Fatwatch: Courtney Love

Holy shit, she is skeletal. I cannot believe that is Courtney Love. On her website, Courtney says:

"im happy not to have crazy lips and a crazy teensy unnatural little nose. so you have your opinion and ill have mine and it is my body and my face and lost 44 pounds with 6 more maybe 11 more to go. and ill fit tin that dammed couture, ( the uh ..real stuff) so im pretty yhappy and really all i care about i sthat my self esteem is limitellss and intact"

Translation: she apparently got a nose job that gave her back her old nose, and she wants to fit in couture, which is why she is starving herself. She thinks she needs to lose up to 11 more pounds. Oh god, Courtney!

Via Shawn at TUS.

I Still Don't Eat

The Fug Girls apparently were also watching the Oscar pre-show I talked about here. They applaud her refreshing honesty while at the same time pointing out... she may actually want to reconsider her stance on self-starvation.

"I kind of get the impression that Debbie's reaction might be, 'oh, you NOTICED! I'm so glad.' And, honestly, that's kind of f'ed up... So here's yet another in our long line of pleas to the ladies of the world: we were not all built to weigh 90 pounds. Being healthy is a good thing: being HUNGRY just makes you really crabby and then your face starts to look prematurely aged, and while some people believe you can never be too thin, there's no cliche along the lines of "you can never be too cranky and gaunt."

Thanks to Jelly for the tip!

Deep Thoughts

Do you feel like doing some deep thinking today? this post by Savy of Shaping My Way asks if the world, in catering to the overweight, is actually, subtly making people overweight.

"So, how do we save ourselves? Where is the line between a reasonable accommodation for every person (because people deserve to be able to participate in the world, regardless of size - I fully believe that, so please don't misunderstand) and a disservice to our society as a whole? Is it fair to make this a world that accommodates overweight/obese people before normal weight people?"

I don't think this post is in any way a knee-jerk antifat reaction, although I do detect a hint of the whole smug-ex-smoker in her attitude. I find the idea that our world is going to cater to fat people--much less pressure people to be overweight--somewhat laughable. But it's still worth thinking about. Is society an enabler? Is it important for us to suffer and to be uncomfortable, on top of all the ridicule, in order to motivate us to lose weight and be healthy? Are longer seatbelts and wider airplane seats a bad idea?

In my opinion, the thin person would never even think about accomodations like that. When I lost weight, I simply stopped worrying if the seat belt would fit around me, because I knew it always would. On the other hand, I am a firm believer in throwing away your fat pants, because hanging onto them means you're giving yourself implicit permission to get fat all over again. So suddenly I don't know what I think. What do you think?

Smoked Salmony Nibbly Things

British celebrity Myleene Klass popped up in my mailbox today saying she "couldn't cope being a size 8." I clicked on the link fully expecting to read that she would rather be a size 6. I was anticipating my reaction already, which is that people should be the weight they are most comfortable at. I wouldn't judge her for wanting to be a 6 rather than an 8. But that's not what she was saying.

"I have gone against the accepted wisdom that the best things happen to women when they are at their thinnest. When I was at my smallest I was most unhappy. I was in a miserable relationship and my career was nowhere. The best things have happened to me when I am most natural and curvy."

So even though I've never heard of her, I found that refreshing and figured I'd post it. Also, there are plenty of bikini photos in that article, and she looks absolutely fabulous.

Breaking News

Anna Nicole died of an accidental overdose of prescription drugs, according to the autopsy report (PDF). I don't know what all the medical terminology means, but it looks like she didn't have a gastric bypass at any point, and TrimSpa didn't kill her either. Poor Anna Nicole.

There is a pair of red lips in the right lower abdominal quadrant. Two red cherries are on the right mid pelvis. A “Playboy Bunny” is on the left anterior mid pelvis. The words “Daniel” and “Papas” are on the mid anterior pelvis region. A mixed tattoo on the right lower leg and ankle represents: Christ’s head; Our Lady of Guadalupe; the Holy Bible; the naked torso of a woman; the smiling face of Marilyn Monroe; a cross; a heart and shooting flames. A mermaid on a flower bed with a pair of lips underneath it laying across the lower back.

Sad.

ETA: There may be something going on with her heart. CNN didn't provide the separate cardiopathology report, and the coroner allegedly "saw something that looked a little bit unusual" in her heart.

A Fat Rant

Here's a video that's currently making the YouTube rounds, and it's really worth watching if you want to see a beautiful, kickass woman speak up on behalf of fat girls everywhere.

Thanks to Wendy, who was the first person to send me the link.

