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Government Should Ban Skinny Models To Curb Anorexia, Say Researchers
smoothjazz writes "Governments are justified to prevent very skinny models from walking the catwalk and ban photographs and advertisements suggesting that extreme thinness is attractive, according to a group of researchers who found that social and cultural environment influences on young women is largely responsible for the spread of chronic eating disorder."
Oh wait, researchers have freedom of speech. Come to think of it, so do marketing firms.
Banning skinny models definitely would help fix the problem. I'm normally against such type of regulation but when the common person is blasted in the face by constant advertising in every form imaginable 24/7 then i tend to fall on the side of regulation.
It's not like the average person can moderate the amount of advertising that rapes their eyeballs and subconcious every day.
Why is it that Euro cosmopolitans have this desire to have that "concentration camp" look. Is there some form of strange bondage and domination fetish I'm not getting? The Nazis were bad. Hmm k?
Life is not for the lazy.
"Government should ban overweight models to curb obesity, say researchers..."
Fat models, skinny controllers, dumb views...
Oh, wait, are we not talking about code all of a sudden? Okay, in that case, dumb, skinny models, and no fat chicks.
In fact, forget I was here.
To understand recursion, you must first understand recursion.
So there are going to be a lot of people who will throw everyone and everything else under the bus.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Let's ban fat people on TV too. Everybody you see must be within 10% of their ideal weight as determined by government regulators.
The social manifestation of the persecution of beauty.
You know, the thing about insurance of groups, which is essentially a statistical undertaking, is that there are always outliers in both directions, and they are accounted for. There are insured people who never go to the doctor or need medical treatment. And there are insured people who go every time someone *else* sniffles. Over a large population, it'll balance out just fine.
Whenever someone starts sniveling about the over-users, take a moment to remind them of me, someone who has been well insured for decades and hasn't *ever* made a health insurance claim -- I seem to have an immune system like a Sherman tank. So far, lol. 55 and counting, though, not too bad.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
If we start censoring people with body shapes we consider outliers, how is that supposed to make people focus less on looks?
"CURVES:
If I wanted a woman who has the body of a ten year old boy, I'd just date a ten year old boy."
Can't take credit for it; this story reminded me of a picture with this quote I ran into a while ago.
I am not really here right now.
Next, a government agency dedicated to monitoring body fat content for all employees of media companies. It will "create" 50,000 jobs in the federal bureaucracy. When an editor for the New York Times cheats on her diet, it will be a federal offense punishable by a fine of $50,000 or up to 5 years imprisonment. Lawsuits and lobbyists will fight over whether Twitter and Facebook qualify as a "media" company and thus whether said legislation applies to all users who have created an account on those services. The Department of Health and Human Services will decline a waiver for employees of organizations affiliated with religious groups who have religious dietary restrictions.
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
to curb our obesity epidemic?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
For example, they may be skinny because the government is spending on healthcare rather than spending on hunger.
Maslow's hierarchy of needs starts with the physiolgical (food, clothing, shelter), which is more important than safety (which is where public healthcare resides): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow's_hierarchy_of_needs
It's always bothered me that people consider universal healthcare more important than universal food, clothing, and shelter. It's also bothered me that it's remained that way since Richard Nixon first proposed universal healthcare as an ide: http://www.everydaycitizen.com/2009/09/ted_kennedy_richard_nixon_and.html
-- Terry
People not eating have a lower mass? Now that's a surprising result!
More to the point, I don't think this a huge enough problem requiring government regulation. Even more, I think anorexia is just a symtpom of low self-esteem, and if those women won't have a problem with their mass they would find another way of destroying themselves.
The problem is not that these body images are harmful, but that girls are trained to think that their appearance is their most important attribute.
This is not improving, this shallow culture is being promoted to men and boys as well, perhaps in order to stave off charges of sexism, but more likely it's just a realisation within these cosmetic and fashion industries that they are missing out on a potential market.
Just send them over to my house. I'll take care of them.
Silence is a state of mime.
Maybe we should ban sitcoms with fat dudes who score disproportionately hot women. That's just promoting the idea that it's alright to be a fat dude.
Why is this article here?
Does it include neato new technology?
Does it review some new CPU or video card?
Does it discuss a new or old computer game?
Does it include high-energy physics or cosmology?
Does it include something about programming languages?
Does it include cryptography or security breaches?
Does it include anything at all about computers?
Hell, does it talk about Bitcoin?
Might as well just post scans from the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue that's out right now.
Put my fist through my alarm clock with its ding-dong death inside my ear. - The Blackjacks.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/5341202.stm
I don't always use unix-like operating systems; but when I do, I prefer FreeBSD.
"We know now that there must be a single purpose! A single norm! A single approach! A single entity of peoples! A single virtue! A single morality! A single frame of reference! A single philosophy of government! We must cut out all that is different like a cancerous growth! It is essential in this society that we not only have a norm, but that we conform to that norm! Differences weaken us! Variations destroy us! An incredible permissiveness to deviation from this norm is what has ended nations and brought them to their knees! Conformity we must worship and hold sacred! Conformity is the key to survival! "
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
While I'm trivially opposed to legislation like this, I will point out that imagery doesn't really change what men want in a woman- that's coded deep or something- but it DOES change what WOMEN try to look like to compete with each other. Most men don't prefer the super skinny models. It's fashion designers who force that on us, and I think it's fair to point out that most men don't follow such fashion. I think everyone knows that a glamour model can be super hot, and a fashion model is... not. And of course, glamour models, while still often at a level of thinness that would be unachievable for all women, have genuinely feminine shapes to them, and are not some concentration camp throw-away.
Anyway, I don't dispute the findings of the researchers, merely the morality of attacking speech.
researchers with opinions...
Ban pill-popping, doc-shopping curmudgeonly radio show hosts, too.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
In Spain it was defined as a BMI of less than 18. In the article I read, an example of a 18 BMI was 5' 8"/125 lbs, which is pretty damn skinny in my opinion.
I don't always use unix-like operating systems; but when I do, I prefer FreeBSD.
Here in the United States I think we need to do something about obesity first...
I don't know why this was mod'd down. Obesity really is the problem. Most of those "skinny" models are not "skinny" - they're normal-sized. It's just that Americans have become a nation of morbidly obese people.
Advice: on VPS providers
My wife is anorexic. She's stable, and she's become a successful practicing MD. Understanding the problem doesn't cure it.
She grew up in a home with two half-sisters under a frequently single mother who went through many marriages. Her (now also anorexic) mother has career success, ridiculously low self esteem, and she married at least two physically abusive men. The worst of them was a churchgoing man who physically abused all his daughters/stepdaughters and repeatedly raped his own daughter (thankfully my wife did not endure that). He hid it from his wife/my mother-in-law and everyone else (except the girls) for several years. When my mother-in-law finally understood it was happening, she divorced him as soon as she felt she could without physical abuse as a repercussion. I don't think that was right away. And because of fear, he was never reported or punished. I don't think he even quit attending church.
My wife had no control of her life in her childhood. She could control her appearance. She became anorexic to give fulfill her need for a sense of control in her life.
Banning the ads would help reduce the draw of that manifestation of the need for control. But the root problem is very commonly associated with domestic abuse and/or unhealthy childhoods like the one my wife grew up in.
The government should ban busybodies from serving in government or the legislature.
Because, you know, seeing too many pornos starring well hung dudes banging skinny skanks with big teets gives young men the wrong ideas about body image, too.
Makes about as little sense as the OP's proposal.
