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Thin Ideal

High Heels & The Weight ‘Deal’ With Abbey Lee Kershaw

Abbey Lee Kershaw first came to prominence in the modelling world when she won the Girlfriend Model Search aged 15.  Now 22, Abbey has gone on to be an international success having worked in campaigns for Pirelli, Gucci and a host of international designers.  Quite heady stuff for someone so young.
Abbey Lee was interviewed on Today Tonight this week about her career thus far and I thought she had some interesting things to say about the modelling industry.  The clip is below.
Abbey comes across to me as a very sweet and humble young woman, and despite being very positive about her career, it’s clear the modelling industry has not always been kind to her.  She has not only fainted on a catwalk while wearing a corset, but also had to have knee surgery after tearing a ligament while walking in ‘mile high’ stiletto’s.  Due to her experience of tumbling in the high heels, Abbey turned down a job where she would have had to wear more outrageous shoes.  Abbey stated she hoped heel heights would soon come down and that “health and safety regulations have got to come into place at some point.”  It’s clearly pretty risky to be tottering around on heels like that so fair enough.
I find it interesting however that Abbey does not appear to think the same health and safety concerns should apply to models regarding their weight and the constant pressure to be thin.  When asked about this pressure, Abbey stated “that’s like asking a body builder how they feel about the pressures to be incredibly muscly.  An elite performer is always put under some sort of extreme pressure that the rest of society can argue or might not quite understand.”  While that may be Abbey’s perspective, I think this pressure to be thin (which she clearly does not deny), is most definitely of concern and worthy of a great deal more health and safety attention. 
I blogged about the importance of model health last year and why I thought it was imperative that these very young women were taken better care of by the industry that they work for.  Even highly successful models such as Sara Ziff agree with this.  This interview with Sara where she talks about her documentary on the modelling world, ‘Picture Me,’ (trailer below), is quite an eye opener, especially regarding the highly sexual nature of the industry and how it preys on young girls.  Further to this, as recently as today, a panel of fashion, modelling and design professionals agree their is clearly a significant problem, with casting director James Scully stating -

“I can open up any magazine or pick any show and tell you what girls are taking Adderall, how many girls are taking Vicodin, how many girls are throwing up, how many girls are carrying flasks,” he said. “Girls are really resorting to incredibly dangerous things.”

Despite what the young and impressionable Abbey Lee may believe, this, to me, is entirely unacceptable.  Changes within the modelling industry that put the health and welfare of models first, above ludicrously small sample sizes, or trends, or what magazine editors want in any given season – is long overdue.  Sara Ziff believes a model union “could provide some protection”  and it is my fervant hope that the Australian government will take on board the recommendations made to it by the National Body Image Advisory Committee that models be clearly of a healthy weight, greater size diversity be displayed on catwalks and no girls under 16 be employed to work at adult fashion shows.  While these recommendations form part of a code that is voluntary, one hopes that any modelling agency that considers itself to be reputable and looking after its “girls” would sign on to meet these standards.  Healthy models and age appropriate hiring.  It can’t be that hard can it?

I surely hope not. The health and wellbeing of many young models, not to mention the starry eyed girls who ill advisedly look up to them as beacons of beauty, really does depend on it. 

Tagged as: Abbey Lee Kershaw, Catwalk, Diversity, Drugs, Editors, Fashion, Fashion Designers, Girls, Government, Gucci, Health, Magazines, Model, Modelling, National Body Image Advisory Commitee, Pirelli, Pressure, Purging, Sample Sizes, Sara Ziff, Sexualisation, Thin Ideal, Today Tonight, Trends, Weight

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Don’t Optislim Your Hips Away

I was at the fish and chip shop last Sunday night.  On the menu – grilled fish, chippies and a greek salad.  Yum.  While waiting for my order I spied some mag’s on a table.  I picked up a copy of ‘Good Health’ which I have heard of, but never read.  It looked good.  Headlines like “Helping Your Daughter Build Self Esteem” and  ”Goal Setting for Women” caught my eye and so away I browsed.
I didn’t get very far though as my eyes were inundated with ad after ad for diet and weight loss products.  Never had I seen such a concentration of them in all my life.  All the usual shockers jumped out at me, but it was this one that nearly sent me into a meltdown in front of the fresh fish counter.
Shame on you Optislim.  Shame.
 
