New anti-anti-anorexia campaign (huh?)

No words are needed - click here (NSFW) and tell me what you think. This is in response to the Italian billboards I told you about last month.

PS I learned about this poster from the MySpace page of past Seventeen Magazine editor Atoosa Rubenstein.

I do believe the underlying message is "Love Your Body" - but is this picture (of a plus-sized model) promoting health, acceptance, and all things positive? Or is it wrong to glamorize any far end of the weight spectrum? Looking forward to a boisterous conversation on this - I'll jump in, too!

Comments

I'm shaking my head right now. I'm a wellness education major and I have to say they're taking it to the extreme. It's incredibly unhealthy to be anorexic and to have an eating disorder, but on the other hand being obese causes a multitude of diseases like cancer, diabetes, cardiovasclar problems, oh and death.

I think the message should be to love your body and for the love of God, TAKE CARE OF IT!!! Eat healthy foods, keep your weight at a healthy level, and exercise regularly.

I think the Hollywood standard for beauty is so "out there" that that's what we perceive as beautiful (being a size 0 or 2) but it's just not attainable for the Everywoman. The women in Hollywood are paid to work out, have plastic surgery, and so on because they're on the big screen. The rest of us are not. We should not be held to the same standards as these woman because we're well, REAL.

There is a tenuous balance to be struck, and I think these people are doing us a disservice by saying it's all right to be obese. It's not.

I'm a not a big fan of this campaign not because it promotes Fat Acceptance or anything like that but because they are responding to the Nolita Campaign with the other extreme. Reminds me of a NO! YES! NO! argument between children. This country (and others) is obsessed with extremes and I think we should focus on finding a balance.

I'm tired of people arguing about how thin is ideal and fat is evil but don't you dare get too skinny. Everyone is differnt. How do I know if the women on the posters are healthy or not? You cannot make that assumption based on appearance alone. Can't we just move past the way people look and just focus on how they move, what they eat and how they feel? I guess I'm saying I would prefer to focus on finding balance and inner beauty instead. How you do that in a marketing campaign? I have no idea and will give mad props to the person who figures it out.

Libby, great comments - maybe this could work as some sort of project for you in your coursework?

Rose, you put it very well when you wrote "I'm tired of people arguing about how thin is ideal and fat is evil but don't you dare get too skinny." This harsh mentality is at the crux of many eating disorders and, I believe, is def representative of what our society tells us - fat is bad, thin is good, but don't you go too far because very thin is very bad. It's been said that women with EDs are often thinking something along the lines of, "You wanted me to be perfect? You wanted me to be thin? Well, look at me now - look how thin and perfect I am now!" At least I'm pretty sure that went through my subconscious when I was anorexic.

i completely agree with rose on this one.
everyone IS different and as long as we keep giving people black and white options (i.e. anorexia or obesity) then society will continue to have problems identifying what "normal" or "healthy" actually means for the individual.

I also disagree with the extremes. While anorexia is extremely unhealthy for the body, so it obesity! They both strain the heart, and it's just rather silly to respond to the anorexic image with an obese one.

I completely agree with loving yourself (I'm even doing a series on it this month), but when you truly do love yourself, you actually want to take care of your health. Obesity isn't healthy, would you want anyone you love to be obese and have health problems? Of course not, so why would it be any different for you if you truly love yourself?

I believe it's much healthier to focus on health and being fit....that doesn't mean being skinny or stick thin. If they had put up an image of a fit woman with muscle tone and definition (and not the other extreme of a body builder), that would have been a much healthier image to display in response to the anorexic one.

Libby wrote, "I think the Hollywood standard for beauty is so "out there" that that's what we perceive as beautiful (being a size 0 or 2) but it's just not attainable for the Everywoman. The women in Hollywood are paid to work out, have plastic surgery, and so on because they're on the big screen. The rest of us are not. We should not be held to the same standards as these woman because we're well, REAL."

Can I ask why it's okay that these women are paid to be a size 0 or 2, to work out, have plastic surgery, and so on? Why is it okay for them to set these bars for the rest of us? Why can't they be a size four, six, eight, or heaven forbid, a size ten? Those sizes are more attainable for the majority of us, why can't Hollywood be held to the same ATTAINABLE AND MAINTAINABLE standards the rest of us are?

Just a thought.

I find the obese girl equally frightening as the anorexic girl. I agreed with Libby's first two paragraphs, her second one not so much and her 3rd she's correct again. I dont agree that hollywood women are paid to work out. they work out to keep themselves in the best shape so that they will get the parts they want - different thing. same as a teacher goes on training courses to keep themselves up to date. the only people who get paid to work out are trainers. as for its not attainable for the regular woman I disagree it is. its just that it involves a lot of very hard work that the vast majority of us are not willing to put in.

Monique, I never said it was OK for the Hollywood standard to be OUR standard. I was limited in the amount of space I had to make comments, so I had to trim my comment down. I find it very wrong that these Hollywood standards are put on the rest of us, and I absolutely agree that the standards should be equal for all of us.

When I said that the actresses are paid to look the way they do it is because they won't get the parts they want if they're "overweight." Remember what a kerfluffle there was over Kate Winslet's weight? She said in an article I read a few years ago that the first question casting people ask her agent is, "how is Kate's weight lately?" In other words, if she's not thin, she doesn't get the job.

Sara Jessica Parker commented after the birth of her son that she was able to be so thin so quickly afterward because she could afford to have a personal trainer and it was a part of her job to be thin. Same goes for Elle MacPherson, Heidi Klum, and others. This, to me, is a job expense.

I don't really think the plus size model is necessarily "the other side of the spectrum..." I was expecting someone of a much more unhealthy size, to be honest. Just my opinion...

It affects what we get in the movies too. Actors male and female have to be thin. We lose so many talented actors due to this problem its a shame.

I never said it was OK for the Hollywood standard to be OUR standard. I was limited in the amount of space I had to make comments, so I had to trim my comment down.