Here's an idea. Instead of *banning* certain forms of expression and restricting the speech of the fashion industry, why don't these public health scientists exercise their free speech. Done creatively, they could use dark comedy, satire and ridicule to point out how downright freaky these anorexic models really are... break a few rules and they could even create enough buzz to get peoples' attention.
- Show a bulemic model excuse herself after a meal to go throw up, then return to the table and give a deep tongue kiss to her date, who shows a visible reaction to the taste.
- Show an anorexic model's view of herself in the mirror as a normal person, then zoom out to show she's really a bag of antlers. Use a digital overdub of a real concentration camp victim.
- Show a train of size zero models walking down the runway, overdubbed by a horse race announcer type... then one trips and breaks her femur in three places as the announcer verbally cringes and says, "ooh, that one's gonna have to be put down. What a shame..."
See... if I can do it, and I'm just a friggin' engineer, then it's not that hard.
I can see the fnords!
they ban McDonalds and other shitty food to curb fat fucks. Look around you - anorexia is the least of our problems. From public transport to medical care, it's lettuce dodging, sweaty waddling lazy freaks with no self respect who are (literally) consuming our resources.
FTFA:
What a revelation! Fat people hang out with other fat people? Who could have known that? Why, it's as if bird of a feather flock together!
Maybe if they would put these high-paid researchers (doing useless research) into the classrooms teaching, they wouldn't have needed to institute those austerity measures that were so severe that students were in the streets rioting about it.
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
Let's restrict freedom of speech in order to solve social problems. Sure buddy, whatever. If we're going to do that, let's start with a few other things first, such as Fred Phelps and the KKK. Any American who thinks this is a good idea, please step out back and shoot yourself, thanks.
Resort to censorship because some people are idiots/have problems. Smart move!
Alternatively, the government could supply fat dudes with hot women. Now that is a government program I could support.
That's exactly what I thought. Far more people suffer from obesity related issues than from anorexia. Plus sized models have to go!
Seriously, can the government stop trying to be our parent.
"That's the sort of blinkered, philistine pig ignorance I've come to expect from you non-creative garbage."-Monty Python
There is nothing wrong with stupid people, it's OK they are stupid, the problem is only that they are allowed to vote in the first place, which should really be discouraged.
You can't handle the truth.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
This blows all the mods I've made, but the shear ignorance here is killing me. People need to get past their misogynist thinking that anorexia just means being lean.
The reason curbing anorexia is a big deal is that it has "the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric disorder" and it's a highly cultural phenomenon, extremely rare in societies before modern advertising. Even with treatment, the prognosis is death most of the time. This is an avoidable danger, like prohibiting the glorification of drugs in kids' shows.
Really... How would regulating this be any different than banning steroids in professional sports?
Ask me about my sig!
It's not like people would stop buying stuff they need.
I'm not sure how great a solution this is. It's incomplete, that's for sure.
Anorexia is typically tied to a need to have control, and the weight issue is where that is manifested. The second part is what we tend to focus on, but the need for control is the root cause. An unhealthy childhood environment is very common among anorexics, which is where the need for control is born.
To me the real research question is, if it were to not focus on unhealthy physical appearance, how would those who would turn to anorexia fulfill their need for control? Some other appearance-based criteria, or through a different venue entirely? If it didn't require enough work to be 'ideal,' the self-deprivation required to 'discipline' oneself would be gone and it may not produce any control-related benefits. I suspect overly rigorous athletic training would be one likely venue, but heavily working in any other person-specific field might be another.
I would like to see results of a study that is able to address that question.
I think most people would agree that they feel more attracted to slender models, as opposed to say, fat models. It makes sense to think that the companies which profit from modeling aren't hiring skinny models to promote Anorexia; what good are designer clothes if your consumer base is falling over dead from self starvation? They are hiring skinny models because people like and respond to skinny models. Supply and Demand. We should not need government regulation to censor and stifle everything that can be found to be detrimental to society in some way; the public should be made better able to make the right choice for themselves. Switching focus a bit, I would think that a much more significant portion of the population is being influenced by fast food advertizing (Fast food Among other things) ; and I would argue that this is a significantly contributing factor to obesity in America. Now, i don't have any actual data to back up this claim, but I would think that the damage caused to society as a result of obesity is hundreds of times more significant than the damage caused to society by anorexia. If the government is allowed to censor models to allegedly reduce anorexia, then will it really stop there? If we censor a relatively insignificant matter, how much greater will the move be to censor more influential matters? I would much rather prefer that we move to promote education (and not just by throwing money at the problem), and better personal decision-making. Help kids learn earlier on how to make the right choice; in this case, helping them realize that Anorexia will not solve their problems. Higher and better education standards are a much better fix; one might call a proactive solution against such easily preventable problems.
It's not just an American thing. More of an Anglo cultural or legal mindset thing, I've noticed: Countries like the U.K. and Australia are much farther along with this kind of nanny-statism than the U.S. is. I often keep an eye on what these two countries do because it usually shows up in the U.S. 5-10 years later.
Liberty in your lifetime
Corporations are not people. Corporations are government created legal entities without any rights other that which government gives them (and shouldn't be allowed to do anything beyond the power of government since that is an obvious backdoor.)
YOU the photographer can photo skeletons modeling etc. Corporation X however can be regulated and restricted to the point of non-existence (which is always their red herring defense against imposing any limitations, including ones with a successful history to point to.)
Smoking and Drinking ARE regulated and censored already.
Phelps is Christianity regardless how many people it upsets; the whole operation falls within the 1st.
The KKK as long as they do not incorporate can do what they want-- but if they incorporate then they should be required to allow black membership. Oh that one could be interesting...
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
No, just the opinions that are wrong.
Seriously, what kind of fucking moron thinks that the government should ban something just because it "sends the wrong message"? So do action movies, romantic comedies, reality TV shows, and all political advertisements. Do you have to have a particular kind of brain damage to think that A) banning it would work, and B) it would not have harmful consequences to our society to give the government that power?
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
The authors of the study are based in Britain, where they don't have freedom of speech. They are also much more accepting of gov't control than the US (but not by much).
No, men aren't off the line either...but from looking on a daily basis at typical people in the US any time I go out.....skinny models causing anorexia is NOT a problem....I can't remember the last time I saw anyone, particularly a chick that looked anywhere or any way too skinny....
Hell, its hard to find anyone out there that looks anywhere close to 'fit'....
I was that way...at least I'm trying with better diet, proper portions...and yes...exercise.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Skinny is fashionable now for the same reason being heavy was hundreds of years ago.
Fat is the opposite of attractive now because it's unhealthy. You don't pick an obese woman to marry these days because you don't want to find her dead at 45.
This problem of glorifying anorexia will go away when we solve the obesity epidemic.
Government: Is there nothing it cannot do?
Folks, you keep sitting around with your thumb up your ass, voting for democrats and other Statists, and you're going to get the government you deserve.
it's not difficult to not be affected by what you see
This seems to be a common notion on slashdot, maybe due to a mix of disdain for the softer sciences and some arrogance about the ability of intelligence to triumph over everything else.
I'll just point out that there exists an entire industry dedicated to 'affect you' by what you see (or otherwise sense). It's called 'marketing' and it's extremely effective and therefore extremely profitable. Would we really be so incredibly saturated in advertisements 24/7 if human beings could easily be unaffected by it?
And PS - That bit about letting 'them' die for some sort of evolutionary goal is despicable.
Hey mate, spare a sig?
