Editorial

Adventurecising: A Proposal
by Michelle Theall

Can the weight-loss headlines on magazine covers cause eating disorders among teen girls? That’s what some medical researchers wanted to find out, and the results appeared in the January issue of the Journal of Pediatrics. What they found isn’t shocking; it’s just sad.

The Minnesota study tracked more than 2,500 middle-school students over a five-year period and found that girls who frequently read diet articles were three times more likely to try to lose weight through vomiting or laxatives than girls who read other types of articles. Boys in the same study seemed unaffected by weight-loss content.

The release of this information follows on the heels of some modeling agencies’ setting new minimum-weight guidelines barring models who are unhealthily skinny from hitting the runways.

Skinny does not equal healthy. But in our society, it’s come to mean beauty and even competence. Attractive individuals are more likely to land a job and make more money than their heavier counterparts. It wasn’t always this way.

Look back to the Victorian era, when voluptuous women ruled the day. Paintings by nineteenth-century artists honored the female form and placed it on a pedestal, with every lovely curve prominently displayed. In many other countries being plump is synonymous with wealth and is envied. The “fat cat” prospers. In the United States, more than 60 percent of women said they’d rather be thin and poor than overweight and rich.

I’m not suggesting that we celebrate our fat rolls and scarf another Debbie’s snack cake. To be certain, obesity contributes to most major health problems, including heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and stroke. Being overweight shortens our life span and, some might argue, lessens our enjoyment of it by making daily tasks more difficult. Wanting to be the ideal height and weight for health reasons is very different from what we’re talking about here.

I’m 5 feet 3 inches and 118 pounds. Why is this discussion important to me? Because those attributes aren’t what makes me beautiful or smart or a better human being. Every magazine shouting “Get Your Best Body Now!” or “Great Abs in 10 Moves!” or “Thinner Thighs in 30 Days!” tells women that their importance as a person can be reduced to the exterior—to how they look and not who they are or what they can contribute.

One of the very first things I learned in Mass Comm 101 was that the media sets the agenda. If the media coverage of Sudan topped the headlines every day, it would appear that things were escalating there even though they’ve been terrible for years. The media has a responsibility. I ask the question: What else could fill those hundreds of pages dedicated to the frivolous pursuit of fitting into a size 2 dress? The message we need to send to this generation of women—and the next—is to strive to be happy, healthy, strong, and confident. The message to be skinny so that others will love you or accept you isn’t worth the trees sacrificed to make the paper.

I believe the answer is adventurecising. We can all do our part to spread the word.

Live life to its fullest. Experience all it has to offer. Treat your body with respect and love. Thrive in the wild.