No stranger to myth vs. reality, the author behind the Harry Potter series, J.K. Rowling, is now attacking Hollywood's obsession with thinness.
Rowling, herself the mother of two young girls, has decided to speak out against the unhealthy message that is being sent to young girls: you can never be too thin.
Using Pink's song "Stupid Girls" as an on-point example, the two have created an unlikely pair to send a positive message that "what's inside is much more important than what's on the outside."
I couldn't agree more. As the mother of young children and stepmom to young adults, I have seen these images of "thinness obsession" cause untold harm to otherwise beautiful young girls, while creating unhealthy messages of what's beautiful to impressionable young men.
Our society is getting fatter, while we are being bombarded with unrealistic versions of what's normal and healthy. Where's the disconnect?
Hollywood and the fashion industry are mostly to blame. A perfect example is that whackjob Lindsay Lohan. Once a healthy-looking attractive teen, she has now become the embodiment of yo-yo weight loss and weight gain.
She even admitted to having an eating disorder (but of course later denied it) in an interview that, as far as I am concerned, showcased her spiral into dangerous self-obsession and solipsism.
Lohan (with a similarly drained Nicole Richie at right) is just one example, but there are dozens who show a lack of concern for their health in an industry that forces them to choose between an attractive, healthy weight and an emaciated, anorexic frame.
Perhaps the disconnect is an inability to achieve this abnormal ideal causing so much stress that people do the opposite and adopt really unhealthy eating habits to cope.
But who can blame women for feeling stressed and unhappy about their weight to the point of paralyzing them into inaction and poor habits?
Dieting is a billion dollar industry in this country and until we come to terms with what is truly healthy and what is nonsense, it won't change.
At least J.K. Rowling is using her fame and popularity to try to turn the tide and for that, she gets some serious credit.
Article comments
1 - Eric Olsen
agreed: undereating is just as bad as overeating. The key is a healthy lifestyle - the weight will take care of itself
2 - JELIEL³
Fantastic article Dawn. Good to see some women speaking up.
I don't understand how Hollywood and the media keeps selling skeletons when most men will agree that they prefer "meat" on women. I never got the obsession with thiness. It's not pretty, it looks unhealthy and becomes to easily obsessive.
3 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Great article, Dawn. I'm glad to see that Rowling is using her name - and hopefully her money - to do some good in society.
4 - JELIEL³
She did get millions of children reading books. She does readings in stadiums and the whole thing looks like a rock-concert, but it's JK reading passages. I think that alone is quite an accomplishment
5 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
No argument with Rowling's accomplishments Jeliel³. But they were essentially for the benefit of JK Rowling and family. This goes beyond her and is not specifically for her own benefit - unless she is preparing the way for a new line of clothes...
6 - JELIEL³
True but sometimes the intent is unimportant. Kids in this age are reading books. That's something.
7 - Dawn
I think Rowling has done a great service for society. If she helps her family along the way, I have zero problem with that. You should always look out for your family first.
Thanks for the comments!!!
8 - Mary K. Williams
Hey Dawn,
Nice take on the 'you CAN be too thin' stance. I think Cap'n EO summed it up great -
the key is a healthy lifestyle - the weight will take care of itself
Glad to see women who have the ear of our youth delivering this message.
9 - Eric Olsen
thanks MKW - with so much emphasis on weight as a number, it's much easier to get caught in the loss-gain elevator
10 - Purple Tigress
I wouldn't just blame the Hollywood movie and TV industry. Try adding the fashion industry and the porn industry as well. I don't think the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition helps either.
11 - Victor Plenty
While I applaud most of your article, Dawn, it's unclear to me why you feel it necessary to label Lindsay Lohan a "whackjob" for suffering from an eating disorder. Unless you're basing your opinion on something that hasn't been mentioned here, it seems she is another victim of the syndrome every sane person is trying to fight. She's certainly not responsible for creating it.
I'm glad to see Rowling speak out against promoting anorexia as the standard of attractiveness.
Few are addressing the root causes of this problem, but perhaps if more and more of us speak out against its devastating effects, some will get around to uncovering its causes.
12 - malin
Great article!
But I was very irritated by the weight loss google ads.