Here in the United States I think we need to do something about obesity first...
The UK (where this study was conducted. Using government funding. That was so scarce they had to cut education funding for students) has an obesity problem too. In fact, it's the "fatest" country in Europe.
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
We are adults and can make our own choices with what we want to do with our lives. Why can't the Govt leave us alone if we only effect our lives.
If they want to be skinny models so be it.
...it is still better than a government run system, as I at least have choices of carriers and coverage.
Have you ever lived under a government-run healthcare system?
I'm from the US, and I've lived in Japan for years at a stretch. In Virginia, Kaiser Permanente listened to my wife's explanation of her symptoms (chronic sinusitis, excessive post-nasal-drip, resulting digestive issues, among other issues) and decided that the trouble in her gut was actually evidence that she needed her ovaries removed. Um, no.
In Tokyo, the local hospital (as part of the government-run healthcare system) listened to her symptoms, and then also to her lungs, and said "hey, you have light asthma -- here's how you manage it." Problems (mostly) solved.
Just because a healthcare system is government run doesn't mean that it's necessarily bad. Just because a healthcare system is left to run on market dynamics and choices doesn't mean that it's necessarily better.
FWIW, the opposite is also true -- we've also experienced crappy medical care in Japan, and good care in the US. Ultimately, a lot of it comes down to the quality of the doctors themselves.
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
Just lower the legal age for marriage. They tend to put on 5 lbs. per year after the wedding. ;-)
Every piece of data I've seem shows that we're getting fatter, not skinnier. If the advertising was working we wouldn't be having an obesity epidemic.
Really... How would regulating this be any different than banning steroids in professional sports?
Welcome to Slashdot, where a considerable portion of the population support legalizing all drugs.
The reason curbing anorexia is a big deal is that it has "the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric disorder"
So it corrects itself out of the gene pool. We don't seem to have a problem here. We have an incredibly sick attitude in our society toward purely self-destructive behaviors - Allow them to run their course, and they go away. Or as George Carlin put it, "See, somehow, I can't feel sorry for an anorexic, you know? Rich cunt, don't want to eat? Fuck her. Fuck her. Don't eat! I give a shit. Like I'm supposed to be concerned about this. I DON'T WANNA EAT! Go fuck yourself."
I think further education is needed rather than censorship.
Teach people about logic. Teach people to not mindlessly accept everything they hear or see on television.
I don't think we should ever resort to censorship because a minority of people choose to starve themselves. I see this as no different than the "think of the children" or "the terrorists are going to get us" nonsense.
Why not take a step back and say, "Why do these women want to be like these models?". They want the popularity and ego satisfaction that goes along with looking like those models. The fact that their self-worth is based on the opinions of other anonymous people is the problem. It's their parents' job to redirect them to base their self-worth on more objective criteria. In other words the researchers have cause and effect backwards. These women already have low self-worth and think looking like anorexic models will make them better because people with low self-worth always think being popular makes them better. The fact that it's anorexic models is arbitrary. In other places and times it was Rubenesque models. It's a moral problem and as usual people want to find a short-cut to dealing with moral struggle by imposing censorship. Censorship doesn't solve the problem. It just forces the issue to manifest in another way.This research is worthless. Actual it's even worse than that. It's positively harmful.
P.S. You also see the inverse, being anti-popular (i.e. pick your "counter-culture" movement of choice) is seen as giving self-worth. It's all the same. The point is to make being popularity irrelevant to self-worth.
I'm not sure that you are the target audience of the modelling industry. Most of the mens magazines have women in them that seem to be relatively well proportioned. Not necessarily really skinny, but healthy (eg the sort of woman likely to give you healthy kids). It's the magazines targeted at women that have the really skinny girls in them, and women keep buying them.
If you want to ban something ban product advertisements for garbage foods and their counterpart, weight loss pills, magic candy bars, shakes, TV dinners, etc.. Product marketing departments and the lack of knowledge about proper diet and exercise are only rivaled in their contribution to obesity and eating disorders by the unhealthy lifestyles that are a product thereof.
Two of my imaginary friends reproduced once
On the one hand, catwalk models tend towards ridiculously skinny; deaths from malnutrition are not unknown. There are one or two TV series that we've stopped watching because the obvious anorexia of some of the actresses kept drawing us out of the story. (cough-90210-cough) Moreover, in a completely perverse move, we've seen advertising groups take deathly skinny models and photoshop them to be *more* skinny. I don't like this any more than the "heroin chic" of a few years ago. It's gone beyond trendy and gotten vulgar.
On the other hand, I can't help imagining that after the government steps in, fashion shows will start looking more like this.
Is there possibly a solution that restores sanity, without having the government replace the current insanity with a different kind of insanity?
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
People need to get past their misogynist thinking
I think you do. You're confusing anorexia with a female only problem.
This is an avoidable danger, like prohibiting the glorification of drugs in kids' shows.
Seriously? Which kids shows did that? Honestly, I'd really like to see a kid's show glorifying drugs.
Anyway, about 50% of the populace has tried some kind of illicit drug or other, so I think the battle's lost there. Those that do, do, those that don't, don't.
this is false. as a sufferer of this condition, i can tell you body
image is always a proxy for other things. it's a way to control
something (even if that has nothing to do with what you'd like
to control). if you fix the underlying issues, typically the eating
disorder gets better. obviously, there are people with e.d. who
develop an addiction to the chemical state starvation brings. but
none of this has anything to do with advertising.
It's difficult to the average person to "not be affected by what you see." For other people, the magical brainwashing waves don't exist.
Ban fat people too.
The United States is a highly regulated health care system already. Many procedures are legally restricted to expensive doctors. There is a big battle between the hospitals/doctors, and the insurance companies. Both have grown in size for negotiating power over the other. People want to pay as little for health care as they can, they might say otherwise, but that is not true. If we let people die outside of the Emergency Room for lack of money as Ron Paul suggests, we would have people paying more attention to their health, and being more proactive.
I want Walmart and Walgreens to enter the low end medical care market and squeeze those profitable companies.
Teach people about logic. Teach people to not mindlessly accept everything they hear or see on television.
You must be new here. And by "here" I mean this planet.
i am most likely not the target of that modelling industry but i heard this so many times before, i dont really see a lot of kids starving themselves because of what they see in magazines either but most of all the fact that some of these skinny models are compared to anorexia patients baffles me, someone suffering from anorexia is pretty much incapable of doing anything they look indeed like walking skeletons, definitely not like anything you'd see on a catwalk, with a few exceptions probably. Anyway, i'm opposed against censorship of any kind, even if its offensive (most of the time it is to someone somewhere). That goes from censoring muhammad out of south park to forcing magazines to ban certain kind of photo's, no matter the subject, as long as its voluntarily, i'm definitely not including child porn here even if that seems to be the perfect hammer to block about everything right now
Free speech was meant to be free for all... how can anyone grow up in a nanny state ?
You understand that if those marketers waited for me to buy their stuff, they'd go bankrupt immediately. I don't make purchases due to marketing. You won't find clothing, vacations, cars, foods, et cetera on my annual expenses that were marketed to me. You'll find movies that I enjoyed, you won't find more than the occasional movie that I didn't enjoy (so you're correct to the tune of $30 per year), concerts and the like. You'll find houses and household expenses.
Certainly, for some marketing, I'm very important. I buy one cleaner over another equivalent cleaner based on marketing, sure. But I don't choose a bad cleaner over a good one due to marketing.
