their diets-since they are already so thin it seems pointless.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05Lm44y81zg
(Oh, and watch the “Date Night” commercial by them that pops up at the end. Love it!)
This commercial chokes me up every time, despite the grown men in ridiculous fruit outfits. I think the last woman on screen is just as beautiful as any of the others, and she sells the product just as well, if not even BETTER, because she shows other women of similar size that they are just as flawless and sexy as any model.
I totally agree with what you’re saying. TOTALLY agree. I just wanted to interject this commercial somewhere, since it moves me so much more than anything I have ever seen from VS. In fact, now that I think about it, I might just buy Hanes since their advertisements are so REAL! :) Lovely women, showing off their beautiful, healthy bodies, no matter what form that takes. I adore these commercials.
Ahhhh! Sorry, Fruit of the Loom, not Hanes! I don’t know what I was thinking!
Thank you so much for this post. I’m a ballerina and I have lived all my life seeing extremely skinny girls prance around and I’m no where close to that. I eat pasta and chocolate and carbs while these girls drink water and live on protein shakes. In the real world I’m skinny but in the ballet world I would need to lose some weight. Being black I have a big butt, and a curvy tummy. When I walked into victoria secrets my average body turned to a fat one. I felt like crying and was absolutely embarrassed because I felt like no should look at me body because I couldn’t be as skinny as them. So for a year, I walked around with long t-shirts covering my butt and pulled down my jacket so no one could look. I started doing stupid and extreme diets like skipping breakfast, lunch, and only eating a small dinner, but them I realized I don’t have to be skinny. I can be whatever I wanted and I don’t have to fall into a black hole where I felt fat all the time and caused my body pain. From now on, I want my dream to become a psychiatrist.
Honestly, for as much as people will bitch about the weight//appearance part of this, the part that yanks my feminist piss-chain the most is the part where the models being quoted saying that their current careers are much more admirable than their prior aspirations of science and athletic careers.
As a woman who is currently fighting to make her way into an all-male, mathematics-oriented department at work (and who has written and presented an original childrens show about women in the history of mathematics and science…) this disturbs me more than the fact that the models present an unrealistic standard of beauty.
Hi! Great article!! Yeah, I’ve been getting annoyed at V.S. lately too. I may be in thier size range, i’m a 32DD…. That is damn near impossible to find in the store anymore. It’s more or less only available online. WTF!?!!?!!?!?!…. I dont even seem to see that in the larger band sizes…. What the heck! And when you do find one in your size, the straps are pathetic!! If I tried to let that support my boulders, it would quikly fail and defeat the purpouse of wearing a bra!! And so many now have so much padding in them to make that “super cleavage” (no longer a DD with that, that it becomes a glorified B!!) I spill over! If I want that, I’ll just buy smaller cup size!! LoL oh yeah, I too eat whatever it is that I want to eat!! (especially CHOCOLATE!! yum! I want some now too….)
And now with the words that you’ve enlightened me with (the fact that they WANT kids to be prissy idiots!?) OMG!! That’s just horrible!! I already think girls are getting way too girly for their own good, but to basically be told that they need to be stupid idiots as well? Thats just pathetic. We as a country need to unite to inform the young ones (I’m only 25 too!!) but, I dunno…. Come to think of it, I see more grade 7 to 10 kid’s wearing the stuff than people “our” age!! They should’nt even be looking at that stuff until they are at least 17 or 18 (unless super cursed with large boobs, but there are other places still..)
Soma.com has lots of good stuff!! They at least accomodate my 32DD pretty well!! And I can have padding *SQUEEL*!!!! Think i saw some up in the 40′s there as well! style, about the same as V.S. but made for REAL people!! And once I managed to get 2 for $50!! That was AWESOME!! I’ve had these 2 for about a year now, but I don’t wear them as often as my old ones. But not everyone can go to like walmart to get bra’s. I hardly ever see 32D let alone DD.. heck, i can hardly find 34D.. And i’m talking Khols, Target.. really anywhere where bra’s are typically under $25 not on clearance.
It’s interesting how somebody said thier V.S. underwire snapped. I’ve had about 4 of them (the non-padded ones) since 2005. As it’s now 2011, I don’t think that’s too bad (though they are nearing thier experation date…. :’< ) But I agree, quality has severly dipped as of late. I mainly like my FREE undies from there!! :D You just can't pass up FREE!!
Anyway, I've babbled too much!! Thank's for the article!! Merry Christmas, happy holidays and a Happy New Year!!
I am glad you love your body, positive self image is lovely! But “burgers, pasta, chocolate, and coffee”? How is that better than protein shakes and water? It becomes dangerous when women who want to establish a positive and non-essentialist view of women end up promoting unhealthy eating and lifestyles and also promoting an “us vs. them” mentality. Some parts of this article were great, I also saw that part about how they wanted to grow up to be doctors etc on tv, and it was fairly ridiculous to say the least! However, the critique seems a bit shallow and redundant. Instead of pointing to sensationalist facts about how the models get ready for the show, maybe more careful insights should be given.
There is nothing inherently unhealthy about any one of those food choices, in moderation. The only thing I was trying to do was give a spectrum of solid food that I eat while the VS models subsist on protein shakes. I’m not sure how you can compare a diet made of a variety of realistic foods to the same thing, a liquid, even, every single day (which needs to be supplemented by pills just so the models have enough energy to make it through every day), for months on end.
I don’t really want to say this again, but I will. I am a healthy woman. I have been dancing for the last eighteen years, ten of which were competitively. I am five-foot-two, one hundred ten pounds, I wear a size three, and I am a 34A. There IS no “us-vs-them.” I’m not some fat woman tapping away jealously behind my keyboard, shoving one unhealthy food choice after another into my mouth, defending that lifestyle, as so many commenters seem to assume.
My problem with Victoria’s Secret is that they promote only one single body type. One height. One hairstyle. There is no room for women who look any different.
Everything I mentioned was fact; there was nothing that I shared simply to coax a collective gasp from my audience. If you see this as “sensationalist,” maybe you need to read again. Sometimes facts are astonishing. Sometimes astonishing facts need to be acknowledged and very directly addressed to provoke a change. And if these women are touted as the very epitome of beauty and “perfection” (there’s another “sensationalist fact” for you: a designer called one of the models, literally, “perfection”), things do, indeed, need to change.
Yes of course they are ok in moderation, however you gave the impression that these foods are central to your diet when you said that “I don’t count on vitamins and supplements for my energy; I count on burgers, pasta, chocolate, and coffee”. I just don’t think there is something empowering in eating unhealthy foods, but you probably don’t either, I hope.
Well, it is irrelevant what size you are since you are free to identify with women who are not as small as you, and still promote an “us vs. them” mentality. Also, I thought the proper term was “curvy women” not fat… (“curvy girl guide”).
If you read the comments, actually, I have been called “fat” and “overweight” multiple times, and I’m just fed up with it.
I’m sorry you got that impression, simply because I expressed that I ate protein (hamburger), carbs (pasta) and fats (chocolate).
Are you implying that it is better for one’s diet to centrally consist of protein shakes and vitamins than to consist of a mix of protein, carbs, fats, and fruits/vegetables? Because I’m not in a health related field, but I’m pretty sure the human body was meant to consume a variety of solid foods, not liquid shakes and supplements.
But the models’ diets don’t centrally consist of protein shakes. They only do that for nine days out of the year. “In moderation” applies.
Nope not at all. I made a comparison between what the author claims she gets her vitamins from in general and the diet the models follow for their job. Neither is good clearly.
And the whole point of the victoria’s secret show is that it is about artifice and fantasy, holding this show to some kind of trumped up normative ideal seems kind of pointless.
See comment below. :)
or above… :)
:)
I feel that there are a bunch of people that are missing the point of this article. It was about how beautiful comes in different shapes and sizes, it wasn’t so that the VS models could be criticized for their diets or their stick thin shapes. Because in reality this is their chosen career. They decided to take on the life of a model and are all very beautiful. Yes, they are the same body type but so are all the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders… I shop at VS for their underwear but not their bras only because I am top heavy, but just because they show off skinny women that are tiny doesn’t mean that we have a right to judge them, Everyone is different, and just because you love your curves doesn’t mean that every skinny person needs to have them as well. (To the author: I am no way criticizing what you wrote, it was very well written and had a very good thought behind it and i did not feel as though you were criticizing VS just making a point of the irony.)
Thank you. THANK YOU. That’s EXACTLY what I meant. You hit the nail RIGHT on the head. It’s not JUST Victoria’s Secret. They were just the easiest (and most outstanding) example, given the very recent Fashion Show.
I would like to start off by saying thank you for the blog. I was one of those real skinny models until about four years ago when I had my daughter. I had never seen what everyone else who isn’t a size 0 see’s. After I gained post baby weight I started to hate the world I once loved because now I was thinking what self image and I going leave my daughter if I lose the weight and go back into modeling. What if she inherits her dad’s hips and butt, am I going to leave her thinking she’s not beautiful if she’s not a size 0 like me. I’ve been on both sides of the weight fence and I don’t like the smaller side.
I was also thinking what about guys. We have all this talk about skinny women and big women but nothing o skinny toned guys and fat guys. As a society we give more love to a skinny man that we do a skinny women and forget fat guys can look good. I say give big guys love too because they also have body issuse just like us women!!
Things like this annoy me. So what if they are skinny, im 5’6 and weigh 98 pounds. I probably eat twice what most of you on here eat. I get called anorexic and all these nasty names things go both ways. When an overweight girl says she loves her body its “inspiring” when a slim girl says she loves her body its “self centered” or “vain”. Wish people would just be happy with there body and stop pissing and moaning about other girls. If you dont like the way you look then do something about it, dont bring other people down because of your insecurities.
When i said things like this annoy me i wasnt really talking about your artical, more or less the women on it bitching about this and that.
LOLS, not a single male perspective…. Oh and btw, She was won her award voted by women in 2010 Esquire Magazine. So again no bias there. Please ladies figure it out. If you are fat and unattractive you better have a brilliant personality or be highly intelligent and you may score a man OR eat right, exorcize to lose weight and start taking care of yourself. All I hear is whining and complaining about what is considered sexy and that if you do not fit the “ideal” then screw it and accept it and move on. You do realize that it is your gender that puts a lot of this pressure upon yourselves. You ever see a room full of ladies when a really beautiful woman walks in? Let the pettiness begin, you don’t see men acting that way when a good looking guy walks in a room.
Have you actually read women’s magazines? They tend to be more raunchy than most men’s magazines and are all about what is considered sexy or beautiful without ever asking what a man thinks is. But then again it is all internal and how YOU feel about it. Just like anything certain types of men are attracted to certain types of women and vise verse. You will not get a Brad Pitt looking like Aida Turturro just like Steve Buscemi could score a super model without his fame and fortune. This is the same idea that all women should be feminist role models when the really is that many just want get married and have children and there is nothing wrong with that. Just like all men cannot be the perfect male specimen many just want to be able to support his family and stay healthy. Sorry ladies but that is just reality. Deal with it.
Not only is being skinny unhealthy, what is it about teaching our children to whore themselves as sex/lust symbols that is okay? Any part of it? Whether it’s Tiaras and Tots or Miss America or Real Housewives- it is not entertainment to see females in roles of objectification and stupidity. This country has just about the most freedoms for women of any in the world and we encourage lunacy. It is time for women everywhere to protest. Throw your milkshakes at their plate glass windows. Tell your daughters that underwear is what goes on UNDER your clothes. And point out to the that Lady Gaga is a circus act we do not want to follow.
Being skinny is not unhealthy! Again im 5’6, 98 pounds. I go out for dinner and i can eat a full rack of ribs, My body without working out has a percentage of only 13% fat. And i still have bigger natural boobs than girls that are twice my size. Also the only reason most of the crap on tv is there is because that is what the mass majority of people want to watch. If i ever have a daughter i would be more horrified at the thought that she was looking up to the girls like the ones on jersey shore! They arent model thin, so are they better than the VS models? And no duh underwear goes under your clothes. Its a FASHION show they are modeling what is to be sold. Which is underwear! They model the clothes as well, like tank tops and sweat pants. If you cant teach your child that not everyone can be like that and to love herself then you are failing as a parent. I’m 22, i grew up in this modern world, i know about all the pressures and images. But have i chosen to be anorexic because of it? No. The girls who give into the media are girls who want to give in, the media doesnt put a gun to your head and make you do anything.
Natural skinny is great, my grandfather could eat a horse and never gain an ounce. I am glad you are thin naturally. I think we agree on most points here, but since we are on opposite sides of the age curve (I am 61) we see things very differently.
However, if you are 22, check in with me when you are 42 it may be different, and I hope not. The second largest groups of bulimics are women in their 40s trying to maintain their 20 year old weight because that’s when they felt desirable and loved. You probably have not chosen to be anorexic because you have a great high metabolism. But I bet you might become anorexic if you had an illness, that caused you to gain say 100 pounds. The point isn’t to hate skinny girls, it is to fight against unhealthy practices to be lower weight than natural. Both my daughters are tall, attractive but not skinny were bulimics in college.
