America's NExt Top Model
When you think Americas Next Top Model, you think wealth, luxurious and fame. Who wouldn’t want to be part of such a life style. It’s a show about teen models competing for Americas next top model position. Of course if not every one a lot of people watch this show and wait for it anxiously. There could be a lot of reasons why people enjoy the show. Some enjoy the suspense the girls go through. Others are probably interested in the fashion that the show talks about. On the other side, the majority just want to look at the pretty hot girls. Every one included in one of the above categories might think its just a show that they watch during their spare time, but what they don’t know is that this “time wasting” show is becoming a very serious issue affecting our culture. Our culture involves people with different shapes and sizes, unlike the show that avoids people who have average sizes, which is causing alot of depression and social problems between the public. In addition to that there are a lot of people in this world who spend so much time and money on their bodies that they haven’t the time to enjoy it! Besides do we really want to watch and follow the steps of Tyra Banks (the main character in the show) who most of the times contradicts her self? She starts in different shows ,among the most famous ones are: 1) Americas next top model, and 2) The Tyra Banks show. In the first one the show is all about skinny women and sexuality. However in the second one Tyra is leaning towards and defending all women in different sizes and fights for their rights and freedom.
Misinterpretation Of Health
To start with, health is a very serious issue and its what keeps the life cycle going on. As Virgil says the greatest wealth is health. That is completely the opposite of what the show is trying to emphasize. As I mentioned previously the show some how sums up that if you have the “LOOK” which by the way is any weight below average results in such wealth and popularity. Even though a lot of people “pretend” that they disagree with such an approach for a life like that, sadly they personally support it, which explains the increasing rate of girls becoming anorexic and bulimic. I’m not blaming this whole rate on the show, but I can relate the causes to it. The show is becoming a very big part of the peoples lives, and if small sized skinny people is all what they can see, then they are going to doubt the way they look. Some might argue that controlling weight and being skinny is just being healthy. In this way our culture is miss understanding what healthy stands for. As Mark Twain says “Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a
misprint.” It’s the same case here. When people see these young women with such figures and looks, they’re going to believe that they are healthy and that that’s the norm, or else why would they be so popular. Since when was being 5’8’’ weighing 117 pounds (one of Americas next top models contestants, Kahlen) considered healthy or even sexy? Of course such models look great and gorgeous. Unfortunately that’s all what people are seeing. Beneath all that beauty lies a very weak body.
Elaina Ramos
Starving Her Self Till Death
18 year old model Elaina Ramos, died six months after her sister who’s also a models and died from starving her self. Elaina had a heart attack that doctors related to her being anorexic. This is just one out of hundreds of models and even regular girls. It became very dangerous and serious that the fashion industry has been required by law to prevent underweight models from being involved in fashion shows.
Economical Effects
Tyra Banks repeatedly tells her models that in order to guarantee a successful career and to work in such an industry looks and bodies are important. If viewers disagree with her, they’re at least going to think about it. Later on they will start to develop the fact that maybe there looks and bodies are keeping them away from being promoted or getting a descent job. It’s a reality, this issue is spreading in our society’s economy and job opportunities. Now a days mangers and business owners prefer to higher good looking people with nice bodies rather than regular people even if they were more skilled than the others. That’s another issue our country is facing. Managers and business owners underestimate the ability of over weight people. They believe that people with good figures are more concentrated and focused on their work. In addition to that customers would want to buy things from good looking people unlike plus sized people who are usually avoided. Shows like Tyra Banks’ is promoting and encouraging this phenomena. I personally have been though it where both me and my mom went on different times to the same store asking whether there were any job openings. The manger told my mom that they weren’t hiring, however he gave me the job after I walled in when my mom left!
That brings us to how much should we be taking Tyra’s words into consideration. We’re talking about a very popular “Diva” who really has an impact on the crowed mostly in her show “The Tyra Banks Show”. It talks about every thing that has to do with women. She defends them and talks about their rights being abused. In this show Tyra shows a total different side to her that is very sympathetic with insecure women. She tries to make women feel good about themselves no matter how they look, and goes against people calling women fat.
