While many of the writers, editors, stylists, designers and photographers in the fashion industry are far from ‘perfect’, they choose to project the image of ‘the ideal body’ on impressionable minds. Why is fashion ‘thin’ and what is its effect?
The definition of fashion is as follows;
style in clothes, cosmetics, behaviour etc. esp. the latest or most admired style. ‘Admiration’ in the world of fashion lies far from the notion of coveting a particular item of clothing. Rather, when we admire fashion, we admire the images that fashion projects. Fashion is all about controlling how we are looked at; it is assumed that you can control or alter people’s first impressions of you by the clothing that you wear.
Fashion designers dress their muses in their creations and send the racehorses strutting down the catwalk in a flurry of cheekbones, hipbones and gleaming, pale skin. If there is any doubt that designers use models to tap into the desires of the target market, you need only compare the curvier models of American underwear monopolists Victoria’s Secret with the waifs of the trend led catwalks. Fashion models are walking coat hangers whose figures do not distract from the garments, whereas the lingerie models are chosen to embody ‘sexiness’ in order to sell provocative underwear.
This example shows the two images of perfection that we are inundated with. A: the sexy, toned and beautiful Barbie-doll aesthetic that has been around since our current hegemonic ideology has been upheld, or B: the bony waif depicted first in 1990’s grunge culture, perhaps sparked with photographer, Corinne Day’s penchant for
heroin chic. An antithesis to the overdone glamour of previous editorials, Day portrayed candid documentation of drug abusers and more famously, heroin chic poster girl Kate Moss, infamously quoted for stating that “
Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.” Far from conventionally pretty, Moss was just edgy, young and skinny. Nowadays, the criteria that distinguished Day and Moss from the rest are the status quo.
Models aren’t slender, they are skinny. The appeal of ‘A’ diminished as concave stomachs, visible rib cages and bony legs surpassed what was previously considered a ‘perfect body.’ Fashion editorials, runway coverage and the media as a whole turned to this stripped back aesthetic. A scrubbed-up heroin-chic that required dramatically thin measurements saw fully grown women in the public eye plummet to the weight of a twelve year old. 100 pounds, seemed like the golden goal.
Kelly Brownell, a US expert in eating disorders says that “
the media contribute to a toxic environment in which eating disorders may be more likely to occur. This is because of the ‘Damaging Paradox’ of modern society.” The media promotes a low-weight, toned body and our current environment “
provides an increasing array of foods high in fat and calories with compelling pressures to consume.” Consequently
“the gap between the ideal and the normal body weight is giving rise to anxiety. We seek to reduce this anxiety by reducing our weight.”
In the online article
The Media And Eating Disorders, Deanne Jade writes that
“There is no doubt that the media provides significant content on body related issues to young women, over fifty per cent of whom read fashion and beauty related magazines. The exposure to ideal images coincides with a period in their lives where self-regard// is at its most fragile. Girls thus find themselves in a subculture of dieting, reflecting messages//from parents, peers, members of the opposite sex as well as the media.”
Today it is harder for women and men alike, to become satisfied with their body image as we aren’t living actively. It is tougher to maintain one’s figure in a modern society where we live online, eat out of packets and constantly compare ourselves with everybody else. It is not much of a surprise then that in this digital age, many young women have taken to the Internet to encourage weight loss and engage competitively in the quest for ‘the perfect figure’. Whereas adults turn to Weight Watchers and the like for moral support; teens have a far more secretive and dangerous way of ‘tracking their progress’.
Online site, Tumblr has unwillingly bred a corner of cyber-space dedicated to ‘#proana’; where people swap ‘thinspiration’, diet tips and images of their ‘progress’. Typing ‘proana’ (which stands for pro-anorexia, which is unfathomable in itself) into the search box throws up thousands of images of models, fruit and ‘encouraging messages’. The blog titles range from ‘
hip-bones-wanted’ and
‘only-fat-people-eat-bread’ to ‘
reaching-double-digits’. The latter posted this message “
Re-post if you’re an eating disorder blog so I can follow you.” Grids of the ABC diet (anorexia-boot-camp) encourage a 500 calorie-and-under diet plan that condones a fast every few days. Here, young people actively encourage each other to develop eating disorders. Even girls that do not partake in this kind of competitive dieting, feel the pressure. One girl that I spoke with says that online, it is virtually impossible to avoid pictures of ‘thinspiration’ even though she doesn’t actively search for them. She admitted that while she would like to look like the women in those images; it isn’t worth starving herself.
It seems that these teens have developed a fixation with being ‘prettier and thinner’; thinking that ‘achieving’ this will in turn make them happier/more successful/more attractive people when in reality, many people who suffer from an eating disorder and recover; often remain anxious about their body image and suffer a guilt-ridden relationship with food. “
Even though I’m in shape, if I eat something ‘bad’ I immediately feel rubbish about myself. I eat chocolate and then think, ‘now I’m going to have to go for a run tomorrow’.” Another anonymous post followed the same line of thought.