I have 2 close friends who were top fashion models (my mother was also) they had to keep their weight way below what was normal for them. All have has serious health issues due to those years of depriving their bodies nutrients.
About the media not putting a gun to their heads…ur, um it’s everywhere. I have a friend who limits TV and exposure to media and still her 5 and 8 year old girls keep saying…I don’t want to eat it will make me fat (these are stick skinny kids).
I worked in fashion and advertising on Madison Avenue for 12 years. These people are paid to sell products. I have sat in meetings where they discuss what emotions they can attack so that women will buy products. They actually bring in psychologist and consultants to help them create a state of anxiety in customers. “I will never be “chosen and loved” if I don’t have, wear, eat this. Children see game ads–there are always parents and friends laughing: message get this game have a functional family friends will want to be with. Make-up ads: message you are not okay the way you are, you must use this product to be noticed and loved. Even the Dos Exis ad fot eh most interesting man in the world he is sky diving, but when he drinks he is surrounded by fashion models???? Really drinking beer equals money and attractiveness???
It is NOT just a Fashion Show. The Victoria Secrets angel campaign (and yeah, how sacrilegious is that to turn messengers from God into hookers) has gone from store ads to a TV show. This is big business. Now with the interviews with the models it becomes a message about a lifestyle of money and greed. Did even one of them talk about the millions they were giving to charity? NOPE! What the hell kind of role modeling is this? It’s like Madonna on acid.
And as far as the product it is slut wear not underwear. And here’s an inside bit…I bought over $600 of VS garments for my second honeymoon…the first thing my husband said as we got cozy in our Bora bora hut out over the water was: “why are you wearing that stuff, don’t you want to have sex?” You see most guys are attracted by us showing up au natural…not with all that VS stuff. VS is marketing to girls/women.
I not only worked on Madison Avenue, I worked as a youth counselor to young girls who were cutting themselves, suicidal and had other addictions. The messages in their heads basically said “I am not ok as am”. So Madison Avenue is winning. I also worked for Save the Children and UNICEF. The condition of girls in America is just as enslaving as other countries who sell their daughters into child wedding or just kill them as in India and China.
I know VS seems like innocent fun, but as I used to ask my youth group kids…when you look at what you wear ask yourself ‘what am I selling with this look?’ FYI I am also think the Calvin Klein ads showing young boys in underwear in huge billboard in Time Square sends a message of sexual activity for way under aged boys.
There are 10 top models in the world…and then there is the rest of us. The ur, um 99.999999%
All im saying is that people need to stop blaming everything else on everyone else. When i was 16 i had low self esteme, didnt think i was pretty i blamed school all the mean girls around me who tortured me pretty much. When i was 17 i realized who cares! Those girls couldnt make me feel bad unless i let them make me feel bad. Not saying if someone says something hurtful i dont feel upset, but im more upset with the fact that they feel they have to be that way to make themselves feel better than feeling bad about myself. As for little 10 year old girls walking around in a mall alone going into underwear stores. That again is bad parenting in my veiw, with all sorts of bad people in the world letting your young kid run around a mall without you isnt the best idea.
As for the store. I dont buy bras from there, i think they are made bad and they never fit me. The underwear isnt really that great either, I probably own about 5 tho. I prefer http://www.bravissimo.com/ ( to be honest i think the website is the perfect example of what all the moaning women on here seem to be looking for, women of different shapes) they have the best and most well made bras ever. They go down to a 28 rib cage and past an F cup. I am a 28 E (Hence why it is a pain to find a bra). I have been into VS to be fitted when i was about 17 they dont know what they are doing ( the words you can “fit” into this were said a lot) No i wont “fit” into a 34C.. I really consider VS for play. Something you use on occasion for “dress up” and honestly i know you say guys really want to see you natural but… every guy is different. Your husband might be that way but not everyone is. I’m pretty sure if i showed up in the bedroom with something lacey my boyfriend wouldnt be like why are you wearing that?
Anywho, I dont hate VS, i dont hate the people who buy it, or the people who work for them. I think its childish what some of the people do like a woman on here who says she yells slut store every time she passes the store and calls all the people who work there sluts. If you dont like it dont go in there, dont watch it, dont look at it. Just ignore it! My cousin isnt a slut and she buys bras there, they fit her she is an average size. She’s married going through years of college to be in political science and has a son. And you know whats funny? Shes a model!
And one more thing to think about, do you wear perfume? Most people do if only on occasion, but the commercials that perfume people produce are just as bad and they are all over tv. They are pretty much models having sex!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&NR=1&v=F75h0gJpOaE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zK4OpiLmReQ
Love the logical disconnect here:
“Again im 5’6, 98 pounds. I go out for dinner and i can eat a full rack of ribs, My body without working out has a percentage of only 13% fat. And i still have bigger natural boobs than girls that are twice my size. ”
(Other than the fact that 13% fat is disastrously unhealthy. That’s lower than a man, and you should see a doctor. I also suspect you breasts are not as big as you say they are because breast are mostly guess what? Fat.
Which makes me think you are full of it. )
AND….
“But have i chosen to be anorexic because of it? No. The girls who give into the media are girls who want to give in, the media doesnt put a gun to your head and make you do anything.”
You didn’t chose not to be anorexic/affected by media pressure because you are already the ideal body type. That is exactly the body type modeling and the media want: a twig with boobs. No one makes fun of you because of your body because you are the ideal.
“Wanting to give in…” is like saying people want to have PTSD. You think having anorexica or bulimia is fun? You think girls have just a barrel of laughs torturing themselves day in and day out? Do you think the extreme cases want to die of organ failure?
I can’t wait to hear you complaining when you have a couple kids or hit that metabolism wall between the ages of 28 to 32.
That is if you are not full of it.
Hey im not saying being sick is fun, im saying its like gambling or alcohol (which are both a sickness/addiction) once you start for whatever reason you think is logical, yeah its hard to stop but if you as a person really wants to stop you can get help and sort yourself out. All im saying is people complain about wanting to be thin and they make the choice to make themselves sick, they choose to not eat, they could just as easily change to a healthy diet and work out.
And you know what, yes i do get made fun of. I have girls say nasty things about me because i am small, I had some random guy i didnt know point at me and say eww shes thin. And at one point in time i was drinking weight gain 3 times a day on top of my meals, plus completely overstuffing myself, so i could get into the 3 digits. Its just as hard to gain weight for a small person as it is for a larger person to lose it at times. But i thought wow im being stupid my boyfriend loves me the way i am and thats really all that matters. And im happy just the way i am.
As for complaining when i get older, my mom(having 3 kids), grandma(having 5 kids), great grandma(having 3 kids), and i could all fit into the same clothes at this very time. If i eat right and take care of myself pretty sure i wont be complaining.
When it comes to my BMI I really dont know how it works, all i know is at the doctors thats what i was told it was. I am in perfect health and even still have my period. For you who said my boobs are impossible well not sure what to tell you. All i know is i wear a 28 E, and if you know how bras properly work you will understand that a 28 E is nothing the same as a 32 E. Not saying im HUGE but for someone of my size im well off. If i buy a 32 waist bra i would wear a DD to DDD depending on make. Or a 34 would be a C…so on and so on.. (if you get it). To be honest i could be at around 15% fat now cause i went to the doctors a year ago. But thats not a huge difference. And a year ago i was doing a lot of hard work building a house for my mom so i was doing heavy lifting and all sorts so thats prolly why it was so low. I never really thought of that as working out but i guess it could be.
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150302620630347&set=a.10150303733820347.546221.796175346&type=3&theater
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150701527545347&set=a.10150303733820347.546221.796175346&type=3&permPage=1
This is me a year ago on holiday and more recently . Every person is different, some have high bone density others dont, some have natural muscle mass some dont, some have a high metabolism some dont. And a whole bunch of other factors. All these things make up your body, I got a lucky draw to be what todays society wants. But 50 years ago I wouldnt have the lucky draw, and even today every person has a different veiw. There are plenty of people who dont find me attractive at all.
Thats what i thought..
Several people commented asking why on earth our society forces women to hate their bodies (paraphrasing). I think it’s part of a larger problem in which we tend to be utilitarian about people: e.g., VS models are required to eat radically unhealthily for a show so that they can be used as clothes hangers, and then are held up as the ideal body type. The key word is ‘used’.
People are meant to loved, not used, just as things are meant to be used and not loved. Switch those around, and you have a materialistic, utilitarian society that loves stuff (=money=power=happiness??) and will use other people to get it. It’s a socially acceptable power trip that we often buy into without realizing it. It doesn’t matter which way a women is ‘supposed’ to look, because when you set a certain mold, some people will naturally fit it and some won’t; power is always the object, and those fitting the mold will have power and those not fitting it will either hurt themselves somehow to attain the same power or just not attain it. Those attacking this blog by saying that “Kristen must be jealous” have bought into the power struggle, assume that everyone else has too, and conclude that she must not be able to attain the mold and just has sour grapes.
This wide-spread grasping after power is a warped yearning for love and happiness, as perfect happiness is the end goal of every human. Ask someone why they did something and the eventual claim they will make, probably after several steps, will be “because I wanted to be happy.” Now, if they say that, are you going to ask, “why?” again? No, because that answer is final and self-explainitory. We can be wrong about what will make us happy, which is a reason that people think power (in whatever form) will do the trick.
All of which is just a really long way to say the most important part again: people are meant to be loved, not used, and happiness is our end goal as humans, so it is important that we learn and teach others the truth about what (or Whom) will bring us true happiness, not a cheap counterfeit.
It was the first and the last time I watch any VS fashion show. The girls, they’re certainly not women, on that show need nourishment. None of them looked pretty, sexy or even remotely attractive. Pounds of make up and getting near butt naked isn’t gonna change the fact that their bodies are not attractive. You know those paintings and frescos that we still admire and are in awe of to this day, they were right in capturing that essence of a woman which is inherantly and entirely female, with hips that flare out and curves in places that were meant to be there. We’re beautiful because our bodies are not angular and muscular. I’ll take Christina Hendricks over these women any day and if she were to walk down that VS runway the boys would go insane and the ratings of that show would actually go up!
I don’t think the issue here is about “real woman” — I don’t really care what a VS model does to get her body. My roommate, a makeup artist for many VS shoots, told me that no matter what the breast size, ALL of those models have to wear “chicken cutlets,” basically padding that makes their boobs pop. As for the rest of their bodies, most of the models work out to achieve that skinniness. The extreme dieting is just for special occasions.
What hit me though was the comment that these VS Angels mocked — MOCKED! — their previous childhood dreams of becoming doctors and marine biologists. Yeah, you happened to catch a lucky break and be blessed with fabulous genes. But that doesn’t make your previous dreams silly.
Why do we continue to perpetuate a society that devalues the intelligence of women and convey the message that it’s better to be pretty than smart? It just kills me.
i get it. these girls are doing things to their bodies that are not healthy. but they are still people you shouldn’t hate them because of their job. that’s like hating a cop because they arrested someone. i understand you should love your body and be happy with the size you were given by god. but if these girls are happy then they are happy. just leave it alone their is no need to bash them. bash Victoria’s secret’s president and producers of the products. the models have nothing to do with all the campaigns. and products. they just wear it and walk on the stage.
“that’s like hating a cop because they arrested someone. ”
False analogies are false. Police officers give a vital service to the community. These models do not. These models are part of a system that creates a damaging cultural pressure that causes the biggest rates of anorexia and bulimia the world.
Thank you!
For all the people out there that needed and wanted to know the truth, thank you!
It seems obvious to me that Victoria Secret is a hollow lie, but to thousands of women all over this is not the case.
They seem to idolize the idiocy and shallow behavior portrayed by these bimbos…And I can’t for the life of me figure out why?!
Even when I was 9 years old (probably before that time, but I can’t remember) I was walking by the Slut-Store (Yes, every time I walk past one I make a point of saying “Slut Store” as loudly as possible. Try it, it’s fun!) and my own Mother told me, “one day you’ll be able to buy bras and panties from that store!”. I took one look at the half naked model on the poster and said, I kid you not, “Why would I want to look like that?”
Mom had no answer for me and we moved on.
4 years later when I was “all grown up”, Mom decided to take me inside the Slut-Store. I will NEVER forget that day and I will NEVER go inside one ever again. What I saw was appalling….
10 year old girls without a parent standing around admiring this anorexic poster and holding strings in the shape of underwear saying things like “I hope this diet I’m on works so I can fit into this!”
…You’re 10 years old and a twig! Why are you dieting? What’s the point?!
You have no fat in your body to burn! You’re killing yourself because your own body is eating away at the muscles inside you!
What an idiot!
Mom then made me try on bras and talk to the “consultant” (Nice word for sales whore) who measured me, felt me up and asked if I had a boyfriend yet.
I was 13…I was barely interested in boy at that time!
I was more interested in riding my bike through mud puddles than pretending to have a boyfriend!
So I told her “No, I’m not ready for that kind of commitment yet.”…She laughed at me.
I feel sorry for the Slut-Store models…But more sorry for the girls and women that are influenced by them.