13 - Richard Marcus
While it's heatening to hear people speak out against self esteem based on body size, as Ms. Rowling is doing, as Victor says this is missing the root cause of eating disorders. The eating disorder itself is a symptom of the overall disease anorexia nervosa. The key is in the second word, the anixety and nervous condition that causes the starving or the stuffing and vomiting of bulimia.
If it were self image alone, how would it explain five year old children with anorexia starving themselves to death? These attitudes stem form the belief that they do not deserve to be nurtured, they are not worthy of any sort of sustanence. Be it emotional love, nutrion or anything it all amounts to the same thing.
With their self esteem at that level, they will than begin comparing themselves negativly to what they see around them. If I can look like that maybe I will deserve love, etc.
In a book called The Deadly Diet the author (whose name has vanished from my head) outlines what he calls the voice. The voice is that which repeats the message inside the head of the sufferer that she or he is a worthless individual underserving of anything.
That voice can continue on years after the eating disorder part of the disease has been conqured. It's a lot like the alcaholic who has stopped drinking, but sill acts like an addict. The motivatins and reasons are still there, they are now just directed in different places.
My wife is a recovered anorexic, but when we first got together she was still dealing with the voices. It took her about two years to believe she derserved to be loved, and she still doubts that anything good can ever happen to her.
The best response to anorexia is unconditional love from the people in the sufferer's life. The last thing she or he need to hear is anything that could be guilt inducing.
Wow, as usual I went on and on. Good ariticle Dawn, and the best thing about it is that it keeps the issue in front of people in an intelligent manner, not sensationally like the tabloids.
Richard Marcus
p.s. I'll see if I can'f find the author's name to that book, and post it here if I have luck.
14 - Richard Marcus
Terence J. Sandbeck is the author of The Deadly Diet: Recovering From Anorexia and Bulimia. It's available at all the usual portals online, and I found it in my local library, which means it should be in any semi-descent one, becaus ours pretty much sucks.
It's a great book for those wishing to understand what a loved one's going through, and for those who have a loved one who wants to help themselves. As with all these things nobody's going to get better unless they want to.
Richard Marcus
15 - Jon
Dont blame her. Just look at the Pink Video, so true
16 - ultraprimus
heh, its all well and good saying that, but evryone has been saying this for a LONG time.
This woman will do ANYTHING to be in the media. I mean heck... she pays the BBC to mention harry potter evry 3 mins on childrens bbc.
in the gutter with this attention seeking talentless retarded... bitch.
17 - Victor Plenty
Richard, you and the book you cite focus on the root causes within each individual who suffers from an eating disorder. While this is important for successful treatment of the disease, it still doesn't address the root causes within our cultural values that allow eating disorders to reach epidemic levels.
18 - Victor Plenty
"Ultraprimus," when you call a woman a bitch, the usual effect is to make yourself look ugly.
Just thought you might like to increase your knowledge of human social interactions.
19 - shaq_mobile
Honestly you guys, who cares? People speak out against this kind of stuff everyday... In fact the only people we have to blame for this our women themselves. You can't force someone to do something, an idea is only influential if you by into it. Yes yes, I'm sure alot of girls fall victim to circumstance... then again, don't we all? We can't blame our own thought's solely on other people.
20 - Dawn
JK Rowling's motives seems to be born from her role as a mother - it has nothing to do with publicity. She gets plenty of that by merely existing.
I also challenge ultraprimus' immature missive. Rowling is a successful author who wrote a fabulously creative story. She will go down in history as popular as Tolkien and Lewis.
21 - jergie
Heh, another idiot to try and group this idiot into the same group as Tolkien.
Stop being a retard.
22 - Sarah
Yet J K Rowling herself routinely spells out how FAT, how very FAT ('looks like a pig in a wig') Harry Potter's cousin Dudley is, and his size is part of what makes him so ridiculous. Kids will be influenced by this.
23 - Eric Olsen
I believe the overall effect she is trying to create is one of unbridled appetite and swineishness - should she be restricted from conveying this in the interest of PC?
24 - Sarah
I don't see it as a matter of being PC or not, it's just 2 contradictory messages that's all. Which one does she really believe? On the one hand she herself is happy to portray Dudley of the 'unbridled appetite and swineishness' as a figure of fun, his imposing size as intrinsically ridiculous, on the other she rails against others in the media for 'promoting', for want of a better word, thinness. I think she's doing her bit to help this along! If kids want to be thin because of what they see on TV/read, then equating being fat with being ridiculous only reinforces the message.