Why is thin ''in''?

One word: the camera.

Once people stopped relying on the paintbrush to create likenesses they had a problem. The camera flattens people into two dimensions. So subjects look flatter and fatter. Women who would have looked stunning as oil paintings suddenly looked dumpy in photographs.

?

These are your posts

"Fashion contributes very significantly to my personal happiness, both when worn by me and by others. Boringly dressed people make me depressed."

"Oh yes, really depressed. I hate ugliness and tedium with a vengeance; beautiful and colourful things make me happy - be that people, fashion, flowers, architecture, food..."

"Gosh no, beautiful people and things don't make me feel inadequate, just uplifted. Ugly people and things though... eeugh."

I am not sure what this rewriting stuff is about. Did you mean what you said in those posts? If so, then what I said in my responses is entirely appropriate.

ISNT - I think you should avoid rewriting other people's posts! Never a good idea.

Bonsoir please can you explain what you meant then. Your words seemed very clear to me but if you meant something else then clarification would be great.

Again, ISNT, you are putting words in my mouth and then getting cross with the things I didn't say. What's the point?

I'm not angry, just flabbergasted that someone could seriously and openly say those things. It's just a total reversal of everything I believe about values and how to treat people and caring for people in difficult circumstances and so on.

The idea of "hating" someone because they are unattractive to look at is just vile.

And yes I also think bonsoir is on the windup. The alternative is just too grim.

It annoys me when people say But men are increasingly judged on their appearance too. Doubling something bad it is not an improvement.

Just because I think that expending a great deal of energy trying to conform to an "ideal" is a waste of time and diverts women's energies away from achieving their full potential, does not mean that I think it's the only, or even the main, factor negatively affecting them.

The thread title is the question "why is thin in?" and my posts are in the context of that. I wholeheartedly agree with Beachcomber above.

It's not particularly feminist not to swallow the notion that looking at 'ugly people' is depressing.

Would you make a list of your basic truths Bonsoir I am finding it difficult to understand what you are on about.

I'm not dismissing physical beauty as shallow.

I'm dismissing the notion that women are being held to silly standards of physical appearance that are impossible to achieve for most of us. Plus the idea that we are judged on whether we try to achieve these standards.

Appearance does hold women back more than men. It just seems like an odd and massively unfair way of doing things to me.

I wouldn't put surgically altering the way we look in the beautiful camp, no.

I feel content that natural beauty is more beautiful than surgically enhance type, so I agree with you on that score.

I found some of the European female athletes stunning in their healthy, physical beauty recently. As a lovely alternative to seeing stretched, plumped and pumped faces, that felt healing too!

My children are beautiful. But they won't look like that at 40 so why should they try to?

No. Physical beauty if very important. But not to the extent that people feel obliged to starve themselves to attain it. Or have themselves plucked, surgically enhanced, and be generally worried about looking natural.

Music can beautiful, so can literature. Lots of things are uplifting and beautiful.

But I don't understand the rush to dismiss physical beauty as a lesser thing, vacuous or shallow. It can be equally uplifting to the soul. It is a salve to the visual senses just as music is to the ears. Isn't it?

And I include beautiful people in this.

I went to a performance in our Arts Centre on Friday. There were various performers but them main one was a Natural Voice choir - and they were stupendous! Totally amazing. Really uplifting. And hardly a one that would be what you'd call beautiful to look at, or very slim, or well-dressed. But IT DIDN'T MATTER.

Ach well, just to add some balance....

Very groomed women who spend a lot of time, energy and money on their appearance, make me feel a bit miffed sometimes. They don't depress me but I do shake my head at the ridiculous standards of appearance that women are held to and I shake my head even more at the utter pointlessness of it all.

Sure it (fashion, grooming, whatever) makes a bunch of money for some people but it really is very vacuous when you think about it.

Women are judged on their looks all the time - bowing to this cultural bullshit does mean that we waste a lot of time and energy on something of no real importance.

I'm not trying to wind anybody up. Just stating a few basic human truths that many on the feminism topic have a very hard time swallowing!

Thin is in because it is the hardest thing to achieve in our western society. In Africa fat is in.

Is ISNT angry?
I didn't get that from her posts.

You're on the windup I think, it's working, I'm having a good old chuckle this morning.

"Queen is well post menopausal, so doesn't even get the 'courtesy' of being appraised about her looks."

Yep. You go from being critisised and commented on to being invisible. Great!

Why are you so angry, ISNT?