“Models Aren’t Supposed To Eat”
It’s Fashion Week, which means we get things like this amazing collection by Christian Siriano and another look at the size zero model phenomenon. Apparently, they’re back in style this season. (So much for Whitney’s victory on America’s Next Top Model.)
Spurred on by a spike in reality TV shows promoting extreme dieting, women are once again being encouraged to jettison the pounds and emulate the waif-like proportions of Kate Moss and Victoria Beckham.
An American size zero is … the average measurement of an eight-year-old girl. But a renowned eating disorders expert says that the media’s fascination with stick-thin celebrities and the promotion of extreme dieting can lead to dangerous eating habits and potentially fatal illnesses such as anorexia nervosa…
“As people look at thin models they want to take on that body [image]. But the bottom line is that the models, in risking their own lives by doing this, are through identification encouraging the young girls and other young women to want to do the same.”
And while we’re on the subject, remember Model Maker? The show that seems to encourage eating disorders, whose auditions were sponsored by, of all things, Torrid? It keeps getting worse, as MTV says in defense of its show:
“Women come in all shapes and sizes, but models don’t,” says the MTV statement. “Skinny, no body fat and size zero are the words and phrases associated with models. Chubby, well-fed and big-boned are not.”
As if I wasn’t angry enough already at MTV and at Torrid, it just keeps getting more gross. And if you follow the link to the original article, you’ll see the title of this post is a paraphrase of Janet Dickinson, who on her show wanted her models to “come down with anorexia.” Please, do not let this show anywhere near your television sets, or your daughters. This is so gross.
Posted by mo pie
Filed under: Advertising, Advocacy, Eating Disorders, Fashion, Kids, Project Runway, TV
ok… this just makes me sick.
I’ve always secretly thought Torrid was a conspiracy to discourage plus-size girls with its ugly clothing and send them into the throes of anorexia. Now I know it’s true.
I find it hard to understand why anyone would watch any reality show, let alone one about the modeling industry, so I’m no help.
Has anyone drafted a good letter to MTV? I keep trying, but it ends in splutter. ..
There is a really fabulous documentary out called “Thin” which follows 3 women and one teen as they go through an inpatient eating disorders program. It’s so painful to watch and try to understand. And it makes so clear how the obsession to be thin (promoted by a culture that romanticizes models and ultra thin movie stars) is a hugely motivating factor in the beginnings of this process.
That’s incredibly sad to hear!
And I am sad to hear that about Janice Dickinson.
I’m a little worried that a couple of the models in Christian’s show looked comparitively healthy to me.
So I hadn’t watched the video before I commented. Why do runway models always have to look so bleak?
Bottom line: “Women come in all sizes, but we wish they’d only come in one: barely existent”.
This is a really sad subject. I know that shows like “Model Maker” truly made me believe that skinnier people were always happier with themselves and just in general. Media and their images were definitely one of the reasons I was anorexic during some of my teenage years. I’m glad to say I’m older and wiser now, but this is something no child or teen should ever watch because it’s promoting such an unhealthy lifestyle. Whoever thought this show was a good idea should be tarred and feathered.
I KNEW despite all of their insistence that the show promoted “working out to be healthy and “photoshoot ready” that this show was about how to turn an ugly fatty into a beautiful model.
I COULD SPIT.
Janet Dickinson is an idiot!!
I think we should take all the designers, movie and TV producers, agents, directors, etc. who force women to be ultra-skinny, and STARVE THEM!
No more business lunches at the best table in the hottest restaurant. No more designer coffee. No more being driven to work from their plush homes in gated communities. Instead, they can starve themselves, work out 6 hours a day, listen to criticism of their physiques 24/7, get the message that the only thing that matters is how thin they are, AND SEE HOW THEY FUCKING LIKE IT!!!!!!
Janice Dickinson is a hag. She used to be gorgeous, but she’s so determined to stay young, all her plastic surgery has turned her face into a fright mask, a drag queen caricature. Yes, I know I’m being spiteful and shallow, but that’s exactly what she is.
I don’t know why she is allowed to be famous these days. Most models from the early years have settled into their age; she is a joke for trying to avoid it and trying to be the Simon Cowell of modeling reality shows. You would think being a former model would open up her mind to how destructive ED’s in the industry can be, instead, she yells at already thin people for being fat. If anyone takes her seriously, I feel sorry for them. A life and a healthy mind is more important than looking like jerk-off fodder.
“An American size zero is … the average measurement of an eight-year-old girl. But…”
I knew it.
I KNEW IT.
And one more thing.
Why does the sentence that follows this one start with the word “But” instead of the word “And”????
*runs screaming*
On the latest episode of ANTM, Tyra called one girl to task for being super-thin. Tyra asked about the girl’s eating habits to make sure she wasn’t starving herself.
I thought that was good, especially in light of this latest.
The modeling world is a microplasm. They don’t know what happens outside of their little room. They only ever talk to other people in the room. Most of them have forgotten how people on the outside think.
It’d be nice if people could realize that fashion designers aren’t really trying to clothe the world as creating art that needs a walking hanger.
There is no way around it, you can find two women who are both 5′4″ and 300 pounds and have to dress them very differently to get them to look nice, and there’s some idea that we should all be able to buy clothes off the shelf. If it makes anybody feel any better, just about nobody can. Not my 6′5″ boyfriend, not my younger brother (who god the Greek God gene of the family). Not my skinny friend with food allergies, nor my relatively average-sized mother (she lost a lot of weight and is in 12s or so, I think). My mother who is, by the way, an actual real, honest-to-god hourglass figure, which is what most clothes are built for, although few women actually are. (I am too, if you go by the textbook definition, I just have much bigger hourglass.) I’ll repeat that- my mother is an hourglass figure and not far from the size eight standard that most clothes are built off of, and *SHE* has trouble buying off the rack.
The move to buying clothing in certain sizes and off a rack was a real step backwards. I’d be more than willing to pay 40-50 bucks to a seamstress if she would make a pair of jeans that would fit me just the way I want them. Around my waist, boot cut, short enough… but I’ll be damned if I’m giving Lane Bryant that much so I can settle on a pair.
I’m not the mannequin they built that pair of jeans off of.
Everything about the Model Maker show is so WRONG! I really don’t understand Torrid’s motives to be associated with it either. I mean, let’s say these girls become thin. Isn’t that loosing perspective customers who would pay money to them?
Anyone else notice that Siriano’s new collection looks exactly like his Project Runway collection, except he threw in a few colors?
He so did not deserve to win. This collection just reinforces that fact.