If it’s not bad enough that you produce a product that encourages people to replace two full meals a day with a powdered concoction claiming it is an “easy” way for them to lose weight – you now promote it with this horror ad.  You are making a gross generalisation that any woman that looks like the one looking in the mirror is either unhappy with her appearance or should be.  This is nothing more than an attempt at shaming women larger than a model size into thinking their body shape and size is unacceptable and that they have to do something to change it.  A perpetuation of of current society’s obsession with the ‘thin ideal’ if ever I saw one.
Also – do you think it cute or sassy marketing to produce an ad that encourages women to aim for a body that does not have hips or a bum?  Is it your intention to send women hurtling into a mind set that sees them want to lose so much weight that they literally diet themselves to skeletal proportions?  Just stop and think for a moment about how dangerous, outrageously stupid and wrong that is.  If your defence is that you are only joking - if you could see the look on my face right now you would clearly see I’m not amused.  Again I say it.  Shame Optislim.  Shame.
Shame also on you ‘Good Health’ for making this claim -  “Good Health will be different from any other (magazine) as every page will improve lives, bringing you the latest health news, views and breakthroughs” – and then cram your pages full of diet and weight loss ads.  Have you had your head buried in the sand somewhere that you don’t know that fad diets and gimmicky weight loss products harm people’s health rather than promote good health?  If you really want to do what you claim you do, then you won’t publish dangerous and demeaning ads like this one.  Until you do, you can be assured the only thing I will find your magazine useful for is to wrap my fish and chips in.

Tagged as: Body Image, Body Shaming, Diet, Diet Advertising, Good Health Magazine, Magazines, Optislim, Thin Ideal, Weight, Weight Loss, Weight Loss Products

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Disordered Eating in Trainee Teachers

I think if you were to ask most adults they would be able to relay to you either their own, or someone else’s “horror” story of high school gym, sport or physical education.  Incidents of shouting, exclusion, bias to athletically gifted students and bullying seem to abound, to the point where many students withdraw from classes or are actually removed by their parents.

I write this not in attack of PE teachers, but actually out of concern for them and the young people they work with.  While there are always negative examples in any profession, I also don’t believe that PE teachers deserve to be as badly caricatured as they are in films such as ‘Mr Woodcock.’

The concern I refer to is related to Australian research released last week.  A survey of more than 500 trainee PE teachers has found that male teachers were almost five times more likely than other teachers to fast, use avoidance tactics around food, smoke, take laxatives, use diet pills and purge as a means of weight control.  Female trainees were twice as likely to purge or take laxatives and were more likely to skip meals and avoid social situations that involved food.  Over-exercising abounded.

The key question is why?  How can these trainee teachers who are so young themselves, be engaging in practices that are incredibly dangerous and leading them down a path of developing an eating disorder – if they are tragically already not there.  Aren’t they meant to be people who know a lot about health, the body and taking care of oneself?   What has gone wrong here?  I don’t profess to know all or even any of the answers – but my hunch is that the following plays some part.

Somewhere along the way the desire to be muscular and/or thin has seen many people begin to equate physical exercise with weight loss, perfection, drive and obsessive behaviour.  Are these young trainees so concerned about their own physical appearance that they have to resort to these methods to feel ok about themselves and their bodies?  They must.  What other possible explanation could there be?  If you know of any – please do comment.  I would appreciate your input.

The follow on question to all of this of course is how these teachers of the future will possibly impact on their young students. Will their own body image woes and dangerous behaviours somehow transfer either directly or indirectly?  Somehow, I tragically think that they may, unless we begin to seriously challenge this warped view that many have of exercise.  In the grand scheme of our wonderful lives – it’s not about weight loss, perfection, muscles, drive and body fat.  Surely it must be about health, vitality, energy and balance.  I hope our trainee teachers can learn this very soon not only for themselves, but for all their students of the future.

