One thing about me is that I love to be brutally honest. To stay true to myself, I am going to say what people seem to be avoiding — being skinny was never really “out.” Current trends of SkinnyTok and all of our favorite body-positive celebrities losing weight thanks to GLP-1s — although many of them deny their use — have people questioning what happened to plus-sized models featured in brands’ marketing campaigns, celebrating thickness in comment sections and even the Kardashians’ iconic BBLs.
Fans of artists who capitalized on body positivity, such as Meghan Trainor and Lizzo, are outraged by this sudden change of heart regarding a movement the singers, in part, gained their fame promoting. What’s shocking to me is the fact that these pop culture icons, among other figures, explain their weight-loss journey as the reason they can finally love themselves or feel deserving of love from others. This leads me to believe that although 10 years ago, many popular figures bragged about being comfortable in their skin and urged others to practice radical self-love for their bodies, this love was conditional. Frankly, #bodypositivity was never meant to stick around.
Sadly, I have yet to live through a period of my life where it was not popular for young women to starve themselves in hopes of achieving a body that is often impossible and unhealthy. Although body positivity was a trend, America’s historic commitment to romanticizing skinny, ill-looking women ensured the movement could not be more than a trend that would inevitably meet its demise.
Video essayist Cricket Guest takes her listeners through the history of this beauty standard in her video, “Why We Heavily Glamorize Pretty and Sickly Girls,” which I highly recommend to anyone with an interest in the history of fashion. Skinny culture can be traced back as early as the 1800s, with the declaration of “consumptive chic” as the pinnacle of high fashion. In this era, women with tuberculosis were portrayed as the height of beauty, praised for their pale skin, sunken-in eyes and fragile figures. Once tuberculosis diagnoses became less common and America moved past periods of war and economic depression, pop culture saw the emergence of the counterculture rockstar “heroin chic.” This aesthetic grew exponentially in the late 1970s when the first supermodel, Gia Carangi, rose to fame. Carangi was an infamous heroin addict and showed that the drug had moved from low-income community usage to more “prestigious” upper-middle-class households. Since then, we have seen the romanticization of emaciated physical appearances persist with the continuation of heroin chic, grunge aesthetics, indie sleaze and other fashion trends that appropriate images of addiction, illness and poverty.
Given this background, it is evident that there is a wide range of issues with our society’s obsession with skinny women in fashion. But why does it feel like our obsession with losing tummy weight and skipping meals has returned to mainstream culture, affecting people who do not have access to Ozempic, let alone Dolce & Gabbana?
Another thing about me is that I almost always bring up politics in my columns. But seriously, in an increasingly conservative America, where men are told they become successful and high-value by subjugating their wives or girlfriends, it would be naive to think that women hearing that they should be smaller is not related to the Trump administration’s reinvestment in traditional gender roles. It may sound silly, but if you are smaller, it’s easier for people to push you around. You take up less space in the world and become less visible, your concerns and opinions shrinking with your body in the crowd of booming voices.
Further, you need sufficient nutrients for your brain to function.Think of eating as an investment in your academic success. At this point, education has the potential to save our democracy, so taking care of yourself to get you through the pursuit of a college degree is an act of protest. Eating enough is radical, even more so for the young women who inspired this column.
The government attempts to tell us what we can do with our bodies, whether that’s limiting diverse gender expression, controlling our reproductive autonomy or trying to determine who we can sleep with and love. Young women’s voices are not raised, and their bodies are not respected. At a time like this, you must respect yourself through nourishing your body, eating enough and prioritizing good food. On that note, it is easy to avoid eating because there are no healthy options readily available. Trust me — been there, done that. My motto is that eating something is better than eating nothing at all. I repeat — eating something is better than eating nothing at all.
The overwhelming cultural pressure to intermittently fast and only eat certain foods became even more apparent to me while writing this article. In my search for what I thought would be an easy source demonstrating the connection between eating three meals a day and optimal brain function, I was instead inundated with articles about various “brain health” diets, the effects of fasting for hours on the brain and overall restrictions. I could very easily question my eating habits. You could doubt my credibility in ignoring those sources at the moment.
I will not be changing my stance, though. These articles are targeted towards adults who are not walking a mile through South Oakland every day to get home from class, using critical thinking for hours every day, working out regularly and walking miles some nights to find a bar playing good music. They also are not intentionally starving themselves. There is copious recent research that anorexia causes severe brain damage. It reduces gray and white matter in the brain, which is necessary for your brain to both communicate with the rest of your body and then process and respond to these signals. Not only is your body slimming, but so is your mind.
I recently watched another video essay about leading from love, not discipline. Sure, discipline is necessary in life. You have to get out of bed in the morning, brush your teeth and go to class. But in order to grow, you have to take care of and nourish yourself. You would not deprive a plant of water and soil to help it flourish, nor would you overflow the pot with water. You would water it when the soil is dry, put it near a sunny window and keep it in a pot that allows it to grow. Treat yourself with the respect you afford the people and things that surround you. Eat when you’re hungry, eat what you want and stop shaming yourself for satisfying your cravings.
I fear there will always be pressure for women to change their looks, especially in favor of being petite. I will not try to tell you that you should ignore these voices, because frankly, that’s not going to happen. It wasn’t happening 10 years ago when “All About That Bass” topped the charts, and it’s not going to happen now in the midst of the Ozempidemic. But, I urge you to reframe the way you think about these rhetorics. Who has something to gain from you taking up less space? How does skipping meals affect your ability to get through your daily tasks? Eat three meals a day, girl — if not for yourself, for the sake of feminism.
Julianna is a junior who studies social work and political science. She enjoys writing about politics, pop culture, and the tribulations of being a woman in your 20s. Respond to her column at [email protected].