Even at 9 years old I could tell they were shallow, irritating examples of store and media propaganda trying to get females everywhere to buy their shit.
Now it’s just gone too far.
Now instead of buying their shit, little girls are trying to become whiny, pathetic idiots that can’t do anything for themselves and need force-fed powdered drink mix just to stay alive.
What a waste of space.
Seriously though, walk by a Victoria Secret every chance you get and shout “Slut-Store”.
It’ll turn way more heads than any thong wearing stick figure, I’ll tell ya’ that!
Just be ready to outrun the zombie whores that come after you, not that hard actually…High heels were not made to run in.
And that’s all for now, thanks again!
-Lena
I think this is a great article. It’s very true that all the women look the same except for skin color. I boycotted the company for many years because I felt like they didn’t truly include sizes for all body types until one day… I am a very small chested woman and it’s extremely difficult to find bras that fit well without spending a fortune on one bra. I walked in the store and found a bra that fit and wasn’t terribly expensive and I was amazed. First of all, before, I was wearing the wrong size and second of all I had to realize that VS doesn’t market to everyone. I am also naturally thin and I have many friends that are model thin (some of them are tall). It is insulting when people ask you if you eat or when they see you eating make comments such as, “Oh, you actually eat?”. It’s not socially acceptable to tell an overweight or obese person, “Why are you eating? You need to loose some weight, you’re too fat”, etc. So why is it ok to make fun of thin people? There are eating disorders of all kinds. Not just anorexia. It’s not just the U.S. that has a problem with anorexia and bulimia (which by the way most bulimics are normal weight to slightly overweight), but parts of Europe like England. However we also have the highest rate of obesity. So there are both sides to the story. I wrote Victoria Secret and asked them to include more of the smaller sizes in the regular section and not just in the Pink line or the Miraculous bra; therefore I was really excited to see the new sizes they advertised this summer in the Body by Victoria line. I was disappointed when it didn’t actually come out and they changed it back. Hopefully they’re just working out some kinks and will sell it soon.
I think Victoria Secret has a lot of areas they need to work on, as with many company’s in the U.S. It is sad that many women (not just adolescent girls) feel badly about their body because of so many starving models out there, yet I agree with many of the previous postings. There are professions out there that have extreme diets in preparation for an event. There are many women who go on special diets or do certain things right before their wedding to look or feel a certain way. Now that may only occur once, but I don’t think it’s so far-fetched to say that there are more women out there that will do the same regimen for other occasions as well. Plus doing a detox for a week or so isn’t a bad thing at all. IT can really clean out the system. I hope that Adriana Lima she doesn’t do that regularly; I did not read the article from Huntington Post, but I personally think she looks healthy and I’m sure when she was pregnant she was eating well.
In the future I hope to see Victoria Secret include a variety of more models and more sizes, however if they don’t, I need to understand that they’re a lingerie company and in the business of advertising. If I don’t like it, I can take my business elsewhere.
What makes me most sad is all of those girls who are led to believe that they do not match up, when nothing could be further from the truth. Marylin Monroe did not get her nickname from woman wanting a realistic person to emulate. She got that name from men. One of the biggest secrets (at least from the media and advertsing agencies) is that men overwhelmingly prefer real women with real bodies. The average girl spends her days trying to be a myth.
Very good! I loved this issue and concludes that the USA is the same thing in Brazil Acutely skinny women being revered as goddesses. But the plus size fashion is growing here and taking their place, my sister is a plus size model and is already doing very beautiful work of photos and walkways and not disclosing it is necessary to follow a standard of beauty imposed by the media, but feel it is well to be happy with yourself.
This is my brother plus size model https://www.facebook.com/#!/ericacalderal
What makes me sad is the argument many people here have made: “sure, they’re skinny and go through a very unhealthy diet and not even drink water, but they’re supermodels so that’s THEIR JOB”.
As I see it, the problem is that we should even have a job that women need to starve themselves to do. Supermodels can be beautiful AND drink water. Any one of those Angels could drink a gallon before the runway and still be beautiful and thin enough to model. So why do we choose to have idolize the kind of beauty that is only attainable to those willing to starve themselves? It should be no one’s job.
Perfect point.
Working in a school, I watch pretty much in horror as our girls emulate this crap. The PINK brand is *everywhere*. The big hazard of American minded consumerism is that advertising can hijack our values when we let ourselves mistake it for a lifestyle, and in this case the target audience is a group that hasn’t fully developed their values in the first place.
The good news is that real role model relationships have a lot of influence over kids, believe it or not – moms, older sisters, aunts, teachers, coaches – they’re powerful. The more comfortable we are showing that we feel good in our skin, and are confident and sexy in a real body, the more likely they are to question the fashion industry’s version of what sells yoga pants.
Easier said than done though! It took me an entire decade of dating in my 20s before I finally realized, “Hell – men love all kinds of bodies. What the f*** have I been beating myself up for all this time?!”
I want that body so bad that it sickens me. i have a disorder. i am 5’10 and 115 lbs. but i couldn’t be that way without extreme dieting…and now thanks to Victoria releasing Lima’s diet I was able to drop 5 pounds. Please understand I know I am doing this to myself…and this is what I think is beautiful. But in my opinion, Victoria Secrets IS NOT portraying REAL bodies across the spectrum. After the VS fashion show, I spiraled again into my eating disorder. I just want everyone to know…I am in a science program at a university…i hold research positions in molecular biology and clinical studies.
I agree wholeheartedly with this article. Because VS is in the limelight…unlike High Fashion Couture brands…they need to be MORE aware of this.
Jeezus, I hope you are seeing a therapist for help with your disorder and I wish you all the best in realizing the simple truth that you are beautiful.
Thank you so incredibly much for sharing this. This is precisely why I wrote this article. I have been accused of so many things, but mostly, I’ve been told that I must be fat, and just jealous of the models. That’s not true in the least! I weigh probably what most of the models do. Granted, I’m about seven inches shorter than most of them, but I’m still a naturally tiny woman, and I’m on the very low side of my healthy BMI.
The SIZE does not matter to me. It’s the fact that these women are held up as the absolute epitome of all that is beautiful, and they really do not take into account what that message is doing to women of every age, shape, and size, all over the country, if not the world!
Again, thank you so much for sharing.
no. i am not seeing a therapist. i wrote that post to show…that people are effected by those images.
You should. Posthaste. I mean it. Put a fraction of the energy you put into fretting about your body into caring for yourself. You deserve more.
I am putting the money towards school…and don’t have any for a therapist. I didn’t post for…like I said, pity. I just wanted people to know that there are people (such as myself) that are heavily influenced. Also, I agree, VS should emulate every body type on the spectrum!
I am also on a shoestring budget, but was able to find very low cost therapy (10$ a visit) through the clinic run by our University. Talk about this with your physician, they can point you in the right direction. This is vital to your health, there should be low cost psychology clinic in your area that can help.
You know what baffles me the most is that Victoria’s Secret USED to embrace models of different sizes and physiques — http://www.listal.com/list/victorias-secret-fashion-show-models (a list of VS models, both then and now). Now they are just carbon copies of each other. I wouldn’t be surprised if their measurements were the same to within 1″ of one another, and even though there are varying ethnicities within their group, they do look largely the same.
Strictly speaking in terms of bras, Victoria’s Secret has such a narrow view when it comes to sizing that I doubt if I’ll ever be able to find a well-fitting bra there, nor will millions of other women across the globe who don’t fit into a 32A to 38DD.
When I was in my teens, I was much bigger than I am now, or have been for the past three years. I’m 5’4″, and I was about 190 pounds and size 14 at my largest. I remember trying to find the right bra size back then, and being that I’ve naturally always had a rather big ribcage AND I had an extra layer of ‘padding’ over top back then, I was at a band size of 40. Try finding that at your local VS.
Last year I was at my smallest weight, about 110-115 pounds (I couldn’t keep the weight on for some reason), and my band size was a 32, cup size AA. Try finding that at your local VS.
All of this year, my weight has levelled out and has stayed at 130. I’m a size 6 to 8, and my current measurements are 38-28-39″. By their standards, I’m too short and too fat, even though I am fit and flat, and have a nice little hourglass shape which I personally am very happy with. (Consider at this time last year, I was a ruler shape, very straight up and down — yep, I’m happy to finally have some curves! :) )
At this point, I have to now take aim at the outdated sizing technique VS uses for their bras. I have a 34″ ribcage measurement and 38″ bust. What did they try to stuff me into? 38A! What size am I really? 34D! Huge difference, Victoria’s Secret, huge difference.
Regarding what size makes you a ‘real woman’, as you can plainly see I have been different sizes in my life, but not one of them qualified me as ‘more womanly’ than another. ‘Real women’ come in all shapes and sizes, and all of them should be considered beautiful, not just one. I suppose that is what’s most disappointing of all, that Victoria’s Secret is sending the message, ‘THIS is what women should look like, and if you don’t, there’s something wrong with you.’
Once more. I didn’t post to receive therapy. I appreciate your concern.
I understand that. Nonetheless, this is a dangerous illness that can cause long term damage to your health, not to mention feeling like crap becuase you hate yourself all the time.
Life can be better than that.
I don’t hate myself. I love love love being thin. I don’t think i am ‘fat’. I just love being thin.
I have hated Victoria’s Secret since 2004. I wanted to find something really sexy to wear for my honeymoon and was tired of being embarrased by going from store to store and not being able to fit into the outfits. So I let my fingers do the walking. I decided to go home and call to find which stores offered plus sizes. Well when I got to Victoria Secret the gal who answered the phone laughed at me when I got through asking my question. She actually laughed!!!! I cried for two days!!!!!! Once the humiliation wore off I felt like calling back and tell her that even though I am plus size someone finds me desireable enough to marry me! I now have daughter and I have lost almost 60 lbs. I am trying to get healthy but not thin, I want my daughter to be healthy, not thin. To think these women are encouraging our girls to starve themselfs to be sexy. It makes me sick. I will never buy their products until they fit women who wear at least a 24 pant and 44D bra. That is the biggest I was, and my husband loves every curve! This is what a real woman looks like.
I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to reply to this, but I wanted to say the right thing.
It is APPALLING that they could do something like this to you. *I* cried when I read this. This is so absolutely detestable in every way. I’m so incredibly happy, though, to know that you are so wonderfully comfortable with yourself now. I applaud you!!! Like…big time! I wish I could give you a hug right now. And also, maybe punch that woman in her face. CHEERS!!!
real women come in all shapes and sizes
I feel and echo your rage.
I loved this whole post, but what I have to thank you for most is the link with Christina Hendricks’ measurements. She’s gorgeous…and I weigh about the same as she does. (Sure, I’m two inches shorter. But who’s counting?)
I’m on the VS mailing list from years and years ago. Every once in a while, they send me a coupon for a free pair of cotton panties. I go in, I get my free panties, and I walk back out. There’s really nothing else I want there. It’s all ridiculously overpriced anyways.
I guess that heart disease and diabetes is better than having ‘your thighs not touch’. Obesity is an epidemic in America. I think it is a lot more of a problem to encourage young girls to eat hamburgers and pizza everyday than to worry about a picture in a magazine. Yeah, some people take it to an unhealthy extreme but MORE people take over eating to the extreme. Heart disease is the number one killer of women in America, so lets encourage healthy eating instead of glorifying junk food.
What a lot of people seem to forget, in complaining about this article, is that there is a middle ground between these women and “heart disease and diabetes.” These women will not necessarily escape without any health risks, either; my brother-in-law actually said the other day that when he did a very high-protein diet (kind of like the ONLY-protein diet of the Angels) in order to lose weight (because he did truly need to lose weight, and he has long since given up this particular diet), he ended up with very painful gout. Of course, you’d never hear about any of these models ending up with unfortunate health issues from this diet, short of actually watching one of them collapse on stage at the Fashion Show. They want these women to be seen as the absolute pinnacle of physical health and beauty.
I understand I could have used the words “healthy” and “natural” more in the article (because that was absolutely the idea I was going for), but I was definitely not glorifying junk food. A burger is not necessarily “junk.” Had I said “Carl’s Jr. burger,” it would have been one thing, but I didn’t. There are also tons of healthy options for pasta dishes, chocolate absolutely can be consumed in moderation (I can’t even eat an entire candy bar at once, so I was definitely not implying that that’s all I eat), and there’s nothing at all wrong with a cup of coffee a day.
All I was getting at with the foods I mentioned was that I actually eat solid food, and I eat a variety of it. And all I was aiming to advocate was the same thing, along with more media acknowledgment that yes, super skinny models can be pretty, but they are not the only beautiful women in existence.
