I feel the same way. Recent studies have indicated that 10 percent of the girls and women in the United States have eating disorders since they give up following their natural eating desires with being concerned about gaining weights. Like showing this recent trend, some fashion models have died suffering from anorexia. Even though this is an extreme case, many women have been victims of the fashion industry’s and society’s obsession with skinniness.
How would you think of these phenomena above? Do you think it is unreasonable that skinny models suffer from eating disorders? What reflection do you have on yourself when it comes to your body? I am sure that there is no girl who feels free out of eating as much as they want and gaining weights. For me, I also have a great fear of gaining weights like any other woman. Even though I am under average weights of my height, I cannot be satisfied with my body whenever I see slim models and actors in television shows and commercials.
Even though I don’t do that now, I used to calculate the calories I ate in a day whenever I ate something. If then, what is the cause that makes us obsessed with being skinny?
We can think about the change of the standards of beauty nowadays. As the capitalism has been established, fashion industry and mass media emphasized more and more on the shapes of women’s body. Although there is no mass media or advertisements that say whichever body shape is beautiful and desirable, they just focus on slim body and people and create the concept that slim body is an ideal appearance for women. That makes women to be dissatisfied with their bodies and drive them not to eat normally and to go on a diet.
However, not only do we always fit ourselves into the standard of beauty recognized in society, but also unhealthy dieting could harm our health seriously from a long-term perspective. It could even lead to an undesirable disease like eating disorder. To protect women from harming themselves like eating disorders, we need to take a measure to this kind of trend.
Then, how can we make a balance between our desire for diet and healthy life? Can’t they go along together? I know it is a hard question to answer. However, there is a way that we should keep in mind. Doing an excessive diet is pointless if you do not accept your body and do not love yourself. We need to love ourselves no matter what shape we may have.
When seeing a person, the shape of body and appearance is not an important factor. It is the inner mind of a person that is the most important factor for everyone. Of course, it is hard to recognize that fact since no matter where it is, everything is just leaning forward to the outer beauty.
I hope Ewha students realize their real beauty inside themselves and that they are still beautiful even though they are not slim like models on the stages and actors in the movies. Making the balance between the desire to be skinny and healthy is always tough, but we should remember that our health comes first and the other thing comes second.
Ewha Voice
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