Not Fat, Just Retro

Angelina of Dustpan Alley searches through her vintage patterns, and finds something interesting—no matter what The Devil Wears Prada would have us believe, a size four isn't necessarily the "ideal" body size. In fact, it was once (and may again be) quite a bit larger.

"Here's something to note: a size eighteen in the nineteen thirties was considered average and medium and today that's a size fourteen. A plus size. But no woman back then would have been ashamed to be a size eighteen. When magazines published patterns they always made it a size eighteen. So if a body measuring 36-30-39 is a size fourteen today, why on earth would any woman consider herself over weight at that size?"

And while we're on the subject, Lisa Fashionista offers a report on her quest to find plus-size vintage clothing. If you have any other tips, feel free to let us know!

Evil Genius?

Nicole Richie and Paris Hilton are going to be counselors at a weight loss camp for a week, as part of the next season of The Simple Life.

"Sending Richie, the poster child for eating disorders, into a 'fat camp' is just plain obscene, not to mention dangerous. 'Proper eating' consists of more than laxatives and Red Bull, and Paris is no wellness champ either unless, of course, your idea of 'wellness' involves mixing a line of blow with Strawberry Quik to balance its bitter aftertaste."

It's kind of a genius idea in its own way, though. Two people who know nothing about health and who stay thin thanks to drugs, teaching the youth of tomorrow. Let's just hope the youth of tomorrow is... not all that impressionable.

Anna Nicole Memorial... Marshmallows?

Here are two rather bizarre tributes to Anna Nicole Smith: Michael Levitt's Rest in Peeps (Anna Nicole has been sculpted out of marshmallow peeps and is featured on the cover of Peeple) and this sad sparkling clown painting by Rene Garcia, Jr. I don't know which one is more unsettling, so I'll let you decide.

Thanks to Kaylin for the links!

Damn that Coco Chanel

We often talk about chubby women being desirable in the past, but I tend to think of the nudes in Ruben paintings, not the 20th century. I sometimes forget that in the first half of the 1900's, women built like Olive Oyl were teased for looking like boys. Angelina collects vintage sewing patterns and has noticed a striking difference in the sizing changes over the past decades. It's no secret that vanity sizing has come into play, with size 0 being the size 6 or 8 of yesteryear, but she also makes a fantastic point:

So if a body measuring 36-30-39 is a size fourteen today, why on earth would any woman consider herself overweight at that size? ... If Jean Harlow were alive today she would not have fit in a size two dress. Today we would call her a plus sized gal. But back then women were desperate to have her figure. But not quite as desperate as men were.

You're not a bad person because you're a size 18, you were just born 100 years too late. We're totally retro.

Oh, Lettucecup

Rachel "Lettucecup" Zoe, celebrity stylist to the stars, has long been linked to various blind items and gossip tidbits like this one on Nicole Ritchie's MySpace a while back. (What 35 year old raisin face whispers her order of 3 peices of asparagus for dinner at Chateau everynight, and hides her deathly disorder by pointing the finger at me, and used her last paycheck I wrote her to pay for a publisist instead of a nutritionist?)

Zoe has also famously been accused of pushing diet pills on her clients. Stars who've signed on with Zoe and gotten dangerously thin include not only Ritchie but also Mischa Barton, Lindsay Lohan, and Kiera Knightley. Circumstantial evidence! My favorite kinds!

Rachel Zoe did an interview with the New York Times denying the diet pill allegations:

"Sounding by turns wounded and willful, she added: 'I’ve never touched a drug in my life. Until recently, I didn’t even know what crystal meth was. And I haven’t known the name of a diet drug since Dexatrim in the ’80s. The only person I’ve told to lose weight is my mom.'"

It's amazing that she hangs out with Lindsay Lohan and doesn't know what crystal meth is. I mean come on, how disingenuous can you be? In other words: I don't buy it. Also, she's kind of a bitch to her mom, isn't she?

F-Word You, Good Housekeeping

While skimming the archives of my newest blog find, the F-Word, I ran across this entry, discussing the newest issue of Good Housekeeping with Kate Winslet on the cover.

The cover quotes Winslet saying "I don't worry about weight anymore." Of course I applaud that statement, but it indicates that the focus of the article is--as usual--on Kate Winslet's weight. I mean my god, she is thin. She is gorgeous. She is perfect. She is fine. And yet her weight is constantly being harped on; it's exhausting. And the F-Word pointed out the other irony, so typical of women's magazines:

"[W]hile Winslet offers a ray of sanity in this thin-idolized culture that should be lauded, the magazine’s sing-it-sister copy is hopelessly rendered moot by the larger, overshadowing print above: 'The No-Hunger Diet: Stop starving, start losing.'"

Sigh.