This past summer, Italian Vogue did a spread about “real women” to combat the idea of always using size 0-2 models. The women they picked were all overweight. That’s fine. Overweight can be sexy, just like underweight can be sexy. But where are the average sized models? Most of the women I know are in this group. Yes, some women are naturally thin or heavy. But most women who excercise a couple times a week and watch tv a couple times a week/eat a salad sometimes and french fries sometimes will be sizes S, M, L/4, 6, 8, 10, 12 and I never see clothes, especially sexy clothes, aimed at them. The only ads we average gals get are for light yogurt and cleaning supplies. Underwear ads tell me I either have to be a twig-with-boobs or a giant-boob-butt-hourglass to be sexy. I want to see a lingere ad that says pear shaped, love handdled, just-touching-thigh, 34B me is sexy, too. That’s a message I’d want my daughter to see: 99% of women have no butt or thick thighs or small chests or short torsos or any number of physcical traits that can be so beautiful, and that’s what I think young girls should be seeing. Women who have FLAWS and are gorgeous anyways, because that’s what most of their bodies are growing into through puberty.
I think your article is great, BUT
“Same hair, same body ect ect)
Guess what, its the whole point of the show. Angels are SUPPOSED to look the same. They don’t all look like that year round.
Not everyone is meant to be a doctor, or teacher or model.
And overweight women need to hit the gym if seeing skinny girls make them insecure and paranoid. I’m not about to eat dry egg powder but I’m all about working for what you want in life. I am brasilian and nothing is sexier than curves in my country. Some women like that some women want to be skinny. To each their own. I’ve seen so many posts like this one and its a little whiney now.
Things that bothered me about this article:
1. Your use of the term ‘real women’ as if in some way thinner women somehow just do not count in society…
2. Saying that sizes 2, 0, etc. are not beautiful. I’m a size 0. Always have been always will be. No I don’t go on starvation diets, but at one point in this article, it seemed more like you were attacking just the idea of being thinner, as opposed to their methods of achieving said thinness. Sorry I was born smaller.
3. Some womens’ thighs do not touch. This can occurs in health women as well… (not just these waif models). I found it a tad hypocritical that to you it’s alright to bash on women forNOT having their thighs touch, when you’re trying to show that it’s fine for womens thighs to touch. Why not accept all body types?
4. THIS IS WHAT BOTHERED ME MOST: If you rely on BURGERS PASTA CHOCOLATE and COFFEE for your energy… you’re doing it wrong! Balance your meals. Yes I agree that these models are not eating healthy, but your ‘energy sources’ aren’t either!! Balance meals with fruits, veggies, grains, lean meats, etc. Common!
1. The term “real women” was used because these women do not eat real food for a week and a half before their show. Their bodies are, in fact, not real, as in, not attained in any kind of natural manner. They are not naturally THAT thin. Nobody would stay healthy and remain energized on a protein-shake-and-water diet for long at all.
2. I never said they are not beautiful. I merely pointed out the fact that they absolutely refuse to acknowledge that anyone who is NOT that size is beautiful. I didn’t call their bodies anything except unattainable and unrealistic for 99% of women in the world.
3. I don’t want to have to repeat my proportions again. I’m small, too. I know what you mean. However, I do not go to unrealistic or unhealthy (there is not a doctor out there that will tell you that that diet, especially if prolonged much more than those 9 days, is healthy) lengths to keep myself this way.
4. I’m sorry, but I absolutely have to laugh at this argument. I was just mentioning a variety of solid foods that came to mind when I thought of actual food I eat. I happen to love everything from Taco Bell to spinach salads, loaded with hard-boiled eggs, grape tomatoes, raw broccoli, and onions, with vinegar and oil dressing. The foods I mentioned are not my entire diet, and I think it’s a little ridiculous for someone to draw that conclusion. Of course I’m not going to list every single food I ever draw energy from. I was just implying that I like real (solid) food. There is nothing inherently unhealthy about any of those foods, in moderation. I know what balance is, and I actually mentioned a protein (burger), carb (pasta), and fat (chocolate). What I was going for was the fact that there is actually variety in what I consume. I didn’t say “All I rely on are Carl’s Jr. burgers, pasta loaded with alfredo sauce, a Hershey’s bar a day, and nonstop Starbucks.” Had that been the case, this argument would have made total sense. However, one can make relatively low-grease burger, topped with vegetables, on a wheat bun, whole wheat pasta with low-sodium, organic tomato sauce, and eat one, one-inch-by-one-inch Dove chocolate square (that’s actually all the chocolate I can handle at once, but I do crave it sometimes), and a single cup of coffee. None of those are bad for you. In fact, they’re downright healthy in moderation.
I can understand where you’re coming from with all of these complaints, but please, at least know what I actually meant, and don’t put words in my mouth…I never said they were not beautiful women.
Thanks for taking the time to reply!
I wasn’t trying to put words in your mouth and I agree completely with you that these girls go to great (and very dangerous) lengths to attain their looks.
It was more the tone that bothererd me, where your article seemed to switch from anti-VS-model-diet-etc. to anti-thin. I think this just upset me most because unlike how most girls were bullied for being “fat” I was bullied for being too skinny (children back in middle school/ high school would often make fun of my collar-bone, thin wrists, etc. etc.).
About #4 and ‘energy sources’ I’m super glad to hear you’ve got your head on straight. Phew!
i’m 5’1-”, 145 lbs, size 6 & i can’t wear bras at victoria’s secret. they don’t make a 38A without push-up/underwire/give-me-big-boobs-magic. i just want something to hold my silver dollar up, i don’t need ‘em bigger. i swore them off years ago.
I totally agree with this article. I’m an extremely slender 18 year old, weighing in at 102 pounds and 5’7″, and even I have occasionally struggled with body image. After seeing something like the VS models, I couldn’t help but think things like, “well, I’m thin, but am I thin enough? I’m nowhere near as skinny as they are… Maybe I should cut down on chocolate.” So I would feel a lot better if someone could start TRULY emphasizing the idea of “I love my body” and embracing all sizes and shapes rather than just the unhealthily thin model one.
I’ve never liked Victoria’s Secret. Being named “Victoria” made it worse. In middle school people used to joke “what’s your secret?”. The idea of carrying around a pink, striped shopping bag with my name on it just didn’t appeal to me.
I’ve gone up and down in sizes over the years (currently 5’5, size 2/4) but I’ve always been rather flat-chested with narrow hips. As a result, VS bras and panties have never fit properly. A few months ago I decided to go into VS for a bra fitting. It turns out they don’t carry bras in my size. The sales girl brought me a sports bra to try on. It was 39.99 and said “Pink” in huge letters on the back. I’m very athletic and own heaps of sports bras. I buy them on-sale at Target. There was no way I was going to buy a VS sports bra. I wanted a real bra that fit.
I left and discovered that I can buy bras in my size in the girl’s section at Target for 9.99. They’re the best-fitting bras I have ever owned. I guess that’s my real “secret”. But I still find it shocking that a store the specializes in lingerie would carry such a narrow range of sizes. Aren’t they alienating clientele at both ends of the size charts?
I guess I’m the minority or the exception, but I grew up acknowleding that I was fat and people in the media weren’t… but I never really cared. I never once think I thought “I’m supposed to look like that”. I just knew that they looked like that, and I didn’t, and nobody who looked like me would be on TV because people prefer skinny. I just figured these were facts and was never upset by them.
I don’t know where these beliefs come from, either, because growing up my whole family was always bigger women and have always had a focus on “you want to loose weight and be pretty to the boys” and putting me on weight watchers when I was eight, but I still never really cared. I think maybe I was just a naive child though and just figured it would all work out in the end (and I guess I sitll see it that way.)
So, basically, I understand that some girls see models like these and end up having self esteem issues – there’s data to back that up. But you can’t assume every child feels the same way.
Also, I’ve never bought anything at Victoria’s Secret (none near by me!) but I looked at their site a few times and was excited to see how high their bra sizes actually went up (40 band!), much higher than any “normal” store I’ve ever seen go up (la senza, walmart, la vie en rose).
i understand your point of view but there are girls out there that are so skinny and have body issues as well. Like me for example im very slim and people always say i look anorexic and i need to eat and things of that sort. but in reality i eat way more than a heavier person eats i just have a really fast metabolism. those comments make me feel like im way to skinny and i feel pressured to put on weight but when i see these models and how skinny they are they actually make me realize, you know what even though im skinny i still look beautiful and i dont have to please other people, as long as i feel good with myself then thats all that matters. So i actually give these women props. Also i am flat chested and if it wasn’t for victoria secret i would be going to many stores trying to find a bra in my size. but VS has every single size so now i dont have to get upset trying to find one. i absolutely love victoria secret and how they do make most women out there feel better about themselves
Is there anyway for me to stop these comments from coming into my mailbox, because I am really sick of hearing effortlessly skinny women complaining about how *hard* it is to be skinny in a society/popular media that worships their body type. They’re size 1 and its so tough for them, boo hoo. Try being 5’8″ a built like an amazon, physically incaple of getting below 140 without doing physical harm. Yes, VS is wonderful because it is yet another rock in the mountain of magazines, TV shows, movies, commercials, music videos, etc. that tell ypu you are beautiful. But loving/showing as acceptible only skinny bodies doesn’t help the rest of us, which had you read the editorial and most of the comments hete, you would understand.
Try getting a date with any man under the age of 30 when you look like you might be able to take them in a fight. Then talk to me about how rough you’ve had it in our skinny-worshipping society.
you need to relax because no one was even talking to you. and do you really think that heavy people are the only ones with problems? well sorry to tell you sweety but everyone has problems its how you choose to solve it and if you choose to get an attitude with every skinny person you meet than your ignorant.
You want honesty and knowlege? Not everyone suffers equally. Thats truth of life, period. Some kids are born on Park Avenue and never have to worry a day in their life about the roof over their head or where their next meal is coming from, and some kids are born in Iraq in the last 10 years. Skinny people coming on here to defend VS glorying a single bodytype that they have but is unattainable for most women, supposedly because they had it “so tough” being skinny in America is a lie. Period. They may have had other problems, but our culture worships slender women. So being slender in the U.S. is not the source of their problem. They simply have not faced thhe same pressures we the rest of us have, and trying to claim you have is insulting.
There are many different body types and they are all beautiful, that us the entire point of this column and I agree wholeheartly. But that is NOT what VS and the fashion industry have been shoving diwn our throats since Twuggy made skinny the ideal in the 1970′s. We’re here asking for equal representation in our media, and skinny women coming in here and claiming that we don’t have a right to get made at “the game” because they have suffered so much being physically and socially desirable just rubs salt in the wound. We watch you girls you know, we see you wearing the cute clothes that are designed for slender women (do you really think hip hugger jeans work on a 160 lb. woman?) , you get the guys at the clubs because your the physical ideal, and then you try to turn around and say how tough it is for you being effortlessly skinny and desireable? Sorry if I call “shenanigans.”
Yeah, you guys may have had a hard time finding a bra. I couldn’t find a pair of jeans for 6 years.
i totally understand this article. my whole family is obese and i see what they go through and i totally support them and everyone who is. i posted my comment because i wanted other people in my position to also realize they are not alone. just like this whole article is about how society is so for being skinny.well i want to let extremely skinny women realize its okay who cares what people say. and actually from where im from most of the women are thick and thats what the guys over here like. so its not as easy for us either. it all depends on the guy. some guys like women thick and some don’t but there are plenty out there and no matter what size you are you should be proud of yourself because confidence is beauty
Yeah, I stopping paying attention to you when you started swearing.
maybe your not getting the guys at the club, because men like confidence. Confidence is the most sexy thing a women can have at any size. Us skinny girls might get looked at because of our bodies, but we hook them because of our personalties. ( or so my husband tells me) Confidence is just as sexy on a size 18 as it is on a size 0 and bitchyness is just as unattractive.
Oh sweet, sweet Anne. Your husband told you that so you wouldn’t feel bad. You can hardly think in a club let alone have a conversation long enough to find out a girls personality. Thin girls who wear the skimpy clothes and show off as much skin as possible are skanky anyway, so I wouldn’t be caught dead in those clothes whether I was thin enough to wear them or not. You don’t need to dress like a street walker just because you have the body to do so and if you do you obvisouly have some serious issues. I have yet to meet a thin girl who is not bithchy to a bigger girl, EVER. They always seem to have this “I am better than you” additude but this is about a company saying they are for “every woman” when in fact they are not.
umm… I am just going to break apart your argument right here. first of all I am honoured to be the first non- bitchy slim girl you have had contact with, but a little sad. I will admit that I have never looked for a guy in a club because I met my husband long before I was legal drinking age (we are high school sweethearts). I have although have had some wonderful conversations on club patios with men. I assume that your going to ask why I am out talking to men in clubs when I have one at home. My response is this just because I am married does not mean I do not have single friends and I cant converse with other men. I am married not owned. I do agree that skanky clothes are unattractive, but it is unfair to think because I am slim that I automatically wear them. I am actually a very conservative dresser. As for slim girls always being a bitch. As I said before I have a Scottish mother with a large Scottish build and two sisters who inherited it and they are my best friends, also a lot of my friends are bigger girls. You cannot just generalize how kind a person is based on their size. Also I do not know what you mean buy your husband told you that for you wouldn’t feel bad. All I was saying is that confidence is sexy and if you like yourself then it is easier for someone to like you. If you get on the dance floor and just have fun and not care what people say you will have to fight the men off with your shoes
I love how people assume the entire planet has the exact same experience that they do…
I have been the slender pretty girl as a young woman. I have been the overweight one in middle age and have struggled to get my weight back where it should be for my health. The reaction of people, not just men, people in general, is completely different. I friend of mine and I were talking recently. We decided that overweight middle-aged women would be the perfect spies, because most people act like they are invisible.
