we're all real women, even victoria's secret models

On Tuesday night was the somewhat infamous Victoria's Secret Fashion Show which aired on CBS.  It feels as though I've read hundreds of posts about how much Victoria's Secret is marketing to young girls, how they give unreasonable expectations about how women should look and a plethora of other things.  I've also seen so many articles about how "real woman have curves" or how the models should "eat a sandwich."  And I have some serious issues with ALL of these things....

If you don't want your children to be exposed to certain things, it is up to you to shield them from it.  Make firm boundaries and let your children know where you stand.  Yes, they had Taylor Swift as a musical performer this year.  Many, many, MANY parents believed this was wholly inappropriate.  Taylor Swift is well above the age of 18, a legal adult.  She made the choice to perform there, you have the choice to allow your children to watch her performance during the show or not.  Also, because clearly many, many, MANY people out there don't understand this.  Lingerie doesn't promote promiscuity, lowered societal standards does that. 

I have actually seen that the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show lets me know that these airbrushed and perfect women I see in the ads are not always perfect.  I can see their thighs jiggle, I can see they have some rolls or cellulite.  It lets me know that even the most beautiful and pinnacle of perfection women have little imperfections in their bodies. 

And, of course the most troubling things I seem to constantly be bombarded with regarding the Victoria's Secret Line...The Thin-Shaming.  It is no secret that fat-shaming seems to have always been a societal problem that people are trying to overcome.  So often we see tabloids showing and pointing out "beach nightmare bodies" or "Look at her weight gain!"  However, thin-shaming has become a more prevalent as the war on fat shaming has progressed.  Often we see the term "Real Woman Have Curves" and things emblazoned on photos of thin models tell them to "eat a sandwich."  In a world filled with so much inequality and hate, why on earth do we feel the need to find another reason to separate ourselves by something as arbitrary as physical appearance? 

A gif showing the before and after photoshop of Kelly Clarkson

 

Body Shaming is, in my opinion, one of the greatest societal issues facing us today.  Both men and women are constantly bombarded by magazines of people airbrushed to perfection.  Society has given us ridiculous expectations of what our bodies should look like.  Ultimately, the best body shape is a healthy body shape.  If you are healthy as a 00, great!  If you are healthy as a 24, great!  I work to lose weight because I do not feel healthy at my current weight.  All body shaming is WRONG.  Too often I see internet bullies and real life bullies pestering both thin and heavy women about their bodies.  Neither is perfect enough.  Neither is good enough.  Body shaming needs to end.  The only way it will end is if we, as a society, make changes to how we all perceive those around us.  So, start today and join me in ENDING body shaming for all body types!

why i hate facebook...and november plus some sunday enlightenment

November is a glorious, yet awful month.  To quote something I saw on tumblr, November is the Thursday of the year.  You just want it over so you can get to the good stuff.  November does have Thanksgiving, which does involve cranberry sauce, so it's not all bad.  However, there is one thing that just will always drive me crazy about November until the end of time (or at least until facebook goes the way of myspace)....

The gratitude posts.  

**DISCLAIMER** There are a select group of people who do these and I find them hilarious and amazing I AM LOOKING AT YOU AUTUMN NEVADA WILKINS!  Keep that crap up, because you're hilarious and we're related.  So how could you not be hilarious and awesome.

I see the beauty in expressing what you're grateful for.  I think it is important to be grateful.  However, naming things every single day just gets very....lame.  At the beginning of the month, people are coming up with amazingly profound reasons to be grateful in their lives.  And then by Thanksgiving, they start getting thankful for incredibly obscure things in their lives.  It's not the fact that people are expressing their gratitude all over facebook, it is the fact that as a culture we have dedicated one entire month to telling people how much we're grateful for things in our lives, then November ends and the usual facebook rants begin again.

After November ends we all go back to complaining about the things we hate in our lives.  My news feed is suddenly bombarded once again with pro-government/anti-government propaganda, complaints about significant others and the unavoidable articles about how EVERYTHING in the universe is going to kill you and your children.  To me, this attitude about gratitude is just wrong.

Gratitude should something you feel every second of every day.  Gratitude should not be something you have to work at.  As far as I'm concerned, there are THOUSAND upon THOUSANDS of things I see every day that I feel gratitude for.  And, no, I don't write about them on facebook everyday.  Heck, I barely blog about them all that often.  Because I see them and feel them in my heart.

Gratitude isn't posting things on facebook.  Gratitude is about seeing all of the amazing and beautiful things around us and just being...happy.  So, let's be happy year round, and not just during November when social structure tells us we should.

Also, this video is beautiful.  The Mimi Foundation sought to take Cancer patients and give them makeovers so they would be able to truly have a moment of carefree-ness.  It's quite beautiful.  Life is just grand, isn't is?