to expect normal sized girls to model in the Johnnie b Boden catalogue?

[mcbalham]

Check out the swimwear page of the johnnie b catalogue - a few of the girls on there are verging on the malnourished and are unlikely to have a healthy BMI. I find it distrubing that Boden of all people are promoting this image as normal - pictures which will be viewed by impressionable teenage girls. There is enough pressure on girls these days - pictures of arms and legs looking dangerously thin for a 14 year old really don't help.

Do you mean these pages?

They look like normal, healthy children to me...unless I'm looking at a different catalogue?

They look normal to me too.

They look quite normal and healthy to me

I think some of the girls are very thin looking, look at the arms.

They look like children, which is what they are. They're not supposed to look like curvy women, it's a range for kids . I suspect they've chosen models who very clearly are children and don't have women's bodies as it makes it obvious who the clothes are aimed at.

people forget Children are supposed to be leaner than adults.I think this is why weighing and measuring in schools is such a good idea because there are so many overwight kids that parents don't know what's normal

They look slender, but teenagers often are. Didn't look malnourished to me.

Look at their faces! They are glowing with health.they don't look anorexic or malnourished in the slightest.

Some are fine a couple are too skinny really, the stripy dress and pink bikini ones are on the verge of bad examples to me. Most teenage girls wouldn't be that slim.

They are kids, and I think we have lost sight of how kids are supposed to look- skinny!

I was that size at 14...I think I'm perfectly normal. I'm now 28 and a size 14/16 (I'm tall at 5'10") after having a daughter. I've always been a healthy weight and have always eaten well. I don't think they look malnourished, they are just slim. I'm all for having all sizes and shapes represented in fashion, I'm technically plus-sized now, but I do sometimes feel it's unfair on slimmer women/children when their size is considered not "normal".

They are a completely normal shape for young teenagers. Unfortunately this body type is promoted as ideal for adult women too, hence malnourished adult models and celebrities are everywhere.

How do you know they are 14? The one in the stipey dress looks much younger 11 maybe.My DD is nearly 11 and about that shape and she is well within the normal range for BMI?

They look like normal children. FWIW all the textbooks say you should be able to see the outline of your childrens' ribs, and that is what normal looks like.

So many children in our society are overweight now that we have lost our ability to judge what is and isn't a healthy size.

Some people are naturally slim and there was a time when many teenagers/kids looked like the children in the pictures. I think they look fine.

However I do think some of the adult women in the Boden cat are too stick thin and that just gives properly average-sized women like myself a wrong impression of the clothes they have on.

I think the problem is that there's no range. I never skinny as a child or teenager, but neither was I chubby. It does tend towards the message that slender is the norm, when in fact there's a much greater range of 'healthy' at that age, and in fact any age.

They look 'normal' to me.
DD is 13 and same shape.

I looked like that when I was a teenager. You can ask my mum and dad, I ate all day everyday. I got detention a few times for eating in classes.

Most of my friends looked like that too. They look perfectly normal and healthy to me.

None of them look underweight to me, they all look healthy.

Normal looking to me too. DD is on the slender side. I struggle to find clothes that fit her. Everything is vast around the waist and bottom.
Currently she is wearing an age 7 school skirt with age 9 top.
She is 11 on Saturday.

I think the problem is that adult models very often look like that as well, which isn't how grown women normally look.

They're all slim but not unhealthily so. Some people are naturally slim. Fairly typical of modelling really, you may as well complain that none of them are short, spotty or wear glasses. They never do show a typical "range" of people unless it's one of those patronising "real people" type things

What is normal? Overweight? Just because something because 'the norm' it doesn't mean it should be actively encouraged and promoted.

I get quite cross with people wanting overweight people represented in these sort of campaigns. It's hugely naive to think that there is a problem with anorexia/bulimia anywhere near the scale of obesity. We need to get a grip on this pretty soon.

They look fine to me.

my dd is 12 in October and wears size small in Johnnie B. they look the same as her to me. She is in the normal range for height/weight and in fact is more developed and broader than most of the girls in her class.

I think most of the Johnnie B models look like young teenagers rather than 16 year olds - I don't think 16 year olds would wear the clothes!