College Students and Body Image

Interesting interpretation. People who think they are fat are automatically concerned with their body image? I'll concede I'm a bit bigger than I'd like to be, but at 300 lbs I would be VERY happy, and yet would still consider myself 'fat'.

This doesn't look to me like they assumed, but rather the students were asked how they viewed themselves and replied honestly that they were concerned about their body image. I find it very sad what mass media is doing. No one should have to be made to feel bad about their body shape. One of the things I like about Star Trek was the IDIC idea, a fictional Vulcan philosophy which meant "Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations," and is one of many reasons why I'm a Star Trek fan. A lot of Trek fans also live by the IDIC principles in real life because it promotes the ideas of tolerance. True diversity ought to be celebrated, not discouraged.

Believing one is fat is probably another way of saying that one is dissatisfied with one's body. I, in fact, am fat. However, I am not dissatisfied with my body. I wonder where that would put me in the charts. Young people are becoming more and more dissatisfied with their physical selves, and who can blame them when they are bombarded daily with messages of unrealistic beauty. I am very concerned about this generation, how they are growing up with less nutritious food, fewer opportunities to exercise, and more body hatred. This is a volatile combination, the effects of which may not be felt fully for many years to come.

Even when I was in high school, and that was like 8 years ago, the message was still very clear. If you were even 10 pounds overweight, you were NOT popular. I still remember going into the ladies' room after the lunch hour. It was commonplace to hear girls vomiting up their lunches, so as not to gain the weight from them. The message we got from the media then, and that young girls are still getting, is quite clear -- that we are supposed to hate ourselves because we don't have a perfect body shape. Years after high school, I've learned that it's not perfection that counts. If only I had known that back then. It is quite sad what media images are doing to young girls, especially when it's one generation after another.

Although I agree that it is sad that people view their bodies with contempt, I noticed a small point that I found curious. I don't know if anyone else noticed this, but I'm kind of a Marilyn fan. Anyway, in this article, it says that Marilyn Monroe wore a size 11. Everytime I've seen something about her size, it was 14, 16 and sometimes even 18. Is it just me, or is she shrinking along with the media's idea of the perfect woman?

The simple explanation is: Monroe wore a size 18, but because of the vagaries of the fashion industry, she would have worn a modern 11 or 12. The exact same garment, but with a different label for a different era.

As a college student, this caught my eye. With my experiences in college, the more you learn, the less you trust media and stereotypes. I've become almost entirely against many forms of media because of the lies that are spread. I've done research on women's advertising, with help from a woman who works in advertising. Women make the majority of purchases. Most ads portray women as intelligent purchasers, but too many still rely on sex appeal and negativity. I used to hate my body in high school, because my metabolism slowed and I got hips, breasts, and a stomach. But here in college, I've learned not to let it bother me. Last year I went on the Slim Fast diet (one of my less brilliant ideas) and my dumb boyfriend-at-the-time (who has been near anorexic at times in his life) didn't truly accept my size. He'd say stuff like, "You're working on it," which made me feel inadequate if I couldn't lose weight. I've met a few people this year who are much better about the whole issue, who understand that yes, I am athletic, I have no health problems, and on a normal diet/exercise plan my weight fluctuates little if at all. The majority of America, is, unfortunately, totally ignorant of the truth because of the fact that all journalism has become progressively more biased. Even in colleges, where in many ways it can be easier to learn your way away from stereotypes, body image is a problem.

I know this is pretty petty, but Marilyn Monroe's measurements were (gathered from her website, studio measurements, and snopes.com): Height: 5 feet, 5Ω inches Weight: 118-140 pounds Bust: 35-37 inches Waist: 22-23 inches Hips: 35-36 inches Bra size: 36D Even when I wore a size 2, my waist was nowhere near 23 inches. And at 5'5", at a *high* of 140 pounds, wouldn't Marilyn be much closer to a size 8 than 11? I'm not saying her body shouldn't be celebrated-- she was a beautiful, volumptuous woman-- but it doesn't seem fair to morph her into a size 16 when arguing for fat acceptance, any more than it would be fair for someone to say she weighed 85 pounds while arguing the Atkin's diet. Just a thought.