When reports such as Fatties on TV regarding Marie Claire Magazine's blog post and Should Women Over 50 Have Long Hair air on NBC news and/or NBC's web site, you have to wonder why they're not spending time on real news. That said, I have some comments about both issues.
Re: Fatties on TV
Maura Kelly said, ". . . while I think our country's obsession with physical perfection is unhealthy, I also think it's at least equally crazy, albeit in the other direction, to be implicitly promoting obesity!" in Marie Claire Magazine's blog. Yes, she also said, "anorexia is sick." However, she doesn't have any problem with television "implicitly promoting" ultra-thin, size zero women and lanky, skin and bones men. I'll admit that the latter is less prevalent. Maura insultingly said, "So anyway, yes, I think I'd be grossed out if I had to watch two characters with rolls and rolls of fat kissing each other ... because I'd be grossed out if I had to watch them doing anything. To be brutally honest, even in real life, I find it aesthetically displeasing to watch a very, very fat person simply walk across a room . . . ." I'm not grossed out. Overweight, and even obese, people need love too. So what if TV shows are promoting "big is beautiful." Here are two truths: 1) Fat does not mean ugly and 2) skinny does not mean beautiful. I've seen beautiful and ugly people (I pay more attention to women in my case) in both categories. I've seen obese (300+ lb) women with very pretty faces. Am I going to say, "Man, she's got a hot body"? Perhaps not. Along the same line, I've seen "size zero" women with pretty faces, but I'm not going to go gaga over their stick figure. A certain percentage of body fat is healthy. Personally, I'd go for a woman 20, or even 40, pounds over her optimum weight (per standardized health guides) over an ultra thin woman (15+ lbs under optimum weight) any day.
After much public attention, Maura did apologize. However, you know it was just to save face for Marie Claire Magazine. Maura, if you want obese people removed from television because of "implied promotion", I'm going to go to the opposite extreme. I think that ultra thin people should be removed from TV. Their very dangerous too from a "promotional" standpoint; especially to teenage girls. After being bombarded by television shows and magazines promoting ultra thinness, many young women think that they have to be size zero to be attractive. While this might not be as big of an issue as far as health insurance is concerned, it does lead to bad eating habits such as binging and purging and even teen suicide. So, I say either get those ultra thin people, especially women, off the TV and big screen or make them gain a few pounds so that they are either at or slightly over their optimum weight. By the way, there are two main factors in calculating optimum weight: height and build. A person's build can range from small to large. For reference, I'd say that Bill Cosby has a medium build.
Here's the type of woman we should see more of on TV:
Patricia Arquette is "plus-size" and beautiful.
Re: Should Women Over 50 Have Long Hair?
Depends on the type of hair the woman has, but I'd say yes in most cases. After all, they say that 50 is the new 30.
I think Meryl Streep looks great with long hair. Enough said.
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Good points. This obsession with redefining the beauty standard every 10 years makes women ill in the head, if not our bodies. We can't achieve this size 0 standard, which is very different from the size 4-6 90s Supermodels I worked with. They were at least healthy by medical standards. The impact of models generally is yet another topic.
As for the long hair, well I have grown my own like Meryl Streep's, and people are raving. I don't know who makes up all these rules for women.
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