And of course my comment is despicable. I think so too. But that's the point. I don't want to live my life having to worry about those people who add needless complexity. Their problems are not my problems. I don't want to be involved in solving them.
And what of the skinny person who isn't anorexic, but is very skinny -- genetics can do that -- and wants to start a modeling agency of their own? You're going to tell them that it's illegal for them to model clothing?
And of course it's common on slashdot. I love the softer sciences, and they are very relevant. They are excellent things to fight - because unlike hard sciences, you can fight them without equipment. The're a House episode floating around with a line to the effect of: if you don't require those who suffer to fight their own fight, you deny those that do the respect that they deserve.
We all have our shit. There are skills that I find incredibly difficult to master, or even to learn in the first place. I fight really hard, for example, to teach anyone anything. It turns out that I can't serialize knowledge at all. That's no the way I think of things. Occasionally, I'm in a position where I really need to teach someone something. I fight hard to do it. And I win. I don't turn and say that the world should allow me to never need to teach anyone anything, that I should have my own private teacher to help me whenever I do.
causes unemployment?
i'm very sorry to post twice on this but i just read some stats and from what i see, overweight or obesitas or what's it called professionally seems to be a much bigger problem than anorexia (sorry, just felt i had to add this)
Free speech was meant to be free for all... how can anyone grow up in a nanny state ?
The most important right of all that is holy and dear for the progressive Western heart is the right to behave stupid, irresponsible, antisocial, self-destructive and plain vanilla irrational.
Whenever somebody treads even close to that holy right, the Wise Pastor of the Past arguments are invoked, Godwin law is suspended and burning coal-hot aforementioned individualistic heart reaches the gaping heights of dignified eloquence.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
part of being a parent is to raise your children however you see fit. yes that includes keeping them away from things if you believe that they shouldn't see it. a big part of growing up, on the other hand, is to suddenly realize that what you learned wasn't all real, and you now, quite suddenly, need to unlearn things. santa clause comes to mind. so do three incorrect definitions of acids and bases. also primary colours, the shape of an atom, and a good 30% of what you learn in high school. and if you grow up enough, religion too.
in the middle ages, when food was tough to come by, yes the obese were considered superhuman. so yes. nowadays, obese have health problems (because we live longer than they used to). but if you want to know the best thing I ever heard from a mother, it's this: "my son was ill last week, he had a cold. but because he's a little chubby, I didn't worry than if he missed a meal or two that I'd need to forcefeed him so he wouldn't starve". buffer weight is superhuman, yes.
I fight to break free of a lot of things. That includes other people's ideals.
Hey, I'm currently fighting all of my family and friends by choosing to purchase a house that I can afford with a cheque, instead of taking a mortgage for twenty years because I believe life is better without financial debt. It's forced me to move farther than my friends would have liked, and it'll put me into a category of people without problems -- while my friends will struggle to make bank payments, ultimately pay a lot of interest, some will get divorced over it, and some will kill themselves over it. most will spend less time with their families too.
you fight for what you believe will be a better life. if you fight for what others believe will be a better life, they'll have that better life, you won't.
As much as I think runway models are fucking stupid, it's not the governments place to be doing shit like that. We need to get out of this mentality that we can tell people how to live by having the govt make laws. that's not how it's supposed to be.
we're not talking about friends. we're talking about making it illegal for someone to do something because someone else has a problem with it. think of the healthy skinny person who wants to start their own modeling agency. you're going to say it's illegal for that person to model their own clothing? just because other people stop eating when they watch those ads?
my sister was and is no longer anorexic.
it's got nothing to do with being able to contribute to the world. everyone can. and I'd hope that you'd help your friend, that's what friends are for. but that's not what strangers are for.
and in this case, you're asking me to help your friend, with my freedom, with my time, or with my money. her problem is not my problem. it may be your problem if you call yourself her friend, but it's not my problem.
and the fact that you'd demand that my government force me to help your friend with your friend's problem, makes you the goddamn computer. it makes you uncompassionate about me. I've got my own problems, and you don't see me demanding your forced assistance.
now things are different with sick people. and by sick, I assume you mean ill. because that's an interspecies attack. I just as vulnerable to cancer as the next person (within a degree of significance). but that's not true with regard to athletic injury. would you demand that I help someone who breaks their arm playing football, by choice? there's a line there. I'm not certain where it is, but I know where it's not. and I'm not going to take the gun out of someone else's mouth. if they want to kill themself, I'm neither for nor against it. and after I weigh everything that they could still contribute, against the cost that it'll take, it's their life not mine.
and that's the point. it's their life to end, and it's their life to deal with. and that's why they have friends to help them, if they want friends. and if they want to live on the edge of death, because they like the taste of the gun, then I'm not going to take that gun away from them -- until they point it at me.
you should never stop helping your friend. and you should never be forced to help mine.
Basically, you're an asshole and I hope you get hit by a truck. Show some fucking compassion you're not a goddamn computer.
This is by far the most quotable thing I've read today. :P
So... you get compassion unless you're an ass, which is in "compassion", so it's even punnier.
You can't legislate how people feel about one another. If society finds skinny people attractive, then banning them from TV is not going to affect it. Just like changing what you are allowed to call a certain race of people is not going to change how you feel about that race of people.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
"Several hundred thousand women in the United States suffer from anorexia "
And several million women in the United States suffer from being fat.
The good of the many outweighs the good of the few.
Because regulating drugs is rather different than regulating the display of photographs of clothed people based on their body type? Can you imagine having to submit every fashion photo to some government committee, which would then argue over whether each model was appropriately non-skinny? I'd call it Orwellian but it's too silly for that.
But if this idiotic proposal becomes law, I suggest men rally and demand the end to all the unrealistically handsome and ripped men on the covers of every romance novel. It's horribly harmful to the self-esteem of all men who don't look like Fabio.
Q: What does the "B." in Benoit B. Mandelbrot stand for? A: Benoit B. Mandelbrot
"Government should ban..."
What government should ban is government banning things; we could use fewer government bans.
If you do what you always did, you get what you always got.
Granted, I do believe that only showing skinny people in ads damages the psyche, but people come in all shapes, forms and sizes. The print ads should reflect this by having a good cross section of the population. Any anorexic model can make any outfit look good, but if it still looks good on a plus sized girl, shoppers will be begging to stuff their cash in your registers... trust me on this!
See... if I can do it, and I'm just a friggin' engineer, then it's not that hard.
Ads cost millions. Where are you going to get the money for these ads? The fashion industry will have more money and will be able to get more ads (though I don't get how the fashion industry can stay in business if all the clothes are designed only for concentration camp prisoners, that is, they don't fit the majority of the market - normal women)
While thin models contribute to some eating disorders like bulimia they are not the main contributor to anorexia. The issue with anorexia is the sufferer's delusional view on how thin they are. I have seen a couple of anorexic models but most are thin and healthy. Most anorexics see themselves a fatter that their goal no matter what their weight is. Even when their pictures and weight are compared against models who are heavier then them anorexics still believe that the model is thinner. Even if thin models are banned there will still be anorexics who view themselves as fatter. That is why it is a disorder as it is a problem with perception and not weight.
That's because obesity is not classified as a psychiatric disorder.
The moment when high fashion becomes the people we meet at Walmart, they've lost me.
Thin is healthy and attractive to me.
Remember kids, if you're not paying for the service, YOU ARE THE PRODUCT THAT IS BEING SOLD.
