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The Café Society program, run by the Public Square at the Illinois Humanities Council, aims to create more informed and engaged communities through weekly coffee shop conversations that tackle relevant social issues.
In a discussion titled “Too Thin to Win” participants this week will be zeroing in on not only the media’s portrayal of thinness as an ideal, but the steps that have been taken to combat destructive and unattainable images. In an effort to legislate against "thinspiration," some European countries have gone as far as to threaten five figure fines and jail time to those running pro-anorexia websites, and to ban underweight models in fashion shows.
Café Society would like us to ponder: should the government be involved in determining our society’s images of beauty? Should similar policies be adopted in the United States? Are banning certain images a form of censorship? What really causes eating disorders? Are we soon going to be suing Tyra Banks for parading skinny women across our TV screens on America’s Next Top Model?
Café Society meets Tuesdays at Intelligentsia Coffee, 3123 N. Broadway, 7:30 p.m., free. Here is the rest of the schedule.
Photo by roger g1.
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I consider my self a friend of the Feminista Movement, but I'm tired of so many women hiding behind Feminism instead of just admitting that they are over weight just like most lazy complacent consumer culture addicted Fat Americans
Are banning certain images a form of censorship?
yes, whether it's for good or bad, using rule changes to hide too skinny models from runways is quite clearly is a textbook example of censorship.
That said, not showing nudity or cigarette commercials on public television is censorship too. Should those be allowed on television?
As someone who has a ridiculously fast metabolism and who has been asked numerous times during her life if she is anorexic, I think this is a bunch of bull. I am all for ganging up on people who support and promote anorexia, but honestly, telling thin people that their bodies are banned really doesn't do a lot except piss off thin people. We should be supportive of *all* types of bodies as long as those bodies are healthy.
AMEN a wu. I'm so tired of irresponsible language that denigrates ANY woman's body and calls doing so a "social issue." My body, and its state, is no one's damn business. So how about we cage these discussions a bit more intelligently and quit with the constant need to tell, subtly or otherwise, women they need typify any particular shape or size.
A wu: agreed. All types of bodies should be supported as long as they are healthy. I'm jealous you have a fast metabolism. I am sure people are asking you out of concern. Or jealousy. Thin or fat, a healthy lifestyle should be encouraged.
What we need to do is educate young girls and boys early in their childhood and encourage good eating habits. Parents play a huge roll in this. My mom, whether she liked it or not, played a huge roll in my body image. There was a reason why all 3 of us sisters in my family had one form of an eating disorder in our adolescence and early adulthood.
If you were blessed with thin genes, that's great. But all too often, models are not healthy. They are encouraged to chain smoke, take diet pills, eat very little, or purge.
We need to look at what has become culturally acceptable. Why is it that a size 8 or 10 is considered "plus size", when that is a healthy weight and body image that should be encouraged in magazines, not banished to fat ads. Yes, weights have steadily rose over the past 40 years, but the ideal model has become much thinner. That's obvious.
I don't know if our government should get involved in regulating the modeling industry, but we really need to take a long hard look at where we are heading, and the government can play a part in that by encouraging healthy eating habits, limiting fatty, unhealthy foods in the public school system, and encourage healthiness--not anorexia or obesity--as a cultural norm.
Something a little hidden from view about this legislation is who exactly it targets. Many of the sites that promote "thinspiration" or sites that share how to tips on eating disorders are teenage girls. Are the fines and jail time really meant for fourteen old girls? If not them, then who?
It's kind of patronizing and obnoxious to imply that women are so susceptible to media images, we can't handle seeing anorexic women on the runway, and that such images will make us anorexic ourselves. If the causes of anorexia were so simple, wouldn't it be much easier to treat, rather than killing 1 in 10 women who have it?
Julia, I disagree. First of all these are teenage girls and tweens who are seeing these images, not just 20- and 30-somethings who may be less susceptable. Second, when the media/ads show these images, society begins to think that extreme thinness is normal, socially acceptable, etc. They are advertisements. If advertisements did not work and people did not fall for ads, there would be a lot less ads, don't you think? Eating disorders are complex, and are about control and addiction, and a whole host of factors play into these disorders, but the images do not help.
I don't think the government can regulate any of this, let alone decide what is "healthy" and what is not. The BMI is total BS, there are too many individual factors when it comes to weight.
What if it was illegal to be fat?