Stand By Your Woman

Recently, an obese woman who didn't realize she was pregnant gave birth to a son. This article discusses the hateful comments that have been directed at this woman on a newspaper website due to her size, as well as comments made by the woman (April Branum) and her fiance(Walter Edwards II) in her defense.

"'I just glanced at the comments, and I was, like, "whatever,"' Branum, 39, said in a recent interview. 'Being big all your life, you expect it. I'm sure there are more people who think it but just don't say it.'

Walter Edwards II – her fiancé and the baby's father – reacted less nonchalantly, calling The Orange County Register to complain about the hateful, uncensored comments being posted about Branum, whose obesity likely prevented her from being aware of the pregnancy. "If I could reach through my computer and strangle them, I would," Edwards said.

With Branum's story, readers commented on her sexual relations with her fiancé, her eating and exercise habits, and her abilities as a mother. Some comments were removed by staff because of a policy prohibiting vulgarity and personal attacks."

Some people have cancelled their subscriptions due to these comments, but April Branum herself seems too busy with her newborn to be bothered too much. There are pictures accompanying the article. And really, no matter what you think of the parents, that is one cute baby.

Viva España!

Major retailers in Spain have decided to ban skinny mannequins in their stores. Eat some tapas, mannequins!

"[T]wo major changes, announced in January, are in the works: Stores run by four big names will start replacing window-display mannequins so that none is smaller than size 38 (size 6 in the U.S.). And designers will standardize women’s apparel so a given size will fit the same way no matter who sells it…. To get a better idea of the shapes of Spanish women’s bodies, the government is employing some heavy technology. Using laser-fitted booths that can take 130 measurements of a body in 30 seconds, the Health Ministry is fanning out across the country to assess the sizes of Spanish women."

Seriously, this sounds really cool. Especially the part about standardizing sizes—I think all of us, fat, thin, or in-between, can relate to that frustration.

Thanks to your friendly neighborhood anonymous commenter for the tip!

"I Don't Eat"

I was watching the Oscar pre-show last month on E!, and caught a refreshing conversation. There were two hosts, one thin and the other disturbingly super-skinny. Here's a paraphrase:

Thin: You are so thin! It's amazing! How do you do it! Do you eat?
Skeleton: Not really.
Thin: (surprised laughter)
Skeleton: I'm really tired of these actresses saying "I eat cheeseburgers all the time!" It's such a lie. I'm always on a diet. I never eat. All I've had today is a cherry.

It was just an offhand piece of banter but it totally stuck with me. I love that she's admitting that in order to achieve looking like a skeleton, she has to not eat. Simple as that. Ever wonder how many calories the average celebrity consumes? Snarky Gossip hypothetically breaks it down for us:

GWYNETH PALTROW: Mother-of-two Gwyneth has followed a macrobiotic diet for years. Recently she adopted a diet prescribed by celebrity health guru Dr Joshi. s well as dairy, red meat and alcohol, she is banned from eating wheat, tomatoes, peppers, fruit, sugar and gluten. Typically she eats celery sticks for breakfast, lentil soup for lunch and salmon with brown rice for dinner.
One portion celery sticks: 10 cal.
One portion lentil soup: 150 cal.
One portion grilled salmon: 127cal.
One 200g portion cooked brown rice: 216 cal.
Total: 503 cal.

Other celebs on the list include Renee Zellwegger, Kate Winslet, and Victoria Beckham. Found via Fitness Fixation.

Ohmigod Again, You Guys

There's a new and satisfying coda to our story of the sorority that kicked out all of its minority and overweight members: they've been permanently kicked off the DePauw University campus.

"'We at DePauw do not like the way our students were treated,' DePauw’s president, Robert G. Bottoms, said in a letter to the Delta Zeta sorority. In addition to [an] apology, the sorority posted statements critical of the women forced out of the DePauw chapter and of faculty members who supported them… Dr. Bottoms cited the sorority’s decision to publicize that criticism as contributing to his decision."

Thanks to Kaylin for the tip!

Star Jones Is A "Skinny Bitch"

The upswell in traffic from people searching for Star Jones tells me that something's brewing with our favorite llama lookalike. In fact, she has a new job at Court TV, and her old friends at The View discussed it today. Rosie even graciously congratulated her:

"We want to wish Star Jones congratulations. She just got a new job with Court TV and she looks beautiful," Rosie said. "She looks wonderful and we wish her all the best."

It was Joy Behar who called her a skinny bitch. But forget all about that, did you see the picture attached to that article? She's definitely uber-skinny and looks like she's had her boobs done. I think she looks better a little heavier but who am I to say? I will say that the ruffled sleeve monstrosity she's wearing is not doing her, or me, or anyone with eyeballs, any favors.