The difference between an overweight and an underweight woman is this: I would never make fun of an overweight woman's body. Being overweight may not be healthy in many cases, nor may it be the peak of sexual attraction, but being underweight is absolutely fucking disgusting. I want to date a woman, not a skeleton with some skin draped over it.
Physical fitness is so much more important. I would highly doubt that an underweight person is "more healthy" in a sedentary lifestyle than an overweight one. There's this thing we call "skinny fat." Horrible fitness level with just very low calorie intake. Awful. The worst. They have such a high body fat to body muscle ratio that the primary deposits (the stuff you can't get rid of short of starving nearly to death) appear as an excess of fat would. Sure, you might fit into a size 0, but you're absolutely horribly disgustingly ugly. Eat a goddamn hamburger and hit the gym once in a while.
http://www.crossfitsouthbay.com/2011/05/skinny-fat/
Universal healthcare is not just the mark of a civilized society, it's cheaper than commercial healthcare, because you don't have to pay for all those claims adjusters and billing administrators.
Actually they don't go away under the currently enacted-but-not-in-effect U.S. system. You are required to purchase insurance from an insurance company under the new system. The costs stay the same, or go up, since you can't opt out because of rising costs.
The U.S. system as enacted is a universal coverage system, not a universal healthcare system. We already have a universal healthcare system, it's just hideously expensive when uninsured people utilize it at a hospital emergency room.
The problems with the system that will be replacing the current system is that it's exactly the same as the current system in the most important respects:
o. You pay an insurance company for health insurance ...looks like a Ponzi scheme to me. The only people who make out are the insurance companies, and they have incredible incentive to drive up costs at some multiplier of their desired margin. And that doesn't change under universal coverage.
o. The insurance company pays the doctor for your visit
o. The doctor pays a portion of the money back to the insurance company for malpractice insurance
o. The insurance company pays for use of equipment like MRI machines
o. The company that manufactures the MRI machines pays a protion to the insurance company for liability insurance
o. The hospital pays an inflated cost for the machines to cover the vendors liability insurance in the cost
o. The hospital pays the insurance company for liability insurance related to the machine
o. The hospital pays malpractice insure related to the machine
If they gave us single payer and tort reform, that would be one thing, but this isn't it.
I'd really rather pay for food for someone than to line the pockets of an insurance company.
-- Terry
Seriously? Which kids shows did that? Honestly, I'd really like to see a kid's show glorifying drugs.
Scooby Doo, H.R. Pufnstuf, the Pacman cartoon show...
Blank until
... continued the researchers at the infamous "Fat University," pausing to wash down the cake they were continually stuffing into their mouths with a milkshake, "low calorie foods should be bannnnnnned, ... those horrible skinny people think they're so great and "attractive", but we know they're unnatural freaks! Fat is beautiful and.... we'l......asl34!!%*"
(at this point the spokesman keeled over from an apparent heart attack.. or maybe he just choked to death on cake; more on this breaking story as it develops)
We live, as we dream -- alone....
I like thin girls. No I do not mean some deluded idiot that thinks that starvation is a goal. But I have no reason to want to see fat women in movies or on TV. Anorexia is a condition caused by being a mid to upper class suburbanite and probable stems from a serious rage towards parents. Has anyone noticed that young men with anorexia are rare as hens' teeth? Spoiled young women with nothing to do just get whacky sometimes.
They're gross... If I'm going to ban something then I might as well be honest about my motivation for it. Crazy girls are going to be crazy. You're not going to stop girls from starving themselves by removing skinny models anymore then you'll stop crazy boys from killing people by banning video games.
BUUUUT... they're gross... so ban them.
Feel the same way about those female body builders that look like they're smuggling breast implants in their arms. It's really nasty. I'm sure most women feel the same way about body builder men... though frankly that isn't as weird looking as the women who have broader chests then the average linebacker.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Marketing targeting STUPID PEOPLE works. It just bounces off anyone with a trace of actual intellect. I for one am perfectly OK with genetically stupid people being selected OUT of the gene pool by their own characteristics. Not that that is a significant result of marketing in actual fact, mind, but I would be fine with it if it were. I can't imagine why some caricature of a do-gooder busybody would NOT be fine with it.
Yeah, why not within 1%? I mean that literally; why stop at 10%? How about 0.1%? How about 0.000000001%, so there is only a single perfect specimen left?
Some people are heavy. Some are LIGHT. Fucking DEAL WITH IT. Your idea of perfection, or some committee's idea, does NOT impress me.
If you want to create a perfect robot race, with every one stamped out an exact copy, be my guest.
How about we ban you first? Oh wait. I have an idea. How about we don't ban ANYBODY because of their opinions and life choices?
A WHOLE LOT of fucking morons think that.
1st ban or enforce disclaimers where images of the models bodies have been modified to shrink waist lines and exaggerate breasts etc. At least prevent from girls striving for the impossible.
Really... How would regulating this be any different than banning steroids in professional sports?
Let us count the ways these two are different. 1) Who makes the ban. In the case of professional sports, the ban comes from the professional sports organizations themselves and the fans. For your example, it comes from government.
2) Who is affected. Professional athletes only or everyone who wants to advertise a product or even parody an advertisement of a product.
3) Harm to society. In the former case, athletes are being forced not to engage in a chemical arms race. Small number of people by a private group. Not much harm. In the thin model case, government is trying to change how society thinks and behaves through government force. Huge immediate harm. To be very blunt here, I do not think saving the lives of a few thousand women a year is worth the harm inflicted by this ban.
4) Precedence. I know some people don't believe in the existence of the slippery slope, but it does remain that private groups imposing behavior restrictions on voluntary members or employees is nothing new. But once we have a ban on certain human behavior and communication due to one disease, that forms a precedent for the government to impose further bans for other tenuous health or public welfare excuses. A ban would also reward the doctors and organizations that advocated for it and empower them. I'd rather they be punished via marginalization for even daring to suggest just a vile scheme.
5) Potential for abuse. In addition to creating a negative precedent on crucial human activities, it also creates a huge avenue of abuse for government to impose its will on businesses and non-profits that advertise. It's an lever for coercion of government whim over a business or charity. It's another means for one business to gain advantage over another through more rigorous enforcement of the ban on the latter.
I don't really care if all of the models are properly average in size; most of those girls are currently nasty looking from being so thin, anyway.
I just hope the government listens, and while banning too-skinny models, they ban any model that would medically be obese. Obviously, since it's a medical ban, any muscle girl would still have her advertising job. It's just the disgusting obese women who will have to work for their money, instead of happily gorging themselves, for once.
The skinny girls won't lose their jobs, they'll only be extremely thankful that the government has given them the chance to eat properly, and to stop using a massive amounts of alcohol and drugs, in order to have a job.
Really... How would regulating this be any different than banning steroids in professional sports?
1. Steroids are pharmaceuticals, and as such are heavily regulated. There is no constitutional protection for drugs. There is for speech, in such places that place a value on free speech. The standard is totally different.
2. With regard to sports leagues, steroids are banned *by the leagues*.
If your point is that modeling consortia should band together to ban skinny models, that would be a great step. I say this as a man who finds women who look like skeletons to be rather unattractive. Bring me healthier women any day. However, when you start talking about governments banning what people can talk about or the images they can portray, you have a different thing on your hands.
People need to get past their misogynist thinking that anorexia just means being lean.
Note that the argument about what people can talk about has nothing to do with cultural ideals of what women should/shouldn't look like, so the whole "let me justify my anti-free-speech position by declaring my opponents to be misogynist" angle isn't flying either.