Recently, I saw a video of an overweight girl who had taken a pole dancing class and made a real go of it. She made the news for it in the U.K.. She was having fun, being sexy.
Being confident.
Most men the message board that video was posted to who saw it laughed, called her a “hippo” and worse, asked for eye bleach, etc. The most charitable ones said they thought it was cute and they were glad she was having fun, but no way would they go out with her.
That’s how men talk when they don’t think we are listening. The joy of having a gender neutral sign-on and a straightforward attitude is often, men (and women amusingly) online assume you are male, and really let fly with the locker room talk. It’s been an education, let me tell you.
Men are visual creatures, and their first estimation of a woman is how she looks. Read a men’s magazines like Maxim or FHM or Men’s Health. There are even studies that prove the human beings of both genders automatically respond better to pretty people then those that do not fit our narrow definition of “beauty.”
Now fortunately, I will say that a majority of men to do not think women that look like these models are attractive. “Bag of antlers” is how women with bodies like this are often described by men (told you it wasn’t pretty, go ask your husband what “butterface” means, or how they call a “tramp stamp” a “c*% target”). Christina Hendricks and Salma Hayek seem to be more what the beauty ideal is for them. And that is a good sign.
But please do not presume to tell us that the cure is “just be confident.”
You obviously have some body issues and I’m sorry about that, but you cannot blame slim girls for it. This is not a site to try to make you feel superior to others by blaming us and trying to make us feel guilty for your problems. I am not automatically a mean person, because I am slim. I never once said that confidence was the end all answer, but was educating you that there is more to us than just our bodies. You cannot control what other people think or do, but you can control how you react to it. So suck it up, stand on your own to feet and solve your own problems. Oh and as for your pole dancing thing, my not so skinny Mom took belly dancing lessons and she told me that my dad could not keep his hand off of her.
AAAND once again, a skinny person misses the point in the rush to be defensive. This article is about the way SOCIETY raises up a single body type as the ideal. Not about skinny women being evil.
Though I do love it when a bunch of larger women get together to try to make themselves feel better, in this case saying, “there is more to beauty than this single body type that is shoved in our face all the time and society shouldn’t do that,” the skinny women rush in and act like victims.
This was not about skinny women themselves until a bunch of skinny women MADE it about themselves.
Where did I say I was “blaming you” for societies attitudes and my problems?
I was blaming you for you naivete and presumption when you did keep insisting that:
“Confidence is the most sexy thing a women can have at any size.”
“All I was saying is that confidence is sexy and if you like yourself then it is easier for someone to like you. If you get on the dance floor and just have fun and not care what people say you will have to fight the men off with your shoes”
“Confidence is just as sexy on a size 18 as it is on a size 0 and bitchyness is just as unattractive.”
And BTW? You “not being a bitchy person?” Yeah, not so much with that post. The personal attack, “you have body issues,” was very classy.
“You cannot control what other people think or do, but you can control how you react to it. So suck it up, stand on your own to feet and solve your own problems.”
Yeah, that’s what people who have never known discrimination and being an outsider say to outsiders like kids who are bullied.
Here is how it translates ot those outsiders:
“Well, it’s OUR world, you just live in it. So shut the F- up you big wussy.”
Never thought I would hear an adult say over something like this.
Hint for real life: Feelings do not exist in a vacuum. They never have. After physical sensation, they are the biggest way we interact with the world.
So no, we can’t just ignore the constant drone of the social media’s standards of beauty, and “act confident” and be admired by society. It simply does not work that way.
I never asked you, or any skinny woman, to apologize for being skinny.
I asked you to try to understand what it is like for the rest of us, something you obviously are incapable of doing.
I asked Victoria to stop playing the martyr because someone pointed out that Victoria Secret does *not* love all body types and the media perpetuates an ideal that is harmful. We’re saying something important about society here and you all keep coming in here and saying “Stop being mean to skinny girls!”
You miss the point entirely.
You first comment was to me. I ignored it, but your repsonse to Elizabeth was full of crap.
“Also it is obvious that you have body issues otherwise you would not have said the things you said (see above)
You can blame me the media and society but the end of the day it is your problem”
Why did you bother to comment on this thread when you failed to understand the article so completely?
I’d love for you to look an anorexic girl, or the parents of a dead anorexic girl, in the face and say “It’s your problem.”
I just got sick of being lectured by people who have no clue what it is like. Who have never struggled with these issues. We asked you to understand and you refuse. “It’s your problem.”
Yeah, thanks, that really adds to the discussion.
Anne, It would really help if you read the posts you were responding too. As I said, I was overweight in HS, dropped it in my twenties, gained it back in my late 30′s. So I have seen what it is like for you. I’m sure you have problems (though you certainly have not related any while you came in from on high to tell us what to do), but I am willing to bet they are not related to your weight. You don’t think so either since you make a point of saying how attractive you are while you tell us what to do.
The fact is everyone in western society knows what it is like to be a skinny girl because you all have dominated the dialoge for the last 40 years. The media is all about you guys.
And when women who do not fit into the narrow confines of socially approved beauty try to put in a world edgewise, well. We see your reactions here: You still try to dominate the dialog.
We ask you to listen to us, and you come in and don’t listen, instead telling us what to do.
Which isn’t as bad as those that came in and insulted us, but still irksome.
The anoxia comment? Deal with it, because that is what the unrelentingly pervasive glorification of the extremely slender body type, which is simply not attainable by healthy means for 99% of the women in the U.S. and Europe (where the anorexia cases are highest) , creates. Tens of thoudands of young girls destroying themselves to live up to an unattainable ideal.
You know when anorexia made it last biggest splash on the planet? The Victorian era of the wasp-waists.
You gained your confidence when you were given the chance (your parents moved *just* for you? I begin to understand) chance to escape the school culture you were in and reinvent yourself in an entirely new school culture.
Great. So when we can hit “reset” on popular media and can get out of this culture that glorifies the skinny, your analogy will have merit.
Though I notice you are back to confidence again.
Let me ask you something, reading my posts, the way I express myself which is exactly the same as in RL, do you really think I lack confidence?
See, my parents couldn’t afford to uproot their entire life *just* for me. So I actually dealt with the bullies. So while I may have body issues, I have no problems being me.
I know what it is like to be slender (though my body never looked like the VS Angels) and I am working on getting back to that. But I will never forget how differently I was treated between when I was young and slender and pretty, and how I am treated now, middle aged and overweight.
You can be proud of your body, no one said you could not. Just let other women be angry at the light, but constant, social discrimination they have to live with.
And let me make this clear, when it came to the bullies at school, you did *not* “deal with your own problems.” Your parents helped you escape/run away.
Which was very cool of them. They did their job to the best of their ability. But it makes you telling people upset by the pressures of society “It’s your own problem. Deal with it.” slightly hypocritical.
I deal with my problems. That doesn’t mean I have to shut up when I see something wrong in the world.
AAAnd again you do not see my point. My point is that you don’t have the monopoly on being prejudge on your appearance and don’t have the right to judge us. Your previous comments are hateful and judgemental.
As for tell you what to do. I have been stating common sense. Don’t judge people on appearance, don’t assume your the only one with problems, be happy with who are no matter what your size, let your amazing personality shine through, approach the world with confidence, and don’t put people into groups and judge them. As for listening to you, you could extend that same courtesy.
As for the anorexia comment. I thought obesity was on the rise in the states. I agree that anorexia is a terrible disease with extremely tragic consequences, but obesity has tragic consequences as well maybe your media should focus on that or is the disease that result from obesity not dramatic enough.
As for my parents moving just for me I should have been more clear. My late father was military (the father I spoke of before is technically my step father I call him dad because he and I are very close) I don’t know what military is like for the states but here every so often you can take the opportunity to be reassigned so my parent did. The point of the bully story was to show that when I stopped caring what people thought about me (people can also mean mass media in other situations) I was happier.
You said many times in your response that I am confident now. I totally agree with you. You seem though to be presenting it in a negative way, what is wrong with me being confident with myself
Can you respond to anything I actually say, or are you going to turn everything into a strawman?
I did not judge you based on your weight, I judged you based on your attitude.
I never said there was a problem with you being confident. I said there was a problem with you telling people what to do when you have no idea and won’t listen to what they are going through. Yeah, you gained confidence when you “stopped caring what othet people think” in a completely new school where people would reinforce the reinvention of yourself.
I stopped caring what people thought in the face of the kids who had been bullying me since kindergarten and would continue to bully me for three more years.
In short, you think you “don’t care what people think” when it is very clear in your sensitivity to being judged for your weight that you do.
I really don’t give a crap.
Unless I move to a mountaintop in Tibet, I can’t replicate your experience of reinvention since it is impossible to get away from this narrow definition of feminity.
So I deal with it by pointing out that its wrong to define feminine beauty by a ideal that is unattainable fir 99% of women. That it needs to change, that women of all healthy shapes and sizes need to be shown as beautiful. That society needs to stop the low level discrimination against big women.
Because while we may have an obesity epidemic, tjat does not mean we should ignore the largest numbers of anorexia/bulimia.
Because the obesity epidemic gets 50 times the amount of coverage in the media the numbers of anorexia does.
Oh they talk about bulimia as a joke, a rich white girls disease with Hollywood hopefulls running to the ladies room to throw up. But no one talks about the girls that die. When I was in college, a 16 year old girl died at my health club. She had starved and worked out until her heart gave out.
But let’s have another season of “America’s Top Model” and “Biggest Loser.”
In fact, it would probably go a long way towards reducing the numbers of both problems if we stopped idolizing people based on looks and started putting people with real accomplishments out there as our cultural heroes. Stopped raising Megan Fox as a figure of desire and worship, and put someone like Amy Tan or Sandra Day O’Connor.
Stop paying these models hundreds of thousands of dollars and started paying our teachers, police, fire and rescue personell, and our soldiers what they are really worth.
But I know you are just going to misconstrue what I say again, so I am done. I am going to block any furthet notification from this website.
A. You just revealed that you don’t live in the U.S., so I doubt your sister would have been the belle of the ball here.
B. We’re back to confidence as the magic man attractor that will make them ignore your appearance.
C. Considering what you said about bitchiness, you really, really should not leave openings like that.
Ummm… I never claimed to be an American I’m a Canadian. But skinny is a global problem so it shouldn’t matter
What is so wrong with confidence Again maybe you should read/ listen. I stated many times that I never said confidence was a cure, I as u have, am make observations in my experiences
What openings make me bitchy
and fuck ya pay soldiers ( my father was one) paramedics ( step dad is one) and fire fighters ( Mom is one) more money finally something we agree on.
I was also wondering if you had the chance to read my comment on skinny girls dominating the market for 40 year and before that bigger girls(by today’s standards) dominated it before. I bet us skinny girls felt the same back then as you do now.
Oh and this…..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agy6KOSwyA8
…is true. I have seen men confirm it. Men will put up with more crap the hotter a woman is.
Though there is a cut off certain line where they “don’t stick their d*%k in the crazy.”
Well you should learn to read. First off you made this about skinny vs. bigger with your comments.
We watch you girls you know, we see you wearing the cute clothes that are designed for slender women (do you really think hip hugger jeans work on a 160 lb. woman?) , you get the guys at the clubs because your the physical ideal, and then you try to turn around and say how tough it is for you being effortlessly skinny and desireable? Sorry if I call “shenanigans.”
and
Yeah, you guys may have had a hard time finding a bra. I couldn’t find a pair of jeans for 6 years.
and
Not everyone suffers equally
and
Try getting a date with any man under the age of 30 when you look like you might be able to take them in a fight. Then talk to me about how rough you’ve had it in our skinny-worshipping society.
and
sick of hearing effortlessly skinny women complaining about how *hard* it is to be skinny in a society/popular media that worships their body type. They’re size 1 and its so tough for them, boo hoo.
and like at stated before, I never claimed that confidence is the end all. (the part where you should learn to read) and bitchiness is unattractive. I am not a bitchy person but nor am I a door matt either I am simply standing up for myself. Oh an for the record I was bullied in high school to the point where my family had to move for I could go to a different one. Also I was responding to Elizabeth not you. I am just tired of you generalizing that all men are pigs and all slender women are bitches. Also it is obvious that you have body issues otherwise you would not have said the things you said (see above)
You can blame me the media and society but the end of the day it is your problem
also I never once said
“Well, it’s OUR world, you just live in it. So shut the F- up you big wussy.
I just refuse to apologies because I am slender.
I don’t even know where to begin. you are just so outlandish.
I asked you to try to understand what it is like for the rest of us, something you obviously are incapable of doing. You missed my point entirely
by the rest of you, I assume you mean bigger girls. Everyone has problems in there life. But like you said, not everyone suffers the same I guess. How about trying to see what it like for skinny girls. But like you said, not everyone suffers the same. I am sure your life is and has been far more difficult then mine just because I am a smaller size. I was not teased in high school because of my weight but for other reasons, but at the end of the day bullying is bullying.
