Be a model... or just look like one

When Madrid’s regional govern-ment announced that they would ban all overly thin models from participating in fashion week, I could practically hear creaks in the tired joints of feminism as it jumped out of its wheelchair to victory dance. It was a glorious moment for all girls – fat, thin, old, young; you name it – to peek out the pigeonhole and steal a glimpse at Utopia. After that short-lived breath of fresh air, the majority retreated to their respective comfort zones to turn the page and read the next headline. The supposedly impressionable public carried on as if no such battle against the "size-ists" was won.

After protests that rail-thin supermodels were encouraging young girls to mimic their looks by developing eating disorders, Madrid Fashion Week organizers decided it was time to take the waifs off the runway. Models with a BMI or Body Mass Index less than 18 like Esther Cañadas, Kate Moss and Alek Wek were banned from participating in the fashion shows. The same restrictions were also considered by Letizia Moratti, mayor of Milan, for the city’s fashion week. Officials are pushing for a healthier look, aiming to blow its evil antithesis, heroin chic, out of the water completely. The fabulous and infallible powers that be made it clear that they did not hold models nor designers responsible for anorexia, however, they said those in the fashion industry had a responsibility to depict healthier body types.

"The fashion industry’s promotion of beauty as meaning stick-thin is damaging to young girls’ self-image and to their health," said British Culture Secretary, Tessa Jowell. "Young girls aspire to look like the catwalk models – when those models are unhealthily underweight it pressurizes girls to starve themselves to look the same."

Jowell’s concerns led the anti-waif movement to invade London fashion week, ruffling more than just feathers as health experts and media kept all eyes on the models’ bodies. Imagine the idea of attending the Fashion Week fanfaronades to look at something other than the couture!

Government officials, journalists and designers throughout the world’s fashion capitals are voicing their concerns for the industry’s connection to prevalent eating disorders today. Concurrently, retailers are dressing up their guilt by placing a greater diversity of sizes on the rack. European girls ranking in the plus and petite sizes now can have their cake and eat it, too. A great victory for today’s PC feminist and her sisters? Maybe. In Europe and North America, I imagine the Valkyries celebrating with champagne and truffles, dancing around a bonfire (sparked by rubbing two supermodels together) in the name of real, phenomenal women. In the Philippines, I imagine women flipping the page, changing the channel and yawning as they take their next subo (pills or potato chips, it varies, really), resigned to the constraints society has always placed on their bodies.

Filipinos And The F-Word

While obsessing about one’s own body weight is perfectly understandable, the issue escalates to alarming levels in our country. Filipinos have a penchant for making other people’s weight their business. Everyone who has gone on vacation for a significant period knows what I’m talking about when I say that Filipinos all suffer from Tumabakangasis, or "Tumaba ka nga, sis." It doesn’t matter that you made the dean’s list, went skydiving to conquer your fear of heights or recently survived a car accident, the only way people want to greet you involves mentioning your weight. I have friends from over 40 different countries in the world and none of their reunions with a friend or family member included a running commentary on how much weight they gained. Even distant relatives deem it de rigueur to squeeze their way through the festivities and past the lechon at the family Christmas party just to tell you to your face how "fat" you are. The sad part is that they feel morally obliged to tug at your spare tire, pinch your cheeks and with utterly painful sincerity, tell you how heavy you look and how sorry they feel. Minutes later, they’re fighting over the last piece of fried chicken. It’s no wonder the girls today are all sorts of screwed up.

When I was in high school, you could always tell when soirees, school dances, proms and debuts were approaching – the cafeteria ran out of Skyflakes. Right before I graduated, I noticed that the younger girls had skipped eating real food altogether; they ate Xenadrine and Bangkok pills to happily welcome the diet season. Sometimes, this was even encouraged by their parents. I can only imagine that teenage girls with weight issues today are shooting up a cocktail of fenfluramine, ephedrine and phenermine in the school bathrooms. Body issues continue to snowball after the initial shock of adolescence. Some women are, literally, dying to be thin. They subject their bodies to self-induced emotional and physical warfare for the sake of looking like supermodels, blind to the fact that their appearances lean more towards Caritas cases than Costume National spreads. It seems that maturity or distinction do not suffice as a "Get Out of Jail Free" card when it comes to obsessing about appearances, either. Proof enough is the recent confinement of a former presidential candidate for anorexia nervosa. It seems that "fat" has always been society’s kiss of death, the f-word for most women in the Philippines. When did weight become such an unhealthy obsession in this country and why is nothing being done about it?

Pretty On The Inside

I tried to research online about the body issues and eating disorders that plague so many Filipinas today and found nothing. Apparently, the drastic measures we take to manipulate our bodies are just as acceptable as having a glass of Shiraz with dinner. Is it because we are part of a culture that is used to looking the other way? Or is it because jeopardizing our health to achieve physical perfection is a necessity? I would rather just put down the damn fork, personally.

I have been repeatedly sucked into the "skinny girls are pretty girls" mentality and have survived each ordeal with a few emotional scars and slightly the wiser. These days, I’m happy as long as I don’t need to do the pants dance (when you alternate jumping up and down and wiggling your hips in order to cinch your trousers over body mass that wasn’t there last month) and can still see my toes when I stand up straight. I figure that if Spanish government officials can pull all the bony Betties out of Fashion Week, then it shouldn’t be too hard to get them out of my head. Besides, it’s way cooler to not look like a supermodel and still be able to wear couture. If I can ever be able to afford it, I hope one day to get there. But for now, I’m all right with munching on fries, eating ice cream and sipping beer. The nosy acquaintances and distant relatives can jeer all they want. My disarmingly clever wit will just process it as "material."

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Wisdom and wisecracks are always welcome at whippersnappergirl@hotmail.com.