First of all the actual article sucks - it contains no link to the actual published research, nor does it even bother to identify the journal in which the study was published. Christine Hsu, the article's author, contradicts herself on whether Austria or Italy has the lowest female BMI:
Of all the 17 European countries studied, women in Austria were had the lowest average body mass index, a measurement of weight compared to height, at 23.67, which was lower than the European average of 25. Italy had the lowest average BMI for young women at 21.40.
And, predictably, she makes NO mention of the actual survey's contents or methodology, beyond stating how many participants there were. So, we have no way of telling how those participants were selected, what questions they were asked, what the margin of error was calculated to be, and so on.
But the biggest fraud of all, is the conclusion that, based on one survey, European governments are somehow justified in dictating which models advertisers may or may not employ. That's not even a slippery slope - it's a precipice that makes the Matterhorn look like a Dutch tulip field.
Crappy reporting on execrable science. Nothing to see here ...
Check out my novel.
Fat guys? Pimply guys? Guys without muscles? Guys with cheap cars? Oh, they exist in commercials alright. As points of ridicule. Ads are not a very nice representation of humanity. They try to sell us something by telling a very quick and simple story and the best way to do it is with stereo-types and pleasant pre-conceptions.
There are plenty of ads with old, fat or whatever type of woman. An ad for heating has an elderly couple in it that I saw yesterday before I zapped away. Yes, an ad for soap aimed at women will see it being used by an attractive woman AND that woman getting the attention of very unrealistic attractive males. Are we going to ban them too? Only ugly people can appear in ads? Then how will the pretty people feel about that? I have noticed more then once that it is the pretty girls who are the most insecure. A woman with some padding tends to be a lot more sure about herself and comfortable with herself then a woman who has the right weight and measurements.
That you are a delusional freak is proven by the fact that men suffer from eating disorders as well. Just that Oprah (a woman) doesn't pay attention to it. Men undergo costmetic surgery to implant muscles or have their penis extended because they are insecure because of constant jokes in the media about how size matters. Ah... yes... say that a woman with small breast is less of a woman, that is a no-no. But penis jokes are perfectly fine.
The simple fact is that the media is a lie. We can then sanitize the hell out of it but where do we go? To be truly free a media program and ad would have to include an awful lot of stuff. An Axe commercial for the fat, one for the ugly, one for the handicapped, one for gay people, one for people who abstain, one for who don't, one for addicts, one for people with skin diseases, one for the blind, one for the deaf, one for animal lovers, one for the pedo's. Anyone could get upset about themselves not being represented in the media.
For instance, I am quite upset by all the ads showing a capable housewife and a clutch of a husband. Makes me feel very insecure... who do I sue for a million bucks?
Isn't it sad that some women get an eating disorder? Sure but you can't make the entire world safe because it would never ever end. Proof? FAR more kids get injured and killed by cars driving faster then 10km/h. Since you care so much about the harm you do, you here by agree never ever to travel faster then brisk walking speed. For the children. Don't want to? Child murderer!
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Keira Knightley is the actress from the Pirates of the Caribean with rather small breasts. For another role, there exists a rather famous comparison picture in which her breasts are photoshopped to be a couple of sizes bigger. It was done against her will, she agreed to some touching up but not to go from A to C.
Is she pretty? Your tastes might differ but a lot of people would say yes...
So... does this stop all the girls out there from worrying their tits are to small? Hell no. For that matter, most super models got modest chest sizes. Does that stop girls from worrying? No. So WHAT image from the media is telling girls that they need to have big tits? Not a famous movie star, not super models.
Yet the claim stands that thin fashion models influence how girls view their body but not the breast part? No, it is a load of bull.
Some people feel insecure about their image, they then find anything out there to justify themselves in feeling bad about it. For a rather extreme and dangerous example, how many black people claim they are kept down by discrimination when the most powerful man on the planet right now is black? Somehow the fact Obama got elected president of the US does not factor into the claim of racism.
Mind you, things are never black and white, there is racism and the media and society put a lot of expectations on how people should be. This isn't just looks, many a person keeps looking for the magical love where violins suddenly start playing. I have met people who really thought that when they became adults, there lifes would be like that in Friends and other sitcoms, sitting around all day drinking coffee with the occasional visit to work if it suited them. Reality? You want to be able to afford even a single coffee, you work so hard that all you want to do in the evening is sleep.
Does this matter? I don't know if the term loverboy is universally known but these are men who seduce young girls with money and a flash lifestype and then get them into prostitution. The girls affected really believe the movie lifestype. "He always got money" and "He always was ready to have a good time" never makes them question how the two combine. It doesn't matter in sitcoms so why should it in real life that a guy with no job has plenty of girls and all the free time in the world and a lot of spare cash?
People who aren't to smart use the media to justify their insecurities, neuroses and world views, and ignore the bits of media that don't match. Porn girls have big tits so big tits are the norm and all the porn with small tits, every single super model don't exist. In comedy, fat ugly women often have attractive wives... of course the BBC series Miranda doesn't count where a very tall and none to skinny rather plain woman has not one but TWO hunky guys interested in her. And gosh, she NEVER goes after men who are overweight or plain looking or, horror of horror, to short.
Media isn't realistic. Or rather it is but we tend to look only at the bits that offend us. Porn is young girls ignoring all the granny and MILF porn. Super stars have big tits except for the ones who don't.
If we start to censor the media to be realistic... then what about those of us who are naturally skinny? Who are just plain good looking? Should they be subjected to a media showing that only ugly people can be happy?
Silly? It isn't the fat chicks or plain looking ones who tend to suffer from insecurity, it is the pretty girls. After all, the fat chick might not get a lot of boys after her but the one who does is probably really interested in her, the person. Where as the pretty girl only gets the guys after her who see her as a trophy and the ordinary guys do not approach her. Being pretty is no guarantee for happiness. See the lives of many a movie actress ending in misery.
There are a lot of things wrong with ads but the biggest is that so many people take them to serious and lack the capacity to look further then their own insecurity at the real world. Believe on pretty people ca
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
It's up to us a parents to teach our children that being too anything is not healthy. It's also up to us to teach our children that fashion is not a lifestyle and should not dictate how we see ourselves. We always explain to our 11 year old how the TV ads work and how marketing works (selling a "lifestyle/happiness") and what a lie it is. It's time for us to stop the consumerism of our culture, that is a lot of the crux of this problem and legislation is not going to fix it. All that said I am a good Liberal and I do believe that government belongs regulating commercial industries, such as big oil, who refuse to regulate themselves.
"The Brady Bunch is back...working homicide"
Because it would be too difficult to get the regulators to agree on whether the perfect specimen is Liv Tyler or Beyonce Knowles.
And how could you televise the cage match between the top champions of their perfection?
Seriously? What do you think is the difference between an apartment complex banning pets and the COUNTRY banning pets? Do you think there is none?
Should really be based on bodyfat % not BMI, since muscle weighs more than fat you could end up with some really unattainable bodies that according to BMI are obese, but look awesome and ripped.
Many sports models would be overweight according to BMI.
That's just nonsense. The correct word is "sow".
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
So ban fat models too. THAT would trigger a shitstorm worth watching.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
I recently heard an interview with a dietician who said that the idealisation of thinness was a net positive; for every kid who ended up anorexic there were many, many more who were one their way to obesity, diabetes, heart disease ;and anything that made that less likely was worth hurting some feelings.