As for my response to Elizabeth how was that crap, I can provide examples for you, if you wish. I know that not everyone has the same experiences but like everyone else I draw from my own.
As for Why did you bother to comment on this thread when you failed to understand the article so completely?
I was more responding to the other comments made. Just like you I have the right to be proud, and happy with the body I have just because it is a socially approved one should not take away that right. I come by it safely and naturally I can not help my genetic.
As for I just got sick of being lectured by people who have no clue what it is like. Who have never struggled with these issues. We asked you to understand and you refuse. “It’s your problem.”
My response to that is when my family moved for I could switch schools. I was pretty low on self confidence and very unaccepting of who I was my peers (like the media in your situation) told me that I had to be a certain way. I had one month before I started my new school and in that month with the help of my family I decided that in the school I was going to be exactly who I was and through that gained confidence made lots of friends and enjoyed the rest of my high school years. Hopefully in that you can see that are problems are not all that different sometimes.
As for your comments on anorexia I never once mentioned it. That comment so discusting I’m not even going to give it a proper response.
as for your other comment about me. I am not focused on being right as you wish me to see your side I wish you would try to see mine.
As for me making assumptions that is something your very guilty of yourself.
also yes skinny girls have dominated the society for forty years, you said so yourself, so before that it was focused on what we would call today bigger girls, something I cannot achieve. So I bet skinny girls felt the same back then as you do now
obviously you do give a crap since before me you where arguing with a Victoria. But sadly I have no more time to listen to a washed up web troll suffering from low self esteem. I have a skinny girl life to lead and according to you it should be a easy one. So you enjoy your life sitting in Canada’s underpants ( if you don’t understand Google it) have fun with your future war with Iran, your unemployment rate. I will leave you with the American ignorance about the world and leave you to continue to think that your problems are the worlds problems. After all it’s the American way. Don’t believe me tell me 10 things about Canada that you don’t have to google. I love how you said that ” you just revealed that you don’t live in the US, like it was some terrible secrete that I was trying to hide lol. Your going to die alone, not because of your looks but because of your attitude
This reminds me of something. When I was overweight, I had friends, but most of them were female. I wouldn’t get much male attention. After I lost weight, whenever I would go to a bar, suddenly I had people sending me free drinks and random guys were coming up to me all the time. It was very startling to me, because I was just not used to the attention. It wasn’t even that I had ‘added confidence’ either, because personality-wise I haven’t changed at all since my looks went through that shift. I’ve always been fairly self-conscious of my body at any size.
third time now I never said confidence was the cure. But if you walk around like eeyor the donkey in your own person pity party your not going to attract anyone boyfriends or friends
also the way kipingkat was presenting it bigger girls never get guys which is not true, and all skinny girls have perfect lives which is also not true
Forget it. Anne is too caught up in being right to read what you wrote, or even the dichotomy between two of her own sentences. Or that she is making assumptions about how people behave. (ie. If we complain about society putting up a single standard of beauty and I get annoyed at skinny women for failing to understand what we are trying to say, then we must lack self esteem and be “moping around like eeyore.”
I have seen this from all sides. I was overweight in HS with a beautiful skinny best friend. I lost weight through my twenties and was desirable. Middle age metabolism and a lifestyle change put me back where I was. Attitude can only take one so far in only so many situations. Yes, you need to to get by in the world. At work it is everything. In Friendships. Romantically it can help once the door is opened, but the truth is most men are going to make a snap judgement on whether or not to approach you based on how you look.
And it is not just men. We live in a very shallow, appearance-obessed society. I wish this article was cited properly, but I have seen these results before:
http://www.sirc.org/publik/mirror.html
It’s a very good article in synch with this one.
Here is one studies:
http://www.questia.com/googleScholar.qst?docId=79273804
“Investigators who have examined the consequences of physical attractiveness on social perceptions and interpersonal interactions in the United States have consistently reported the benefits of being “attractive” and the liabilities of being “unattractive” [see Adams (3) for the most recent review]. Unattractive people, when compared to attractives, are generally less liked, less preferred as dates, friends, and marriage partners, less likely to receive sympathy, and expected to do more evil things (4, 7, 8, 18, 20).
Even mere association with an unattractive person produces a negative social reaction and has a “negative halo” effect of cohorts (19). “
Sorry, no one checks the comments awaiting moderation here, so let me repost with the links removed:
First of all Anne: I never said skinny women had no problems.
And I am really getting sick of you misinterpreting me. Strawmen do not win an debate.
Lianne, forget it. Anne is too caught up in being right to read what you wrote, or even the dichotomy between two of her own sentences. Or that she is making assumptions about how people behave. (ie. If we complain about society putting up a single standard of beauty and I get annoyed at skinny women for failing to understand what we are trying to say, then we must lack self esteem and be “moping around like eeyore.”
I have seen this from all sides. I was overweight in HS with a beautiful skinny best friend. I lost weight through my twenties and was desirable. Middle age metabolism and a lifestyle change put me back where I was. Attitude can only take one so far in only so many situations. Yes, you need to to get by in the world. At work it is everything. In Friendships. Romantically it can help once the door is opened, but the truth is most men are going to make a snap judgement on whether or not to approach you based on how you look.
And it is not just men. We live in a very shallow, appearance-obessed society. I wish this article was cited properly, but I have seen these results before:
From http://www. sirc.org
“Mirror, mirror
A summary of research findings on body image
Motives: why we look in the mirror…
Attractive children are more popular, both with classmates and teachers. Teachers give higher evaluations to the work of attractive children and have higher expectations of them (which has been shown to improve performance).
Attractive applicants have a better chance of getting jobs, and of receiving higher salaries. (one US study found that taller men earned around $600 per inch more than shorter executives.)
In court, attractive people are found guilty less often. When found guilty, they receive less severe sentences.
The ‘bias for beauty’ operates in almost all social situations – all experiments show we react more favourably to physically attractive people.
We also believe in the ‘what is beautiful is good’ stereotype – an irrational but deep-seated belief that physically attractive people possess other desirable characteristics such as intelligence, competence, social skills, confidence – even moral virtue. (The good fairy/princess is always beautiful; the wicked stepmother is always ugly)”
It’s a very good article in synch with this one.
Here is one study:
http://www. questia.com
“Investigators who have examined the consequences of physical attractiveness on social perceptions and interpersonal interactions in the United States have consistently reported the benefits of being “attractive” and the liabilities of being “unattractive” [see Adams (3) for the most recent review]. Unattractive people, when compared to attractives, are generally less liked, less preferred as dates, friends, and marriage partners, less likely to receive sympathy, and expected to do more evil things (4, 7, 8, 18, 20).
Even mere association with an unattractive person produces a negative social reaction and has a “negative halo” effect of cohorts (19). “
orry, no one checks the comments awaiting moderation here, so let me repost with the links removed:
First of all Anne: I never said skinny women had no problems.
And I am really getting sick of you misinterpreting me. Strawmen do not win an debate.
Lianne, forget it. Anne is too caught up in being right to read what you wrote, or even the dichotomy between two of her own sentences. Or that she is making assumptions about how people behave. (ie. If we complain about society putting up a single standard of beauty and I get annoyed at skinny women for failing to understand what we are trying to say, then we must lack self esteem and be “moping around like eeyore.”
I have seen this from all sides. I was overweight in HS with a beautiful skinny best friend. I lost weight through my twenties and was desirable. Middle age metabolism and a lifestyle change put me back where I was. Attitude can only take one so far in only so many situations. Yes, you need to to get by in the world. At work it is everything. In Friendships. Romantically it can help once the door is opened, but the truth is most men are going to make a snap judgement on whether or not to approach you based on how you look.
And it is not just men. We live in a very shallow, appearance-obessed society. I wish this article was cited properly, but I have seen these results before:
“Mirror, mirror
A summary of research findings on body image
Motives: why we look in the mirror…
Attractive children are more popular, both with classmates and teachers. Teachers give higher evaluations to the work of attractive children and have higher expectations of them (which has been shown to improve performance).
Attractive applicants have a better chance of getting jobs, and of receiving higher salaries. (one US study found that taller men earned around $600 per inch more than shorter executives.)
In court, attractive people are found guilty less often. When found guilty, they receive less severe sentences.
The ‘bias for beauty’ operates in almost all social situations – all experiments show we react more favourably to physically attractive people.
We also believe in the ‘what is beautiful is good’ stereotype – an irrational but deep-seated belief that physically attractive people possess other desirable characteristics such as intelligence, competence, social skills, confidence – even moral virtue. (The good fairy/princess is always beautiful; the wicked stepmother is always ugly)”
It’s a very good article in synch with this one.
Here is one study:
PHYSIOGNOMIC FEATURES AND FACIAL APPEARANCE JUDGMENTS IN CHILDREN
“Investigators who have examined the consequences of physical attractiveness on social perceptions and interpersonal interactions in the United States have consistently reported the benefits of being “attractive” and the liabilities of being “unattractive” [see Adams (3) for the most recent review]. Unattractive people, when compared to attractives, are generally less liked, less preferred as dates, friends, and marriage partners, less likely to receive sympathy, and expected to do more evil things (4, 7, 8, 18, 20).
Even mere association with an unattractive person produces a negative social reaction and has a “negative halo” effect of cohorts (19). “
I also have a related story, my oldest sister delivered a beautiful baby girl in October. Before she became pregnant she was about a size 14, after delivering she was quite a bit bigger obviously. When I came home for Christmas after my final exams. She wanted to go out for a girls night. I assume she was tired of being home bound with her baby which is fair. I didn’t want to go but she was so excited, so I agreed. Like I said I had just got out of finals so I had bags under my eyes and since I had my period the same week my face had completely broke out due to stress and hormones so I was feeling a little self conscious. But the night was about her so I helped her get all dolled up, ready for a night on the town she was super pumped and nearly shaking with excitement. She left the house feeling beautiful
When we got there and danced for a bit, she was having so much fun laughing and danceing like an idiot, as we are both not good dancers at all. I was still self conscious and tired. I went outside for a smoke, she stayed inside because she didn’t want to brave the cold and is a non smoker and when I came back in she was sitting at our table with the rest of the chairs taken by men. Like I said she is about a size 16 and was wearing her wedding rings. Obviously there was something about her that men where finding attractive. I on the other hand didn’t talk to a guy all night, except when they were being polite in including me in the conversation with my sister.
Another sister of mine (yes I have a large complicated family) also recently delivered a baby. Again not a small girl especially after baby. We where out for lunch talking and laughing, ( she has the most infectious laugh) and a guy came over and chatted her up, this with her engagement ring, baby, and baby weight
I respect that you and others out there may be naturally slim due to either metabolism or other things, and I think that you, just like everyone else, should feel free to be secure in your own skin without having to be torn down a peg by someone else, but I think the reason so many people take issue with these particular VS models is that we know they are not naturally slim, and they are in fact taking great (sometimes dangerous) lengths to get to this size. Along with this, they are also advertising in such a way that says that their body type — which isn’t natural for them, and isn’t natural for most (in fact, it’s unattainable for most) — is the most ideal form of ‘beauty’ out there, and if you don’t fit the mould, too bad so sad.
I live in the UK so I don’t actually have a VS near me, but I’ve been into one a few times during my travels, as well as looking online. I have to strongly disagree with your statement that VS carries ‘every size’. I posted a comment earlier which said that I have never been able to find the correct size at Victoria’s Secret, from 40B (when I was at my heaviest but still fairly flat-chested — they only make a 40 band in C, D, and DD), a 30AA (though I realise I made a typo in my other comment, but 30 is a band size they don’t carry, or to now, where I tried their online bra fitting guide, and they told me I’m a 38A when I’m in fact a 34D, sometimes a 32/34DD depending on the brand. That just goes to show how wonky their sizing is. Here in the UK, it’s estimated that AT LEAST 80% of women are wearing the wrong size bra, and it’s because of the archaic bra sizing guides that places like Victoria’s Secret utilise.
Aside from myself, there are millions upon millions of women who will never be able to buy a bra from Victoria’s Secret due to their limited sizing. Many women require a band size less than 32 or higher than 40, and a cup size higher than DD. DD is not nearly as big as most people think it is, so it’s really not abnormal for a woman to be a bigger cup size than that.
i totally understand but thats what the fashion and modeling business expects and theres nothing you can do to change it. models are expected to have there rib cages showing in order to look be considered beautiful. and i dont find that beautiful i think its disgusting. that fact that theres actually someone thinner than makes me feel better. because there is no one that is and thats why people say comments like that. but i feel like VS shouldn’t be the only company targeted. most modeling companies are the same way so it shouldn’t be just VS being the blame. And there are many stores that dont carry my size in bras jeans shirts dresses but i shouldnt blame them and say they are bias against thin women. i totally understand what you guys are saying i have seen what my family has gone through like how many dresses they had to get handmade or how they cant find a decent looking bra because the dont carry DD’s. but i don’t feel its just VS contributing to it, its the industry. And there are more and more plus size models so i do feel the industry is starting to change for the good. i think finally they are realizing that a size 16 can be beautiful and a size DD is still beautiful. and i agree with the sizing chart because when i measure it says i am a 34A when im actually a 32A and would never fit in a 34 band. and shirts that are small mostly fit a size B. So we are expected to be a size 0 and a C. but like i said its not VS fault
and i do appreciate how you were nice about this convo and not attacking me like some other people.
listen bitch your psychotic trying to compare rich kids with iraq kids and skinny girls. like do you hear how that sounds? and you dont know me and you dont know what i have gone through in life and if you did then you wouldnt be saying that i didnt have a tough life. wether it be weight related or not.your 30 something years old and your argue with people on a blog. like are you serious your a pathetic jealous bitch. so you should shut your fucking mouth.
