Flowers blossoming, the sun shining earlier, longer and more intensely, birds chirping in the trees around you — summer is drawing near. The warmer it becomes and the sooner summer arrives, the more people begin to think about the beach, swimming and tanning in the sun. Along with these summer fantasies come fears about the extra weight you have gained over the winter and the need to diet and exercise to get that perfect beach body. My friends and I recently decided that we were going to begin a competition to see who could lose the most weight before the end of the semester. We all want to be skinnier and prepared for those moments in the sun where we will have to take off our shirts. But why are we telling ourselves that our bodies will not meet the expectation of others? Why are we allowing society to tell us what we must look like and how we must accomplish this look? Why do we want someone to be attracted to us or to love us solely because we are as thin as possible?
These questions, with so many more, dig at a much deeper issue: the issue of being fat in America. News reporters, politicians and other professionals proclaim the “epidemic of obesity” that America is facing and the war that must be waged against it in order to save children’s bodies from the “horrifying” weight gain that will supposedly kill them. A better report to publish would be one stating how people are affected by reports like these rather than the weight gain itself. Best Health Magazine quotes Dr. Arya Sharma saying, “‘Am I at a healthy body weight?’ is an easy question to answer. But ‘Am I at a beautiful body weight?’ is dictated by media and culture, and that’s not about healthy weight. That’s about meeting the appearance that’s dictated by the fashion industry.” A healthy body weight is not one dictated by the culture around us. Bulletin boards, magazines and commercials are perpetually penetrating people’s minds with the idea that only thinness equals health and beauty. While being as thin as these ads call for may be healthy for some, it is not for everyone. Bodies are different. What is healthy for one person is not necessarily healthy for another.
Tolerance.org states, “Body image ideals, like race and gender, are social constructs that have grown out of a combination of history, politics, class, and moral values. One need look back only a few generations, or across cultures, to see that attitudes about thinness and fatness are fluid and ever changing.” Body image ideals constantly shift and change according to the current culture, society and ideologies. It may not be possible to stop media from proclaiming one body healthier and more beautiful than another, but together, people can begin to find ways to appreciate each other’s beauty no matter what size they are. Beauty comes in all shapes and sizes. The ability to accept this is not always possible, but it is something to begin moving towards.
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