Beauty is within. A women that is more focused on looks and will damage her body to fit into a jeans isnt attractuve. By damaging, I mean laxitives, bulimia, anorexia, and surgery. I work with beautiful women every day and my opinion (like it matters) is low self-esteem is less attractive than letting it all hang out. I personally like BBWs... I dont like girls that appear fragile and boring. I lost 90 lbs the hard way, exercise and determination. Ive kept it off for 7 years. Even when I was fat, I was still getting attention from beautiful women. Attitude matters more than anything. My advise for you lazy chicks griping about not being the ideal image.... Free yourself from the media. Instead of watching Jersey Shore, go for a walk.
Marketing targeting STUPID PEOPLE works. It just bounces off anyone with a trace of actual intellect. I for one am perfectly OK with genetically stupid people being selected OUT of the gene pool by their own characteristics.
I don't know, man. How do you know that's not what they want you to think? They want you to think you're not being affected by their magical brainwashing waves! It's all part of their plan to make you not buy their products whenever you see an ad!
Seems to me if 1/3 of Americans are obese and another third overweight, there are two criticisms:
1. Anorexia isn't as big a problem as some other dietary issues
2. If seeing skinny models increases anorexia, then we need to do more of it in order to solve the obesity problem.
Their conclusions weren't thought thru very carefully.
I've seen this one up close. Over the last couple of years I've lost a lot of weight, 150 pounds. Nothing fancy, just counting calories and exercising. It's done wonders for my physical and mental health, and has attracted a lot of attention. People stop me in the hallways, in the elevators, hell, even in the street.
"How much weight have you lost?"
"How did you do it?"
"You look amazing!"
If losing this much weight means I look amazing, I attract attention, people like me, maybe if I lose some more, I'll look even more amazing. And attract more attention, and people will like me even more. There's the slippery slope. I've resisted it, partly because I'm not so emotionally fucked up as to crave that sort of attention, and partly because excessively thin middle-aged women get a certain "hard" look that I dont like, and don't want for myself. I'm not toothpick skinny, but am slim and nicely curvy. I'm a woman, dammit, not a stick insect. I like it.
As for photoshopped/anorexic models, I shop at places that use reasonable looking models (and carry clothes in reasonable sizes), and ignore the places that don't. If more people did so, things would change. The dollar is mightier than the sword.
...laura
plus size models were never banned during the whole waif craze.
alive to the universe, dead to the world
I can't remember who it is that said that "the answer to bad speech is more speech, not censorship", but I agree. In this case it would be to allow them to use whatever image they want, but force them to acknowledge what they're doing
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
Malnutrition may be unhealthy, but skinny is not. If anyone is unsure about this, I'd invite them to do some research on Calorie Restriction. Let's not forget that more years are lost to obesity-related causes than to anorexia. Banning pictures of skinny models would do much more harm than good.
This is exactly like what legislation in Australia tried to do when they banned nude models with A-cup breasts, saying it was promoting pedophilia[1]. Or how regulations around softcore magazines lead to photoshopping out protruding labia minora[2]. Both of these "conditions" are completely natural, and telling women that you can't show the goods if you have small breasts or a "messy vagina" is unforgivable. It lead Australian women to get unnecessary cosmetic surgery to match up to the government mandated acceptable appearance. While this might seem like the exact same thing that's happening without government involvement, women getting force fed an unattainable image of beauty, at least being skinny isn't illegal; which is what these researchers are proposing. So if don't want to let photoshop decide beauty, and you can't legislate a standard without infringing on the rights of others, maybe what we need is a little common sense. We all agree that many of these perfect images are a result of photoshopping, taking models who are human and elevating them to god-like proportions. Perhaps what we should be banning isn't who, but what. Regulate how photoshop can be used specifically on covers and advertising, make it a fine to make a size 4 a size 0. While it won't make anorexia go away, it will at least bring back some attainable standards of beauty. [1] http://boingboing.net/2010/01/28/australian-censor-bo.html [2] (nsfw, but in an educational way) http://jezebel.com/5535356/the-labiaplasty-you-never-knew-you-wanted-%5Bnsfw%5D
Sigh... At the peril of feeding a troll (I really can't believe someone could honestly miss the point so completely)...
People need to get past their misogynist thinking
I think you do. You're confusing anorexia with a female only problem.
Congratulations sir, you win the more-PC-than-thou trophy! My bad, pointing out the obvious fact that "Anorexia nervosa occurs in females 10 times more than in males" and making the leap of thought that there is much more societal pressure for women to be thin --especially from men. If you won't take a few semesters of sociology and abnormal psychology, at least browse the article on Wikipedia.
This is an avoidable danger, like prohibiting the glorification of drugs in kids' shows.
Seriously? Which kids shows did that? Honestly, I'd really like to see a kid's show glorifying drugs.
Um... Yeah... That was my point. I think everybody understands that would be a bad idea.
Anyway, about 50% of the populace has tried some kind of illicit drug or other, so I think the battle's lost there. Those that do, do, those that don't, don't.
Again... You're missing the point. Protecting impressionable kids is a different topic than limiting the rights of adults. Whoosh!
Ask me about my sig!
Because regulating drugs is rather different than regulating the display of photographs of clothed people based on their body type?
Sure, I'd agree it's significantly different, but at the root of it, it's a public health issue --and that's supposedly why pointy-headed politicians got all bent about steroids in baseball. The welfare of the professional players wasn't as much of a consideration as the message it sent aspiring young athletes. Both problems hinge on behaviors that are heavily influenced by culture.
Can you imagine having to submit every fashion photo to some government committee, which would then argue over whether each model was appropriately non-skinny?
No, nothing that ridiculous, but I can imagine something similar to what already happened with Spain's fashionistas. I don't think it's absurd at all to ask an industry to NOT encourage unhealthy employee behaviors.
Ask me about my sig!
Really... How would regulating this be any different than banning steroids in professional sports?
O.K. Apologies for being a little over-dramatic, but there are some parallels I'd like to point out.
1) Who makes the ban. In the case of professional sports, the ban comes from the professional sports organizations themselves and the fans. For your example, it comes from government.
I'm with you, this shouldn't be government business, even though it was very popular with Congress and President Bush recently. A responsible industry should handle it themselves --Spain is a good example.
2) Who is affected. Professional athletes only or everyone who wants to advertise a product or even parody an advertisement of a product.
See above. Professional models --and, as in sports, their impressionable fans/followers.
3) Harm to society. In the former case, athletes are being forced not to engage in a chemical arms race. Small number of people by a private group. Not much harm. In the thin model case, government is trying to change how society thinks and behaves through government force. Huge immediate harm. To be very blunt here, I do not think saving the lives of a few thousand women a year is worth the harm inflicted by this ban.
I think the alleged point of the congressional hearings and media flap on steroids in pro baseball was that it encouraged the acceptance of steroid use by young athletes. It seemed more people were having a "think-of-the-children" moment than displaying genuine concern for the plight of professional ball players.
And I am not surprised that you are unconcerned with the deaths of thousands of women.
4) Precedence. I know some people don't believe in the existence of the slippery slope, but it does remain that private groups imposing behavior restrictions on voluntary members or employees is nothing new. But once we have a ban on certain human behavior and communication due to one disease, that forms a precedent for the government to impose further bans for other tenuous health or public welfare excuses. A ban would also reward the doctors and organizations that advocated for it and empower them. I'd rather they be punished via marginalization for even daring to suggest just a vile scheme.
