The Boob Tube : Can you be a fat actress? (part 2)

Fallen Chubby Champs (continued)

FALLEN CHUBBY CHAMPS (CONTINUED)

So I started this "Can you be a fat actress" post, with a specific structure in mind - Name the women that have succumbed to the pressures of the media to lose weight, then name those who haven't - "The Real Chubby Champs". But alas, my blog hit a snag when I realize there are no "Real Chubby Champs".... at least not anymore. Any women in television or the media that has made a name for herself, and at one point was considered chubby, has lost weight in order to fit in with what American society expects it's celebrities to look like.

However in the middle of writing this blog I realize that I am not being fair. All these women I've listed below are amazing, and losing weight is not an easy task. Furthermore, I commend them for stepping into a realm bias for size two women, as themselves, and prevailing as full figured women.

The fact that they later lost weight does not diminish this accomplishment in any way. It does however speak to a bigger problem -A problem not with the women themselves wanting to lose weight, however a problem with society expecting them to.

Every women wants to lose weight, in fact I'm on a diet at right now. This isn't a random fixation that we all have, but for most a need subliminally injected into our self-conscious. It's a poison imbedded in our minds -That we have to be thinner to be attractive. I'm not going to sit here and say this is "man's" fault for objectifying us and treating us like all were good for is sex, because at some point we have to take responsibility for ourselves. We as women feel inadequate because we measure ourselves up against other women. These other, thinner women do happen to be the object of a lot of men's desires and fantasies, but we helped put them there, by one day buying into the image of a skinny woman as perfection. We make the fashion and the trends and we determine what's sexy.

The kicker of it all is that the women that we have built up in the media as pictures of perfection and aspirations actually have to live up to these ideologies ( or attempt to), a institution that has led to some adverse effects. Cases of eating disorders and self esteem issues are all too common in TV land.

There are women in television that have spoke out about the affects of a life in the limelight and the pressure to be perfect (and thin).

Tracy Gold, of the hit 1980s Growing Pains, and Demi Lovato, of her own popular Disney sitcom Sonny with a Chance, both admittedly battled anorexia as a direct result of the pressure they felt from being on television.

I'm not sure at what point we stopped believing that full figured women like Marylyn Monroe (who was a size 14) were sexy, but they do say that everything comes back around, in this case however I believe we're too brain washed to turn back now. I just find it a bit sad that most times we as women don't love ourselves for just who we are and that is what we truly need to get back to; A sense of self love.

Jennifer Hudson