“I always complain that I’m fat, and then raid the fridge anyway. I think it’s because we aren’t supposed to eat junk food, that we want it. They (the magazines)
make us think that we can’t treat ourselves, so we want to. That’s how the guilt relationship starts.”
A university student, age 21, spoke to me about her views on the impact of fashion magazines upon body image. “
I think magazines and the media are the main cause of society’s negative view on body image. Magazines show what is supposed to be relevant but by only showing women up to a size 12 (at a push) it alienates bigger women and makes them feel inadequate.” She continued “
I know personally as a plus size woman that even though demographically I am the magazine’s target audience, I can’t/won’t read them because they don’t show anything relevant to me because of my size. When the average woman is a size fourteen, and they neglect to represent them, they’re missing out on a large portion of readership. It’s a shame and even having a division between ‘plus size’ and ‘normal size’ can be damaging to someone’s self-esteem.”
Fortunately, some are helping to change the ridiculous notion that ‘plus size’ isn’t pretty. 23 year old model Robyn Lawley began her modelling career at 16, living on apples and counting calories as she tried to meet the modelling industry’s “
corrosive skinny standards.” However after returning to her natural size (12-14) and becoming the face of lingerie brand Boux Avenue, she made Elle and Vogue covers.
“’I tell tall girls, being tall and curvy is the double whammy! But confidence is really sexy. I love my shape. I love my body. I’ve come a long way.’ She adds: ‘I genuinely want companies to take notice and start being more realistic about who their customer really is. I hope to keep breaking down those barriers.’”
In an online survey that I created, 100% of the participants agreed that fashion magazines can influence body image. One person commented that
“I often look at models in magazines and compare myself with their thin frames. While it makes me more conscious of my diet, I have the knowledge to prevent me from taking drastic steps to lose weight.” While 68.2 % of respondents thought that fashion editorials sent out a negative message; fifty per cent said that people on the television influenced their body image most. However the remaining 50 % stated that images from the Internet are the most influential. One participant commented that
“I’m not that affected by magazines but I may be affected by people on the television and pictures on the Internet.”
A participant anonymously revealed the cause of their own eating disorder.
“I remember that the reason I started was actually because I saw a television show about how being Anorexic and Bulimic was bad…how did that happen? I can’t stop now that I’ve started no matter how hard I try. It’s the only control I have.”
One of the issues with television it seems, is when the representatives of the 16-18 year old demographic are misrepresented in the media. Exports from the US like 90210, cast size-zero twenty year-olds with gleaming hair and perfect skin as high-school students.
“I’d say television actually does a lot more damage than magazines I’ve seen. Most of us know that models in magazines aren’t ‘real people’; they’re airbrushed and fake. But characters in TV and movies are supposed to represent real, 3-D people with personalities and lives. When everyone in that setting is super-thin and attractive (especially the women) it can certainly warp the way people think about themselves.”
When asked who they most compare their body image with, 81% selected their peers as their main point of comparison. However, 68.2 % cited celebrities as an additional influence. 57.1 % had even bought something in order to emulate someone in the public eye at one point or another; which supports the idea that we are influenced not only by magazines, but the media in general.
“There is no doubt that media affects my body image. I’ve had an eating disorder for five years now and while I don’t necessarily believe that the media alone can cause an eating disorder, it certainly encourages unhealthy eating habits. Also, for someone who may already have a biological predisposition to disordered eating, I definitely believe it can push them over the edge.”
This is the perfect example that the media we are exposed to can directly influence our body image. Whether it manifests as a television programme, website or film, I have gathered conclusive proof that the media makes a significant impact on the majority of people. Despite the statistical proof that the television and Internet influence body image the most; 72.7% still agreed that models in magazines were too thin and 81% felt that fashion magazines indirectly cause eating disorders.
With their miscellaneous contradictions, praise for the immaculately beautiful, criticism for the rest of us and yet campaigns like
Cosmo hearts your body in Cosmopolitan; readers are often left with a distorted image of what is right. Magazines can often feel like they’re dictating our standards; encouraging insecurity and suffocating us with costly solutions to our problems. If one remembers that
our problems are created by
their issue with us,
their need for financial gain and not a personal hate crime against ourselves then their impact on our body image should diminish. If they were urging us to eat copious quantities of junk food because being in shape was as ‘disgusting’ as they portray excess fat to be, would you follow their regulations? We seem to have a predisposition to adhere to their rules but it seems that now is an apt time for a game change.
Models are just images printed on paper; one person’s ideal showing off their own sartorial creations. A figment of imagination if you will. We shouldn’t be affected by something as intangible as someone else’s daydream.