Sorry bad link
I'm with Sparky. However much I'm for individual choice and reflection when it comes to consumption habits - whether that's through one's pocketbook or through one's mouth - I don't think even the most vigilant folks fully understand the reasons for their reasons. Identity ain't no island in a sea of vacuums.
Matty: in some places, obese people do get punished through higher insurance premiums. It's also a very socially acceptable form of discrimination. You don't see many fat people in sales positions, for example (except maybe some men). According to the AOA, wages of mildly obese white women were 5.9 percent lower than standard weight counterparts; morbidly obese white women were 24.1 percent lower. Men, on the other hand only experienced wage penalties at the very highest weight levels. Fat women are perceived as slobs.
So, while it may not be illegal, it certainly isn't good to be obese in this country.
Playing the devil's advocate here: Keep in mind that the target of the European legislation are those who are promoting Anorexia as a lifestyle. Not just thinness, but a physical and psychological disorder that warps self perception in a life threatening way. Advertising that promotes harm isn't protected speech. Maybe some precedent for this can be found in the way that we limit how the tobacco industry can advertise because of health concerns.
I don't think we need to worry too much about a slippery slope taking all the skinny people off of our television in this case.
Do the people discussing this proposal even know what an eating disorder is?
i recognize this as a problem that needs to be adddressed but am troubled by the role of the government. this is very euro.
I'd like to see minimum weight requirements enacted for models. It would be great if the fashion industry would do this on their own, but that's like asking polluters to voluntarily limit emissions...it's just not going to happen.
"So, while it may not be illegal, it certainly isn't good to be obese in this country."
*round of applause*
sorry, it's affecting everyone, including me. I am 20 pounds overweight. I don't call myself a victim or anything like that. I wish others would just say..."it's not society, it's me...this is empirically unhealthy"
We're not just talking about censorship issues, but also, using jails as part of the "solution" to this problem! I think, as with most social justice/community well-being issues, the criminal legal system is not a productive tool. There are other ways for folks to work on broadening our standards of beauty, including making our own media, boycotting/girlcotting products and programs that violate our standards, letter-writing campaigns, and work within our own communities to support diverse bodies.
I think that's a great point by thishere about the criminal legal system. What does that solve?
You ever walk past a Lane Bryant store and look at the mannequins in the window?
They look like what a normal healthy person should look like.
So, it's no wonder that so many women have eating disorders when healthy and normal are considered fat in our society.
Sure...they have clothes in that store for really, really big women...but the mannequins in the window sure don't look fat...and everyone knows that Lane Bryant is a store for 'fat' women.
I loved it when my high school aged son and I were walking past the Lane Bryant store one day and he made a comment on how it was sick that what they were displaying in their window was considered, in our society, to be fat.
We idolize the likes of Kate Moss who is seen snorting coke and constantly with a cig in her hands (vices that keep a gal thin).
She is rewarded with obscene amounts of money
and holds the admiration of young girls everywhere in her hands.
And then you'll read snarky comments about young women like Raven Simone, who in my opinion, is just adorable and I love that she's a curvy girl who has loads of confidence.
The media really does a good job of exposing celebrities and their bodies. When you read headlines about Britny Spears being fat, and Mischa Barton's cellulite...no wonder young girls
are starving themselves. I mean, Britny may have gotten a little soft as of late, but c'mon...she is not fat (as the rags call it)
and zooming in on dimpled thighs of movie stars is just disgusting.
Women have cellulite. Get over it. Skinny women have it, fat women have it.
There is no getting around it and it's just sad that
the media makes women feel ashamed of being women.
Parents really have to work overtime these days to give young girls the means to deal with this scrutiny. Not that boys are immune either. There are many boys who also deal with anorexia and boys who are afraid to
show emotion and their feminine sides. The world does not seem to reward the Alan Aldas of the world (especially when you're in high school).
Thishere and special k: the Europeans (French, specifically) are using jail time for website developers, magazine editors, bloggers etc. for promoting anorexia. Not 14 year old girls that these websites are targeting. This is about protecting children. That doesn't mean that we will do that in the US or that it should even be done. I don't know. But, we have to examine what really is protected under first amendment rights. Is a website or magazine teaching children to use syrup of ipecac to induce vomiting to lose weight protected under the first amendment? Should a website developer be fined or jailed for promoting this lifestyle? I don't know.