Dear Nigel Lythgoe: I am fat and I have sex and get naked. A lot. Thank you.

I'm a little late to the party with this, but I've been really bothered by the fact that Frenchie Davis was unceremoniously kicked off the second season of American Idol for topless photos on the internet, while X-rated photos of Antonella Barba emerged that show her topless while actually engaged in the act of sex (Granted, not according to the Clintonian definition, but we'll go with the definition of the current White House administration, shall we?) and yet we were still subjected to weeks of her tone deaf warbling until America collectively spat her out.

One argument is that Davis was paid for modeling while Barba is just a cheap date. But what is also interesting is that Davis claims that she disclosed the existence of the photos to AI producers from the start, while I somehow doubt that Barba disclosed her night of too many Flirtinis with her date and his camera phone.

Davis is black, plus-sized, and immensely talented. Barba is white, looks like a Bratz doll, and has marginal vocal ability. While there have been black idols and overweight idols that have gone quite far, do the producers prefer their Idols lumped into one of two categories: either you're a sex symbol or you are nontraditionally attractive yet powerfully talented. And while it is possible to be sexy and talented (see Clarkson, Kelly), please don't remind the nation that fat people have sex.

Is it justified that Frenchie got shown the door while Antonella continued to perform each week? Am I just being over-sensitive to fatism and continuing to show my bias toward plus-sized Idol contestants? Would Mandisa have been kicked out if candid photos had surfaced of her giving her man some oral pleasure?

Model Thinking

Catching up with Too Fat for Fashion, I came across this post meditating on the thin ideal, especially in the modeling world:

"People genuinely believe what they're saying; people believe clothes look better on the thin, the slim, the tall. I sometimes believe it, even though I 'know' differently. How have we learned to see this way, and how do we learn to see differently? One cover girl or one plus-size model isn't enough, because they will automatically look 'wrong' set amongst other bodies of a thinner type. "

The whole blog post is great, and at the moment, I have nothing to add. I just wanted to make sure you didn't miss it.

Fatty Talk Keep Talkin' Fatty Talk

Anabell sends along this thought-provoking question from Diet Blog: do you participate in Fat Talk?

"Some intriguing research shows that college students - males and females - know that when women are in a group of other women who are fat talking, that they are supposed to join in to say negative things about their bodies. And, there is pressure to do so."

On second glance, I don't think the statistics are so convincing, since only 40% of male and 51% of female students identified this pressure, hardly an overwhelming majority. However, from anecdotal evidence, this rings really true. Women bond by complaining about their bodies and sometimes it seems that anyone who doesn't complain "can't relate." I've had fatty talk conversations. Have you?

Champagne Tastes

The Budget Fashionista is reporting new designer plus-size clothing lines by Michael Kors and Calvin Klein. I haven't found any pictures, but one commenter reports:

"I saw the first pieces from the Calvin Klein line, and I'm disappointed. Nothing new or inventive, although the pieces looked like they were nicely cut. The colors were boring, nothing like the sharply tailored pieces of Calvin's 'regular' line. I'm hoping that the Michael Kors line will be better."

I am interested to find out what sizes the "plus-size" line covers, and to see what the clothing looks like. Oh Michael Kors, first Project Runway and now this to make me love you. I forgive you for tanning yourself until you look like an Oompa Loompa.

WLS Patient Dies

This is just a little news item, but it is sad.

"Renee Williams, the 841-pound woman thought to be the largest ever to receive gastric bypass surgery, died Sunday night of a massive heart attack. Williams, 29, had undergone the increasingly popular solution to morbid obesity on Feb. 20 and was thought to be progressing well in the week and a half thereafter, said officials at Houston's Renaissance Hospital, where she had the surgery. But hospital officials today announced the sudden turn of events."

Wow, she was only 29. Here is a little article about her before she had the surgery, explaining how she gained the weight. (She was bedridden after an accident with a drunk driver crushed her leg.)

Cognitive Dissonance is a Good Word For It

"Dissonance" therapy addresses, amongst other things, the media's thin-biased bullshit. This, in turn, helps to alleviate the symptoms of eating disorders. A crazy coincidence? Somehow, I don't think so.

What is this "Sushi" You Speak Of?

Everyone! Be on alert! You may soon find yourself invited to enjoy sushi with friends at a sushi bar or restaurant! Are you ready? Are you ready for health? For sushi is the healthiest of all meals, and is something even the squeamish can enjoy. Say halleujah, the squeamish! Your diet is saved!

I love sushi (so much), and I loved this article for its earnestness, and I love it the most because who doesn't want to hear that sushi is the perfect diet food? Communists, that's who.