Upset Tyra
As I mentioned before Tyra has asked a lot of skinny models on Americas Next Top model to go on a diet. On the other hand in the above paragraph and video, she is boosting plus sized women’s’ confidence which is kind of contradicting. In addition to that, recently the paparazzi had caught a picture of Tyra on the beach in a bathing suite that disturbed Mrs. Banks. The picture showed Tyra in a plus sized body which is the body of the majority of the US women, that caught the medias attention. People saw how upset Tyra became which convinces them that gaining few pounds is a mistake that should be avoided!
Happy Tyra: Now That She Lost The Weight
Shortly after the exposure of the picture Tyra lost the weight and showed up in the same bathing suite on her show looking better. If looks didn’t really matter as she says on her show then why was she so desperate to loose the weight and in such a short time? She also denies what the media said about her gaining 40 pounds over the holidays because its not healthy, and that she only gained 10 pounds. Don’t gaining or loosing too much weight have the same unhealthy results? After Tyra lost the wight she went back to encouraging women to face others calling them fat because there's nothing wrong with that. That brings us back to Tyra conrtadicting herself.
What Tyra did sounds okay and normal to a lot of people. She was considered “FAT” which is not “cool” and she fixed her self. So things went back to normal as if something was wrong in the first place. Tyra is only reflecting the real issue in our country. You hear everyone talking about them loosing weight but never about gaining any! That’s not because they don’t gain weight, but because it’s something wrong and no one should know about. It’s known that over weight people get picked on by others whether at work, school, or at home. But why do people do that? It’s very simple, it’s because it makes them feel good about them selves and since they‘re in a good looking shape then they‘re better than them. Our culture is begging to judge others based on their looks and bodies.
Causing Low Self-Esteem
Tyra tried to come up with excuses about the photo by saying that the photo was
taken from a bad angel that made her look fat, and her body was the same meaning she
didn’t gain weight. We might say that she is ashamed of her body but in reality she’s just
like any other woman. This shows how serious this issue have become. Tyra isn’t the
only woman embarrassed of gaining weight or trying to excuse herself . A lot of women
now a days are doing the same thing. They are going on diets, taking dietary pills, or even
going through surgery secretly. They don’t want any one to know that they are fat and that
they should loose the weight because to them that's something to be ashamed of. You hear a lot of women talking to their teenage daughters about how bad it is to take pills or going on crash diets. Yet these women are doing the same thing to them selves. Most of these women know the side affects of all of the above, but they’d rather sacrifice their health to fit in that perfect body image. This is how bad this issue is affecting our culture. As I mentioned previously our culture involves people of
different sizes. Today a new culture is arising, that’s based on looks and bodies; and what most of the above women are doing and going through is convincing enough that it’s becoming a very serious issue.
In conclusion, America’s Next Top Model is only one show out of hundreds promoting an unhealthy and wrong image. A lot of people watch this show in hope that they too can share such a life with these girls. A life where they can wear what ever they want, have a lot of confidence, attract the other sex…People need to know that starving them selves and working out day and night is only leading them to a sick frustrating life because they’re always going to have that fear of gaining weight again. However this show is emphasizing the opposite by showing all the glory and fame these girls are receiving in return of keeping themselves skinny. Nowadays the country and the society is dealing with the consequences which involve a lot of stress, frustration, low self-esteem among the public. Not to mention the decreasing rate of job opportunities among both skinny and average people. From one aspect, skinny employees are preferred more than the average sized people. Second, the rate of people becoming skinny is increasing leading to a decrease in job opportunities among them selves
Sources
http://www.cwtv.com/shows/americas-next-top-model11
http://tyrashow.warnerbros.com/
http://www.tv.com/americas-next-top-model/show/14888/summary.html
http://www.tv.com/search.php?type=11&stype=all&tag=search%3Bnewshows&qs=fat+tyra+banks
http://abcnews.go.com/gma/Story?id=2837578&page=1