Wow, I wasn’t trolling, but if I were, I’d say I was damn sucessfull. Yes, I am arguing on the internet. So are you. I at least manage to do so without friathing at an obscenity-laden mouth screaming what amounts to “Shut Up!”
Yeah, that really invalidates what I’m saying.
It would also help if you actually read the posts you were responding too. Like when I said above that skinny people may have problems in their lives, but those problems do not stem from being the socially acceptible dress size.
And strawmen, deliberately (I hope) misunderstanding a lesson of examples, don’t impress me either.
i said i understand and if you want to know the truth there are more and more plus size women that are famous and drop dead goregous and they are making more and more plus size stores with cute clothes. so you can’t say the media is all for skinny. VS is just a company trying to make women feel sexy no matter what size they are. but there are plenty of plus size lingerie stores that are trying to make plus size women feel less insecure. thats what its truly about. and no i don’t agree with the dieting the do and yes they are on the very skinny side but if they are willing to do it and work out and barely eat then let them be. let them be them and you be you. because at the end of the day you are your own worst critic. and if you are harsh on yourself then everyone else will be.
That is a lie, and a very blantant one. VS is most certainly not trying to make women feel better about their bodies no matter what size they are. If they were, the “Love My Body” campaign would have featured models from a wide range of bidy types. It does not.
A have no problem letting people just be. In fact the entire point of this column is getting the media to let women just be by stopping the continuous, near universal pressure to strive for a usually unattainable physical goal.
But the fashion industry makes boatloads of money off keeping women insrcure (if a woman felt herself beautiful, why buy tons of make up because she can’t even go put gas in the car without “putting her face on.”
But my point here this evening is probably best summed up like this: I have a friend who, at age 12, went through menarche and menopause at the same time. And that was just the beginning of a condition that now, in her 40′s, keeps her housebound. She just lost the genetic lottery. So I din’t try to invalidate her suffering by saying, “I’ve had it so tough.” Because I’ve broken a number of bones throughout my life.
You want to talk to us about this, talk to us. But don’t say, “I’ve had it as bad as you, stop complaining.” The whole Curvy Girl phenom is relatively new. In fact, I can track the moment it arrived on our shores with Selma Kayek. But the fashion industry has put up a hard fight and has very strongly resisted showing and catering to women if all types.
and you dont know how i have medical problems and its interferring with my schooling and its making me incapable to even make a full week of school and last year i had to be home schooled for 2 months because i got so sick and i have chronic pain with this and with this rate i might not even be able to graduate. and how i have to try not to stress out cause it makes it ten times worse and i can end up in the hospital. so dont try to tell me i dont know anything about suffering
For the third time, please learn to read, I did not say you or any slender women did not have problem. I just said they did not stem from you being a socially acceptible dress size. That fact that you are, in defiance of not only basic loguc but simple reality, so blindly defending this company which was picked out as representative of an industry that makes a lot of money making women feel insecure about their bodies, says to me you have been completely snowed. You are the skinny and the beautiful and like other slender women who have come on here to defend VS, you are very threatended by the idea that what us socially approved as beautiful may not look like you anymore.
no i just dont understand why is VS being singled out. its just not fair. and i honestly could care less if skinny isn’t a “trend” anymore and i could care less if people dont find me beautiful anymore because i know no matter what people say i still will think i am beautful. and you can keep going on trying to get through to me what ever you are trying to but i have very strong opinions and it wont change because i stand up for what i believe
Pardon the typos, I’m on my mobile.
And I should have said “..invalidate her suffering because I have broken a few bones hiking, bouldering, rollerblading, etc.” Things she can never do.
Sorry, I wanted to love this article, but I can’t, simply because I find it a bit pointless. You state that until Victoria’s Secret recognizes that not all women are a size zero, that you would not buy any of their products. I guess that is a “powerful” statement, but the fact is that you couldn’t buy any of their products anyway, simply because they are not made for you. I was big for most of my life, yet I could never understand this “boycott” of stores because they did not make sizes for women over a size 10. If you’re not a size 10 or under, then why in the HELL would go into a store that you KNOW is not going to have your size? I believe that when a larger woman, who does have a lot of options out there to make herself feel beautiful, bitches and complains about a company like Victoria’s Secret, is not upset because there are not enough “positive” images of real women; she is upset because she is not happy with her outer appearance as much as she claims and wants to really look like those models deep down. When I was bigger, I bought sexy underwear at Lane Bryant and Torrid. It made me feel sexy and beautiful. I did not stress out about Victoria’s Secret. They had the underwear they wanted for their type of women in mind, and I bought underwear from companies that had ME in mind. Victoria’s Secret, as rich as they are, could even be richer if they tap into plus size market; they know this. The fact they STILL have not done this, should tell you something. Victoria’s Secret is only interested in one type of woman. Instead of bitching and complaining about it, ignore it all together and find a store that REALLY accepts you for who you are. Only then, will you actually start to accept yourself.
I really feel the need to chime in here, because the writer of the article has had to state so many times already that this isn’t about her size — she’s not a ‘plus size’ or overweight. The issue is that the poster (not just this one, but I’ve come across another one too) says ‘love your body’ but showcases only one body type. How does that come across to you? It doesn’t come across very well to me.
The other thing, which I personally have a problem with, is the fact that even if you’re slim, you’ll have a hell of a hard time finding anything that fits you at a Victoria’s Secret store because their range of sizes is so narrow. I was overweight in my teens and had trouble finding things, but for the past three and a half years I haven’t been over 130 pounds (at 5’4″), yet I still haven’t bought a single thing from VS because nothing fits properly. I understand that they don’t fit every body type — I came to an understanding that many stores don’t — but isn’t it kind of sad that they don’t even fit smaller women, too?
And I’m not just talking about me, I’m talking about women my size and smaller. Slim women who may have wider hips with a small waist; slim women who may have a bit of a tummy but small hips; slim women who have narrow ribs that require a 20-some-odd band rather than 32+; slim women who require a cup size larger than DD. Chances are that none of these women will be able to shop at a Victoria’s Secret, even though they are in fact size 10 and under.
Unless your proportions are similar to that of an ‘Angel’, let’s face it — Victoria’s Secret really DOESN’T love your body.
At this moment, you are my favorite person. I want to hug you. Thank you.
This isn’t about personal shopping, but about the attitude toward beauty dominant in the fashion industry that is perpetuates through the popular media girls and women are bombarded with every single day.
Personal shopping and the attitude in the fashion industry go hand in hand. They don’t make these things for the hell of it. Again, like I said before, the fashion industry is not gear towards you. Yes, you can argue and complain about the way things are, but that is pointless. Instead, just accept who you are and move towards brands that really fit you (fat or thin) rather than “boycotting” a store that is not gear towards you. That’s like going to a men’s department store and complaing that there is no clothing for women. When women stop complaining and TRULY begin to accept and love their bodies and ignore those that say not to, then you’ll start to see Victoria’s Secret marketing towards the real woman. But, whatever. If bitching and complaining makes you girls happy, then you’re doing a fine job. Nothing EVER needs to change.
Thanks for missing the point.
Most of the fashion industry is run by gay men who turn otherwise healthy women into skeletons that look like young boys.
I have an issue with where the US is headed. It’s widely accepted to tell someone they’re too thin or they should eat something, yet telling someone they’re overweight and should probably put away the fried food is a no-no. Most Americans are fat and there are serious implications associated with that. While these women may have unattainable bodies, most women are not naturally plus-sized. They become that way by making unhealthy diet choices and not exercising. Say what you will about the VS Angels, but they work out extremely hard to get their lean, muscular physiques. Every body and every woman, VS Angel or not, is special and unique. Please give credit where credit is due.
Did you even read the article?
“She sees a nutritionist, who has measured her body’s muscle mass, fat ratio and levels of water retention. He prescribes protein shakes, vitamins and supplements to keep Lima’s energy levels up during this training period. Lima drinks a gallon of water a day. For nine days before the show she will drink only protein shakes – “no solids”. The concoctions include powdered egg. Two days before the show she will abstain from the gallon of water a day, and “just drink normally”. Then, 12 hours before the show she will stop drinking entirely.”
This is healthy?
“I went from simply disliking them for trying to convey to women everywhere that “beauty” means being a size two or smaller, to being absolutely furious at them for aiming that exact message at little girls….
Could it be that real women want to emulate and look up to someone with whom they can identify, in size and looks, instead of a gaggle of impossibly thin models, who are nearly indistinguishable from one another?”
And since when has it become a “No-no” to tell someone they are too fat? You don’t seem to have a problem with it. MANY responders to this article don’t have a problem with assuming the writer is fat and deriding her for it. The media is filed with articles about the obesity epidemic in this country. It has never been a problem to tell someone they are too fat.
Meanwhile an article like this, pointing out that the media promotes a *single* ideal of beauty (skinny) that is simply unattainable to many while maintaining long term health, is accused of “promoting fat people.” Which means the problem isn’t that other woman are fat, it that they have a problem with someone pointing out that these models are too skinny. (Ie. it’s not o.k. to point out skinny models.)
I definitely don’t think it’s become a ‘no-no’ to tell someone they’re overweight. This is actually one part of a big problem I see right now; we as a society are constantly bombarded with images of individuals who aren’t a normal, healthy size, that I see more and more instances of people calling celebrities in the media who actually ARE a normal, healthy size ‘chubby/fat/overweight/obese’ (the list goes on).
However, if you take into consideration life outside the media, I also believe that most of us are so used to seeing overweight/obese people walking down the streets that this also affects our ability to see people of a normal, healthy size. Either way, it’s a disturbing trend to think that someone who may have been called ‘slim and healthy’ a decade ago would now be referred to as ‘chubby’ by today’s standards.
It’s also worth it to point out how the media is so accepting of weight loss. The best example of this is how magazines and big brand companies like Weight Watchers and Jennie Craig will pay through the teeth for a celebrity to lose weight, whether it’s after having a baby, or just because they’ve gained a bit and are ready to lose. The magazines will pay millions for a before/after cover of their weight loss journey; likewise, the weight loss companies will draw up multi-million dollar contracts for the celebrity in question to be their spokesperson (possibly for years at a time). If a celebrity GAINS weight, they might get a cover, but they won’t get paid for it — it will be to their own surprise and likely embarrassment.
Yet again, though, if you look at life OUTside the media, things are different. If anything, over the years I’ve noticed that you tend to get rewarded for eating as unhealthily as possible. The sugary cereals, the crisps, chocolate, all of that stuff usually has contests going on where you can send in proof of purchase and immediately get some sort of prize. With sugary cereals, sometimes you can get something pretty great; like you send in five boxtops, and you get four free film passes. Things like that. Likewise, all of these products are always cheaper to buy. When was the last time you saw a contest on a box of quinoa? Or the last time a bag of vegetables was cheaper than a bag of crisps? For me, the answer to both is ‘never’.
And that is a massive problem. I had this discussion when the “soda tax’ was being bounced around. A gallon of soda costs 1/4 what a gal. of milk does and 1/3 a gal. of real fruit juice. Fruit canned in syrup is 1/2 what the same amount of fresh fruit is. Cheapest food you can buy? Carb-loaded pasta.
It is flat out expensive to eat healthy these days.
(And don’t get me going on why we live in a society where a gallon of milk is more expensive than a gallon of gasoline…)
It’s quite sickening.
As a woman who has been larger for nost of my youth, until my mid 20′s, I purchased, and purchase victoria’s secret, in any incarnation. I was raised from a young age to realize what was real and what was noy. Watch the fasion show, and see that the perfectly toned, tight large breasted perfect women, have small breasts, cellulite asses and are too thin. That is the reality they sell. The models, in the bikinis have toilet paper tubes stuffed in the back to give the illusion that they fit. I started wearing victorias secret as a size 16- yes they have clothes that fit, i have the xl tops and jeans to prove it. Now at a size 6 i still wear it. I know the truth about illusion, and just as covergirl sells the fantasy that everyone gets super clear skin, and lush lashes- that they have been cited for in the eyes of the public, so too must this be taken as that an illusion.
ADD PLUS SIZES TO THE NEW VSX LINE BY VICTORIA’S SECRET!
http://www.change.org/petitions/add-plus-sizes-to-victorias-secret-new-line-very-sexy-sport-vsx-introduce-plus-sizes-for-the-new-vsx-line
its a very unrealistic view of women’s bodies.. most women are a size 12, which Marilyn Monroe was.. to me, they are all skinny with implants..