Ingrid: I have to agree. I walk past Lane Bryant stores and see the models that are thinner than me (but I am too thin to shop at Lane Bryant). I am a twenty-something woman who should be over this crap. But all the self-esteem in the world doesn't help me. I work out daily and eat right--and I am healthy. But I still can't help but feel like shit for being a size 10/12.
Good for your son for understanding what it means to be healthy in this society and not accepting the social norm of thinness and goodness. And good for you for teaching him that.
Shameless plug here: we had a great discussion on this topic last night at Intelligentsia, and there'll be more of the same tonight at Pause cafe (just off the Berwyn Red line stop), tomorrow and on Friday. This topic in particular is the sort that benefits from real-time discussion as well!
Sparky, I am old enough to be your mom and I STILL struggle with these issues.
I grew up with a mom who was short and 'round-ish' and I was born tall and skinny. Problem was, my mom, who was ALWAYS on one diet or another never told me that I wasn't fat.
I grew up thinking I was fat. That is the tape that I carry in my head, so no matter how thin I get, I still see fat. I think I will go to my grave thinking I am fat.
That is the legacy that my mom left me. I look back on those days and I can see that there was probably some jealousy on her part, especially as I got to be a teen. I just wish that at least once she had told me that I looked good. She would go out of her way to make underhanded comments that
really whittled away at my self confidence and self image...but that was her own insecurity surrounding her body image.
Which is sad, because even though she was, what they called back in the day "pleasingly plump"...jeez...I look at old pics of her and she was really pretty...she had a sexuality that she NEVER recognized...kind of Nigella-ish Just so sad, in so many ways.
I have a daughter in her 20's who is amazingly secure in her body image. I guess I must have worked overtime
to make sure that she never had to deal with those inner struggles that I did growing up.
Whenever my mother would see a fat woman strutting around in a bathing suit she would make her disgust known in no uncertain terms. This always bothered me, because to this day (and even though I judge myself so harshly) when I see a fat woman in a bathing suit I admire her for being
comfortable with herself.
I look at her and I just wish that I could have that ease with my body. I could be 115 pounds and still not be at ease.
It really is amazingly refreshing to be around a woman, even though she would be considered fat, it's nice to be around her if she is comfortable with who she is. I love that. I admire that.
You think just because you're in your 20's you should be over it? Ha. I have a friend...a talented, advanced degreed professional who must weigh no more than 105 pounds. If she does so much as eat one fucking donut hole, she will go on the treadmill and punish herself for who knows how long. She is older than me and still has this mindset!!
I also knew this woman, years ago, who was in her 50's and in and out of rehab for anorexia. In her freaking 50's with 2 young daughters and was constantly going away to rehab. This woman looked like a walking skeleton. Nice example for her daughters.
But, I really do think that the whole industry....modeling, advertising, magazines, Hollywood, sits such as TMZ...they are all despicable for promoting this measure of beauty that is unattainable because 95% of it is airbrushed anyway.
I don't know how the jerks that promote this sleep at night.
I can understand the rational behind this idea, but it today's media environment, is regulation in one country actually going to change anything? Given the ubiqity of the internet and American culture around the world, how will regulation in France make a substantive change in the images of women that are produced in and coming from outlets outside France's jurisdiction?
I find the move by the French government compelling in how it is a formal attempt to change how people make distinctions.
JAH-
How will it change?
We are having this conversation anchored discussion in a language and in a place other than French/France. Isn't this a case of where ubiquity of the internet works in a different way than you imply? Perhaps culture is not only 'American' but 'French' as well if we are discussing this here. Without the French resolution WE probably wouldn't be discussing this in the first place.
It is ultimately through the most basic conversations that new, substantive distinctions emerge. (good work Chicagoist and Illinois Humanities Council)
the media’s portrayal of thinness as an ideal
Now come on...when is the skinny guy the ideal? How many of you noticed that Barack could stand to put some meat on his bones? And if he did buff up a bit, would that make him more electable? You bet
recall that last five male movie protagonists you saw...bony? That last five televised male athletes?
Consider that william perry would be considered of average weight at this phase of the NFL.
When at a family reunion,
"look at skin n bonez J, man, J, when are you gonna eat some more, you need to get some meat on your bones!"
OR
"Look at J! He is so fucking fat! Man, when are you gonna stop eating?"
King of Queens? Jay Leno? Jim Belushi stupid show?Shit HOMER SIMPSON The Bachelor? Fucking Chef Ramsay and that guy miglaoklin group on PBS the hero of GTA IV?
Media portrayal is NOT on the thin side for the guys