London Fashion Week used to be marked by endless accounts about how silly the clothes on display are. The dresses are just as daft this year. Nobody's taking any notice of them, however. Instead, all focus is on those wearing them and their resemblance to living skeletons. Many journalists are concerned that teenage girls will take one look at them and instantly embrace anorexia and/or bulimia. Interestingly, this comes in the midst of a more sustained moral panic about obesity. Again, the primary focus is on teenage girls. But, just for the moment, the greatest threat to Western civilisation isn't being five pounds overweight. It's anorexia, and it's all the fault of those evil models.
These public outrages tend to happen in isolation. Few ever try to link them up. Nobody has suggested, for example, that some may be encouraged by the models to shed a few unnecessary pounds. Or that another possible cause of anorexia is every branch of the media constantly screaming "You're a lard arse!" Or even that models, together with actresses and female singers, are possibly so thin because gossip columnists slap the 'fat girl' tag on them as soon as they try looking remotely normal. Journalists need simple wrongdoers and this can never be other journalists.
As a result, women's bodies have become a constant subject of public debate. Perhaps, as a heterosexual male, I shouldn't mind this too much. But I'm also a heterosexual male who likes to read some actual news occasionally; like who my country's at war with this week, for example. Anyway, this isn't the GQ-style "Phwoar, look at the jugs on that" sort of enjoyable nonsense. It's the endless tutting of elderly, prudish tongues. The only reason it isn't accompanied by claims of "When I were a lad, models looked like real women" is that this would be too obvious a lie. Models have always looked the same; Twiggy didn't earn her nickname for nothing. Not only is this 'story' not news, it isn't even new.
Incidentally, for any journalists who really disapprove of London Fashion Week: It isn't like Miss World, which survived for decades without coverage. The only people who care about it are other journalists. If you ignore it for long enough, it really will go away.
These public outrages tend to happen in isolation. Few ever try to link them up. Nobody has suggested, for example, that some may be encouraged by the models to shed a few unnecessary pounds. Or that another possible cause of anorexia is every branch of the media constantly screaming "You're a lard arse!" Or even that models, together with actresses and female singers, are possibly so thin because gossip columnists slap the 'fat girl' tag on them as soon as they try looking remotely normal. Journalists need simple wrongdoers and this can never be other journalists.
As a result, women's bodies have become a constant subject of public debate. Perhaps, as a heterosexual male, I shouldn't mind this too much. But I'm also a heterosexual male who likes to read some actual news occasionally; like who my country's at war with this week, for example. Anyway, this isn't the GQ-style "Phwoar, look at the jugs on that" sort of enjoyable nonsense. It's the endless tutting of elderly, prudish tongues. The only reason it isn't accompanied by claims of "When I were a lad, models looked like real women" is that this would be too obvious a lie. Models have always looked the same; Twiggy didn't earn her nickname for nothing. Not only is this 'story' not news, it isn't even new.
Incidentally, for any journalists who really disapprove of London Fashion Week: It isn't like Miss World, which survived for decades without coverage. The only people who care about it are other journalists. If you ignore it for long enough, it really will go away.
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