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She Ain't Got No Booty!
Recently while at a movie theatre watching an ultra thin blond
actress on the screen, a teenage boy shouted out, "She ain’t got no
booty!" My sister and I smiled.
Afterwards in the car driving home, my sister said to me that she
was glad there were men out there who appreciate women with
figures!
I have an MA in Educational Psychology and have written a children’s
self-help book which teaches anger management. It is part of a
series I hope to get published. One of my unpublished manuscripts
deals with body image and protecting oneself from all of the
messages that women should be as thin as possible. Sometimes I
have to remind myself of my own advice!
Lately, I had been feeling bad about my body. I am short, hippy and have a bust. In other words, I have a
woman’s figure. Then, I realized something. I noticed that the television actresses are getting so thin they no
longer have breasts.
Some of them have been whipping their false silicone inserts out during interviews! We laugh but isn’t it sad? Isn’t
it dangerous for young women to be bombarded by these unhealthy images? More and more actresses look
anorexic/ bulimic. The image that we see is not normal. I cannot stand the jeans commercial with the talking belly
buttons attached to completely flat stomachs! Enough is enough already! Must they now speak to us?
It’s difficult to fight the feeling that somehow you are not measuring up. I don’t
know why but for some reason when I realized how distorted these actresses’
bodies are, it freed me. I want to feel good about myself. I want to celebrate
the fact that I am a healthy woman. I’ve got curves. I eat food. I exercise in
moderation. When will Hollywood revert back to the images of beautiful healthy
women? I hesitate in saying that men find women with bodies attractive
because our main goal should not be to attract men. But, feeling attractive is
important.
I have witnessed my mother struggle with her weight all of my life. The mere thought of dieting and restricting
herself causes anxiety and she ends up over eating. Then, she weighs herself, gets more upset, and eats again.
I wish we could switch our mind set from trying to be as thin as possible to being as healthy as possible. I don’t
believe in weighing myself. I don’t even get weighed at the doctor’s office. I try to eat healthy so that I have
energy and feel good. We need to free ourselves from the vicious cycle of self-hatred and obsession with weight!
Next time you see an extremely thin actress on television ask yourself: Is this really normal? Healthy? Desirable? I
say it’s not! Try to be good to yourself and feel good about looking like a woman. That’s what I’ve decided to do!
Copyright © 2001 Laura Fox, author of the book, "I Am So Angry, I Could SCREAM!". Reprinted with permission.
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