Tagged as: Balance, Body Fat, Body Image, Bullying, Diet Pills, Disordered Eating, Eating Disorders, Energy, Fasting, Food Restriction, Health, Laxatives, Muscular Ideal, Over-Exercise, Perfection, Physical Education, Purging, Self Care, Smoking, Students, Teachers, Thin Ideal, Weight, Weight Loss

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Bridal Body Pressures

I started 2009 in the most beautiful of ways. I got married.  Having just settled into being ok about being a Bridget Jones singleton forever, falling in love and getting married came as a surprise.  Planning the day was a great experience except for one small detail. 
How was I going to get skinny?
Like most women living in a western world I have not been immune to body image, dieting and weight pressures.  As a hopefully worldlier woman in my thirties, I now feel a considerable deal less vulnerable to such pressure, but being a bride sure did test my ‘worldliness.’
Shopping for my dress was an average experience.  I was not permitted to have much of an opinion about what suited me.  I was steered towards what I can only describe as meringues or frosted cake ensembles that were supposedly meant to ‘disguise’ my bottom and hip area. Hmmmmm.
In one upmarket boutique I was asked if I had plans to lose weight and in another it was ‘do you think you might tone up?’  The pressure was building as the wedding world convinced me that I needed to lose weight to look and feel my best on my big day. Every magazine, chat room or blog I looked at was saturated with dieting tips and articles on how to be a ‘hot and skinny’ bride.  It was difficult to resist and I started to linger longer in front of the mirror in the morning, wondering whether I needed to do something about what appeared to be a drastic situation.  I was not, and never have been, naturally thin.  Did the success of my entire day hinge on this?
While the marketing machine of the wedding world may have been trying to tell me so, the whole thing was of course insidious and nothing more than an attempt to get me to spend more money on things such as ‘Bridal Boot Camp,’ the ‘Skinny Bride Diet’ and various forms of expensive magic knickers that were supposedly going to help me lose kilo’s in an instant.  It was all very hard to resist but was superbly helped by finding a dressmaker who actually listened to me and what I wanted.
While I felt incredibly beautiful and happy on my day, it deeply saddens me that Britt Pulton, 29, will never experience her own, after dying from bulimia just months away from her wedding date.  Britt had suffered from a long standing eating disorder that was exacerbated by workplace bullying.  I can only assume that Britt’s anxiety was also not helped by her impending day and the pressure that society places on women to look nothing less than perfect.  I am incredibly sorry for Britt’s loss but wish to thank her and her family for inspiring me to write this blog post.
If you are a bride, a bridesmaid or simply on a journey to a big occasion where you want to look your beautiful best – here are a few tips.
Crash diets are disastrous and dangerous. They will make you hungry, moody, and sap your skin of vital moisture. They can also set you on a fast path to an eating disorder. Please avoid.

Have confidence that no-one knows your body the way you do. If you want a certain look, don’t let anyone persuade you otherwise.

Be wary of bridal magazines. They are expensive and while useful for ideas and inspiration, they can also be a source of insipid marketing designed to make you feel you must look, act and be a certain way to be a ‘real’ bride.

Remember that your fiancée is marrying you not for the way you look, but for who you are – your soul, your heart, yourself. They are lucky to have you.

Do remember that this is just one day of your life. It’s an important one, but don’t place so much pressure on yourself about your weight, appearance and that dress that you become anxious, irritable and upset. You are worth more than that.

The most beautiful brides and indeed people, are the ones that radiate love and confidence. Be yourself and you will be beautiful.

Lastly – this is me with my divine husband Glenn on our special day.  I think I scrubbed up more than ok with not a meringue or frosted cake in sight.

Tagged as: Body Image, Bride, Brides, Bulimia, Bullying, Confidence, Dieting, Diets, Eating Disorders, Love, Pressure, Real Beauty, Thin Ideal, Wedding, Weight

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