The political balance between regulation and freedom is tricky --and the first 100 tries usually fail. But if we didn't try, lawful civilization wouldn't exist. The fact we're not all paying over 90% in taxes is a thorough debunking of the slippery slope. The pendulum of human affairs always swings back when it's gone too far.
5) Potential for abuse. In addition to creating a negative precedent on crucial human activities, it also creates a huge avenue of abuse for government to impose its will on businesses and non-profits that advertise. It's an lever for coercion of government whim over a business or charity. It's another means for one business to gain advantage over another through more rigorous enforcement of the ban on the latter.
Again, I think we agree, ideally this should be the business and responsibility of the fashion industry, not government, to stop encouraging (sometimes demanding?) unhealthy behavior.
Ask me about my sig!
Note that the argument about what people can talk about has nothing to do with cultural ideals of what women should/shouldn't look like, so the whole "let me justify my anti-free-speech position by declaring my opponents to be misogynist" angle isn't flying either.
Sorry if I wasn't clear. At the point I posted, most of the discussion seemed to reflect a callous "hey, if she ain't fat, what's the problem?" attitude. The conversation seemed to be missing the fact that anorexia is a deadly disease.
I'm no opponent of free speech --far from it, but I'm also cool with not shouting "fire!" in a crowded theater. Trying to curtail the glamorization of anorexia, is more a pro bono publico issue than a free speech issue --like limiting the free speech of the pedophile film director's idea of entertainment.
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Seriously? What do you think is the difference between an apartment complex banning pets and the COUNTRY banning pets? Do you think there is none?
You think the government should be the regulator? Sure, they've dabbled, but that isn't what I'd propose at all.
Professional sports organizations do the right thing and discourage unhealthy behaviors, the fashion industry should do the same.
Ask me about my sig!
The problem with modern marketing, and the skinny model thing is but one example of this, is that it is easier to sell something to someone who is dissatisfied with what they already have. Thus much marketing aims to induce this kind of dissatisfaction with the status quo in the hope that you'll plump for their 'fix'. The real solution is to change how you view yourself and the world, but this is not easy, and not easy to educate about when the media and marketing people have a vested interest in spreading the opposite. What's needed is satisfaction, joy with life and general responsibility rather then dissatisfaction, greed and selfishness, which is alas the norm for the modern world.
-- The Grand Teddy Bear has Spoken: "Windows 8 Source Code Available NOW! more disgusting than your pr..."
Again, I think we agree, ideally this should be the business and responsibility of the fashion industry, not government, to stop encouraging (sometimes demanding?) unhealthy behavior.
Nah, it should be the responsibility of women themselves. Anorexia, while relatively dangerous, is not the only form of self-mutilation that women perform in the name of beauty. It's a matter of free speech that anyone can demand any sort of unhealthy but legal behavior. One of the points of a free society is to accept both that everyone will make bad decisions now and then and not to impose on society when bad decisions are made.
Would be to ban advertising.
is always lying, and that it's not about properly informing or educating you, but rather, to manipulate you into behaving the way some corporation wants you to. Usually with profoundly shallow and anti-social consequences.
Wow, was your doctor in Virginia a Jewish lobster-person by any chance? What sort of quack sees someone with post-nasal drip and decides it must be the ovaries!?
It's been many years, but what I recall of the ethnicities was your basic white-bread caucasians.
The line from "chronic runny nose" to "removing ovaries" did at least have a detour through "chronic gut problems", so there was some connection to the torso at least. But the quacks didn't connect the dots, and thought my wife's gut issues and abdominal sensitivity were because of ovarian cysts, rather than the true cause of irritable bowel due to chronically excess mucus and some undiagnosed minor food allergies.
My guess was that basic respiratory health management advice and the occasional albuterol inhaler prescription wouldn't make Kaiser as much bank as hospitalizing my wife and removing her organs. Cynical, sure, but I really can't think what else would have prompted their line of bizarre thinking.
Suffice it to say, we didn't follow through with the ovarian removal, and instead changed "healthcare" providers as soon as possible. (Actually, after that was when we moved to Japan for two years.)
Cheers,
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
WARNING -- Long post here. :) I reply to each of CAIMLAS's points, describing my related experience. TL;DR: It still comes down to the individual doctors.
My uncle lived in Tokyo for 10 years. I don't know where you went to the hospital, but here's my understanding of how it really works, based on what he's mentioned:
* You go to the doctor's office. They ask you what's wrong but don't really care.
* More than likely, they subscribe antibiotics or pain killers for it.
I think that's common to many places and many systems -- it depends a lot on the individual doctor you get to see. We had a couple shit doctors in Japan, who took the easy "here's some drugs, now go away" approach; but we mostly had better luck with good people who actually seemed to pay attention and care, and who followed through with real healthcare.
* If you need dental work done, it will more than likely result in a hasty tooth removal.
I never had much dental work done in Japan, but this doesn't jive at all with what I've heard from other zainichi gaijin (i.e. foreigners in Japan). The Japanese healthcare system's reimbursement plan for dentists is based in part on the number of visits, and I heard numerous stories of people going in for basic cleaning that was split across multiple visits -- top left one day, top right the next, bottom right a week later, and finally the bottom left, for instance -- as the dentist in question worked the system to their own gain. "Hasty tooth removal" would mean one single visit, which would mean the dentist was short-changing themselves. The more likely scenario would be many appointments spaced across weeks as the dentist did various things to fix the issue while also generating as many visits as possible.
* Any work done will likely require a full day of waiting in line at a clinic.
Maybe dental, dunno. But that was never our experience in the medical system. We were generally done within a few hours, and that includes mucking about with check-in, waiting to be called, seeing more than one doctor, and then waiting at the PX afterwards for whatever meds were needed.
* Even though it's state-funded, you still have to pay to see the doctor.
You could make the same gripe about the US mostly-private system -- Even though it's already funded through ever-rising premiums, you still have to pay to see the doctor..
The truth of the matter is that, for most things, all you pay out of pocket is a simple co-pay, which tends to be around $5 to $20 in US dollar terms. (Any meds would be separate from this, but still quite inexpensive out-of-pocket compared to the US.) If you're doing something on an in-patient basis, you can opt to pay a bit extra for a private room, for example, or for special meals -- but those are extras, and the fees weren't that high in our experience (my wife had her appendix out while we were in Japan, and due to some minor complications, she spent about a week in hospital).
* Doctor's offices and hospitals are crowded, and if you can do without going, you're better off not: you'll get a secondary infection while there, more than likely.
Very much not our experience. Japanese healthcare facilities are more decentralized than anything I've seen in the US, with oodles of smaller clinics scattered around the neighborhoods, some getting quite specialized. The huge multi-wing hospitals like you see in the US are generally (but not always) university setups. We got my wife's bicycle-accident broken arm treated at a local place of only maybe a dozen rooms, and her appendicitis treated at a similarly small surgical clinic. Meanwhile, we went to a different and much larger place for her asthma care after we moved to Tokyo. Despite being larger (large enough to get lost in, like most US hospitals I've been to), the Tokyo place we went to was never "crowde
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
What absolute bullshit numbers! Like 100 women a year die of Anorexia in the US! Millions die from obesity!
Slashdot "libertarians": Small government for me, big government for those I disagree with. -1, I disagree with you
My point is, you were asking the difference between MLB regulating something and the GOVERNMENT regulating something. Now suddenly you're insisting there's a big difference because one is the government and one isn't.
So I think you've answered your original question, yet you seem to think I'm promoting the position that there isn't a difference. My point was clearly that there IS a difference.