Dove has a much better campaign for “real women”..
so, because of my small size I’m not a real women? 34-23-34
so, because of my small size I’m not a real women? 34-23-34
I don’t know why you’re getting offended, I’m not talking about you — I’m saying that ON AVERAGE, women are a size 12.. nothing do with your size
I’d like to point out that Marilyn’s size 12 of yesteryear is not the same as today’s size 12. She was much thinner than that one beach photo indicates. Many fat women want to make skinny women think that Monroe was one of them but the reality of it is that she was thin, healthy and not a fattie.
Today’s size 12 is more like a size 8-10 of years past and most women today are not sized 12… they are closer to 14-18. The problem in determining how fat people based on clothing sizes is that companies keep changing what a size 8 or 10 or 16 really is. My fiance technically can not shop in most american stores because she has a fit body, is healthy and almost no one carries clothing for her frame (115lbs and about a foot shorter than I (5’11”). She would qualify as a VS model without having to diet and her body fat % is attainable by women who desire it.
The main problem today is that American women are eating American foods… other countries do not have this issue because they eat healthy organic foods that include real animals.
I’ll leave you to eat your non fat, non dairy, sugar free, flavor free imitation ice cream product. My woman and I will have ourselves some heavy whipped cream from an organic dairy farm with our strawberries and champagne.
Jose — i dont care what size your gf is, and dont try and judge me just because of my comments.. you think American women are on average size 14-18? No , your wrong its size 12!!
take ur fattie remarks somewhere else noone wants to hear it
It is time that the world got over the fact that some women are naturally slender.There are articles saying that all women should love their bodies, portraying girls with larger, breast, waist and thighs. Don’t get me wrong I think it’s great but just because some women are smaller doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t also be told to love our bodies.
I am in my early twenties and I have the measurement of a VS model, just not as tall. I have no desire to be a model but don’t think I should be prejudged on what my life is like because of my body. Yes I work out, not to stay super skinny but because it is a great stress reliever and it gives me more energy. I also watch what I eat because I don’t think anyone should load their bodies up with junk food every night. But I have never meet anything with chocolate that I didn’t like. My mother didn’t project a certain image of me. In fact my Mom and I look nothing alike and people are surprised I am her daughter. She has a strong Scottish build (which work to her advantage because she is a fire fighter) I get my looks from my dads side who is French.
I am tired of being treat or lectured because I meet the industry standards of beauty. I sell women clothing part time I actually had someone tell my manager that I should never have been hired for my line of work because I portray an unachievable body image.
I do agree that the way some models achieve their weight is unhealthy not all of them go to that extreme though. You speak about facts, fact is vs just had one of her models that is pregnant walk the runway.
The part of the article that angered my the most was your subtle claim that women who are industry standard beautiful cannot possible be smart. Just because they chose to be models doesn’t mean that they are not smart. I happen to be finishing up a double major and then I will be getting a masters, which does require me to be intelligent. When I applied for university I didn’t send a pic and my measurement. As for the models they get paid tones of money and get to see the world and make connections. For most of them this line of work is short lived. Maybe they will use that money to pay for education afterwards for they don’t graduate with large amounts of debt. The thing is once they are off the runway and out or the spotlight we don’t hear about what their lives are like. Maybe a few years after her modelling is over she will be a debt free marine biologist.
I actually didn’t lecture anyone about size. It was the lengths to which these models go to achieve their size I had a problem with, along with the fact that they will not acknowledge that any other size is beautiful. And it’s great that they let a pregnant Angel walk down the runway, but she was an Angel before her pregnancy, and chances are, she’ll be one after.
I also never even implied that they weren’t smart because of their looks, size, or profession. In fact, it was quite the contrary – I said I was astounded at what they chose as their profession *because* they were so smart. So I have no idea where you picked up the “because she’s beautiful, she must be dumb” implications.
If you took the time to read any of the previous comments, you’ll actually find that I’m a naturally slender, athletic woman as well. My hips are slightly too large to be a VS model, and my breasts are too small, but I am not just a jealous, heavier woman, as so many people have implied. What so many people have missed as being the point of this article is that I don’t at all have a problem with thinner women vs. curvier women; the unhealthy lengths to which these models go to achieve their figure is my problem, along with the fact that they then hold these women (and only these women) up as the standard of beauty when 99% of women will never look like them. That’s all.
This was a huge eye opener to me. I have loved VS ever since I saw my first fashion show at fourteen years old (I am now seventeen turning eighteen)!
Over the years I subconsciously thought:
skinny = sexy
hourglass figure = happiness
flawless face = fearlessness.
I believed that all girls who wore Victoria’s Secret was perfect and pretty, and ended up buying a lot of VS merchandise. I remember walking into a VS store for the first time, I loved how everything was so girly (I am a huge girly girl) and got hooked. VS was soon the only place where I could spend my whole paycheck in one visit. I would literally beg my mom to take me to a store whenever there was a sale or if they were launching a new product.
Soon my whole room became is covered in Victoria’s Secret products, I became obsessed with VS so much.
One day I bough a magazine that had a photo of Candice Swanepoel (VS model) , framed it and hung it on my wall. As I put it up I remember thinking to myself “One day I will look like that! No matter what I have to do, I shall look flawless like her”. Every time I saw that photo I was reminded how many imperfections I had. How I didn’t have perfect breast, perfect waist, nor a perfect “straight as a pen” nose. But some how I was going to “fix” all of these things about myself so I could be “perfect”.
Years went by with my VS obsession increasing and my food intake decreasing. I subconsciously ate less resulting in losing a lot of weight. I also considered getting my breast enlarged so I could look “sexier” and achieve that “perfect” hour glass figure (36, 23, 36).
Reading post has helped me realized how I was being brainwashed! I assumed being super skinny was the only way people would like me. Or having a prefect body is the only way guys would love me. Now I know that being beautiful is different from being perfect. I use to assume happiness comes from perfection, But now I know inner peace is the only way I will achieve true happiness. Thanks for posting.
I stumbled upon this shortly after watching the video “killing us softly”. Watching the video was an assignment for my psychology class. The whole video is about how people idealize women into something we are not and is almost impossible to be. Even the women we consider the most beautiful have flaws. Photoshop has reaked havoc over society. Us women look at these magazines and see the beautiful girls and desire so much to be like them. Little do we know that they are photoshopped and have flaws like everyone else. I think VS is notorious for this as well. Women should be allowed to have flaws! I’m 5 foot 5, 145 pounds, I have your typical cheerleader figure (large things and broad shoulders) and even though I’m not perfect I know I don’t have to be, and I want everyone out there to know that no matter what you look like or how much you way your beautiful. Every single women is a specially made creation, love your body and love yourself! Even learn to love that belly chub, and even those freckles! It’s okay no one is perfect no one!
I agree Becca — everyone should love their body no matter how much they weigh!!
This is interesting..because I’ve been buying clothes out of VS catalogs for years and I recall some curvy models in the catalog (i.e. laetitia casta, daniela pestova, and tyra banks)…so go figure.
I posted here before once and I’m skinny as hell but I really do think these places need to include women of all sizes. I think it’s messed up that they don’t to be honest. It even doesn’t help skinny people like me because we get backlash and envy from other women….some people might wish they were envied but it can cause cruel things to happen to you. Sure its’ not as bad as what some people do to people who are the opposite side of the scale but it’s still not very nice and probably wouldn’t happen if they didn’t only pick women with one body type to be models.
They need to start including other women, maybe some that are like this(this is from a Newspaper here in Toronto, they do this thing called The Sunshine Girl, which is mostly directed at men, but I like how the sizes of women that are featured are certainly more varied than models generally are:
http://www.torontosun.com/sunshine-girl/2011/12/03/natalie
^ You can scroll though more of her pics too. She’s clearly beautiful. You don’t have to be a size 0 or 2 to be beautiful and I’m tired of that message they send, despite being that skinny myself. I just think it’s wrong and harmful to people.
silly female. These women of Victoria’s Secret are career models and take their jobs very seriously. You will criticize these women at their dedication to creating an image of female beauty that other women wish to emulate and yet you do not complain about weightlifting women who do everything these models do for their own competitions!
I call jealous snarky sarcastic stupidity on this one. And the #1 purchaser of women’s clothes are… WOMEN. So blame yourself, put down the donuts and cookies and quit blaming everyone else for the cows that are fat women of today.
Yet another individual who seems to have missed the point, who is jumping to conclusions, and is making insulting comments toward both the writer of this article and basically any woman who has a problem with Victoria’s Secret.
The point of the campaign, which has been pointed out, is for women internationally to love their bodies; however, this message is a thoroughly misguided one, because all of the VS models pictured for the campaign have nearly the exact same measurements, and what they have to do to attain those ‘perfect’ physiques is extremely detrimental to their health.
Loving your own body would be a wonderful message to send out to the world — especially in this day and age, where we are living in such a media-saturated world and women, young and old alike, are feeling the pressure more and more to be thin — but instead. people will look at this campaign and wonder whether they should love their body at all since it’s promoting one body, and one body only, as beautiful and worthy of love.
Regarding your fat comments, believe it or not, you don’t have to be ‘stuffing your face with doughnuts’ to be upset about the way the media is presenting beauty. The writer of this particular article has already had to state over and over to people like yourself that she is a small person (and honestly, you can tell by her photograph anyway). I’m also a very healthy, slim, and fit individual, as I’m sure many of the others here are.
You also spoke of athletes and how they prepare to get into shape for competitions. This is, quite frankly, a very unfair comparison. Let me walk you through it.
Let’s take a look at Adriana Lima. In her own words, this is what she does before the big VS runway show.
-She works out every day, twice a day for the month leading up to the show.
-She has a nutritionist measure her muscle mass, body fat percentage, and water retention, and then come up with the perfect amount of protein shakes and vitamin supplements to take every day, as well as drinking a gallon of water a day.
-For nine days leading up to the show, she’ll then cut out all solid foods and drink only the protein shakes.
-Two days before the show, she’ll stop drinking the gallon of water and drink normally.
-Twelve hours before the show, she’ll fast completely — no food, no water, nothing.
All of this is done to make her look as thin as possible.
In contrast, let’s take a look at what a Crossfit athlete does before a competition.
-Athletes will start training many months in advance to give themselves plenty of time to gain strength and mass, and muscular and cardiovascular endurance.
-Because Crossfit encompasses so many different kinds of exercises, training will include everything from running to olympic weight-lifting to gymnastics and more, with special focus on the areas you know you need the most improvement in.
-Caloric intake is increased by quite a bit during this time to a) sustain the high activity levels your body is doing and ensure it’s getting enough energy, and b) build and repair muscle tissue. Protein intake will be quite high to support muscle growth and repair. Most Crossfitters eat a palaeo/primal diet which cuts out grains and most dairy and legumes, so all carbs are taken in from fruits, vegetables, and what little amount is found in nuts and seeds. Water intake is also very high to keep hydrated.
-During the last few weeks of training leading up to the competition, training will become less frequent and recovery periods will become more frequent. Most athletes will use this extra recovery time near the end to prepare their mind for the competition, by meditating, doing yoga, etc.
All of this is done to ensure the body and the mind is as strong and fit as can be.
The training the runway model is doing twice a day, everyday, is the type of training that will not make her any stronger. In fact, I guarantee you that 99% of models don’t lift any weight greater than three pounds, thanks to Tracey Anderson and her method which states, ‘women shouldn’t lift anything greater than three pounds.’
Couple this with the fact that they’re severely restricting their calories and putting themselves on insane diets, and you have the vast majority of these models who walk down the runway with next to no muscle mass and would not be able to do a single pull-up, perhaps not even a single push-up from their toes. Some of them might have the cardiovascular endurance to run for a few miles, but some of them might not be able to do even that. Bottom line is, all of their efforts put in before a show is so that they look their best, their thinnest.
On the other hand, the training the athlete is doing is to build lean muscle mass to become stronger, doing drills to become more agile, and doing plyometrics to get greater height in their jumps. Everything they do is intense enough to get their heart rate up, so while they do all of the above, they’re also working on their cardiovascular health, whether they’re doing strictly cardiovascular activity or not. They’re eating more, instead of eating less, to support their bodies, but more importantly, they’re eating heathily.
The bottom line for the athletes is that all of their efforts go towards being as strong, fit, and healthy as possible; it has nothing to do with how amazing they look.
For reference, here is a comparison of a runway model and a female Crossfit athlete:
Runway model – http://www.crossfitsouthbay.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/runway-model.jpg
Crossfit athlete – http://www.crossfitsouthbay.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/Crystal-682×1024.jpg
They both have approximately the same amount of body fat (12%). The difference is that the runway model has next to no muscle mass, whereas the athlete has been working for years to get continually stronger and fitter. She also happens to be about forty pounds heavier than the model.
I actually would love to see some women on the runway who look like they’re strong enough to lift some heavy weights and do some bodyweight exercises. I myself have been lifting heavily for years and would prefer to see that type of body on the runway, setting a good example for girls, rather than women who go nuts with a diet and exercise routine to make themselves as thin as possible while in the process putting their health at risk.
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