France has passed a law against the hiring of those ultra-skinny “supermodels”. I think this quite reasonable, as being very thin can be very dangerous for your health. My question: is there any generally-accepted physician’s guidelines that defines a state of starvation? Would somebody like Gisele Bundchen fit sucha definition?
Wouldn’t the problem be not with the models themselves? – you have to be pretty fit and healthy to be a model, even if you are skinny. Wouldn’t the problem be with them as role models, encouraging other young women to starve themselves into an unhealthy state? And in that case, whether the models themselves are healthy is the the real issue.
Well, the DSM says:
Some quick Googling seems to indicate that the average model is significantly underweight
So it seems the answer is Yes. Fashion modeling is very much a case of institutionalized anorexia.
Standard disclaimer: I find nearly all models revolting.
Regards,
Shodan
The fact that a model is thin does not prove she has anorexia nervosa. Some people are just thin. They are, by selection bias, the ones who end up being fashion models. Some models may have anorexia, but many don’t. They’re just skinny.
A law against hiring skinny models is stupid. Imagine if they were to pass a law against hiring fat waitresses. Overeating is - by far - the most costly and common eating disorder there is; for every person starving themselves to death there’s 50 people swallowing Big Macs whole and growing asses the size of sofas. So why not pass a law against hiring fat models, waitresses, grocery store employees, day care workers, or anyone else who might indirectly suggest to young girls that it’s okay to devour candy until they’re morbidly obese?
But according to an article in the Sunday edition of the Toronto Star, anorexia nervosa may be mostly genetic in origin:
The article states that rates of anorexia nervosa have not changed in the past few decades, even as other eating disorders have.
So is the fashion industry just taking advantage of a pre-existing population of abnormally-thin people?
Fit and healthy? Then why do so many models starve themselves, use drugs, smoke cigarettes, and vomit after meals to stay at the desired weight. And these are indeed the ones who are genetically selected to look like models in the first place. Models are not simply skinny. They have a noticeable look that is distinctly different from any norm. And they still have to seriously abuse their bodies to keep employed.
The fashion industry has systematically moved toward skinnier and skinner models over the years. Check out the images on all these pages. They have a BMI of 16, corresponding to over 5’10" and less than 110 pounds.
You can’t simply tell teenage girls to stop using role models that the entire world is dangling before them as role models. You have to attack the source of the problem.
Is an actual law the best solution? I don’t know. Several places have instituted voluntary guidelines banning those who are unhealthily thin. Perhaps a law would be a needed last resort to get them to straighten up their act.
It’s rank hypocrisy to tell athletes not to use steroids because of their side effects and the influence they have on teens and not to tell models to cut out the drugs and starvation because of their side effects and the influence they have on teens.
Models are dying from anorexia. You cannot maintain that body shape naturally. I’ve never read of a model who didn’t resort to what most of us would call extreme measures to keep at the weight - the ever-decreasing-weight - required. The rewards counter the risk, just as the rewards of drug dealing do. That doesn’t mean that either profession is sensible.
What you see at the extreme edges of fashion modeling isn’t natural or healthy. It’s the equivalent of Chinese bound feet. All over. Is it a crime? Maybe it is. We need to discuss the possibility, at the very least.
If someone want’s to be a model, and the “industry” demands skinny women, I’m at a loss to see what the bid deal is. It’s a choice that they are making. No one is putting a gun to their head. The French must be have a slow legislation day.
Note that the proposed law is broader than indicated in the OP, and that it hasn’t been enacted yet.
News article: http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/04/15/anorexia.france.ap/index.html?eref=rss_latest
First line of article: “France’s lower house of parliament adopted a groundbreaking bill Tuesday that would make it illegal for anyone – including fashion magazines, advertisers and Web sites – to incite extreme thinness.”
Interesting line from article: “[The] bill mainly focuses on so-called ‘pro-anorexic’ Web sites that, for instance, give advice on how to eat an apple a day – and nothing else.”
I don’t know the full range of issues that models have, nor am I medical professional whatsoever.
I do know a decent amount about body fat percentages because I’ve always been very much into physical fitness, and even measure my own body fat percentage with calipers regularly (and have for years.)
What I do know is that everyone I’ve spoken with (including people who go way beyond just wanting to be “fit” like myself, I’ve known a lot of guys who are semi-professional or professional body builders and a lot of the stuff they do seems just as unhealthy to me as the stuff models do) typically agrees that men can get their body fat percentage as low as 2-3% and still have all the essential fat they need.
This is why men can actually develop a “six pack” and be healthy. Getting that “six pack” look both requires you to build abdominal muscle and to reduce your overall fat level enough so that the layer of fat over said muscle doesn’t obscure the six pack.
Most figures I see indicate you need to get down below 9% or so before you really get this.
Guys can do that because they can get their body fat % really low and still have all the essential fats they need.
Women, on the other hand, because of differences in physiology should never have body fat percentages below 10-12%, women just need a higher body fat % to still have all of their essential fats.
I’d be very, very surprised if any of the popular ultra-thin supermodels have body fat percentages anywhere near that high–which would suggest they are dangerously thin.
There’s certainly a serious problem (not just in the United States, but this is now starting to impact the rest of the Western world as well) with obesity. But that doesn’t mean the converse of obesity–unhealthy thinness is healthy, healthy is “normal” weight, not extreme thinness or extreme fatness.
I don’t know if what I’ve heard about body fat percentages is necessarily true, I’ve read it in magazines at the gym and heard it from serious body builders, but if it is then I’d be shocked if many models weren’t dangerously thin and keeping a dangerously low amount of fat on their body.
The oh, it’s just capitalism defense was abandoned in the U.S. over 100 years ago. People did seriously argue before then that child labor, 16-hour days, lack of safety measures, and all the other horrors couldn’t be regulated because that was an abuse of the ability to freely enter into a contract. If you took the money, then the employer could do anything short of shooting you in the back of the head. It was your free choice.
Today you’d be hard-pressed to find a profession or an industry that is not protected by health and safety regulation. Why should modeling be different?*
Again, this is a general argument, not one in favor of the specifics of the French law mentioned in the OP, which, again, has not been passed. I don’t know enough about it to come down on one side or the other.
*You could argue that modeling shouldn’t in fact be different, so let all health and safety regulations be repealed. However, I’d say that line of reasoning works better as an argument against libertarianism. 
EM Are you really trying to compare adult models with child labor at the turn of the century?
The government stepped in because the nation was appalled, and these children were essentially defenseless. Models are adults, who are making informed, intelligent decisions on how best to make their livelihood. They know what the score is and have other real, legitimate options, and they have chosen this path. What about professional athletes? They are forced to lift weights! They are required to keep in shape! We need ensure that pro athletes are no longer required to weight train!
Want to ring the alarm? Talk to me about sweatshops in China, mining conditions in the third world, possibly even the construction industry. Many of these workers have little choice, and a forced into terrible working conditions. They need sympathy and support. Models in France? Not so much.
This is by no means universally true, since many models begin their career well before age 18.
And not that this rises to the level of peer-reviewed research, but I’ll even provide a cite. http://sabrinasikoraproductions.wetpaint.com/page/What+Age+to+Start+a+Modeling+Career%3F?t=anon
Great. Pass a law that applies to minors. After 18, they are adults, . . . (what I said)
What a crappy article. They’re talking about genetic predispositions toward developing an eating disorder. Reading your article, the big insight according to “studies”, “scientists”, and “experts” is that everybody has different genes and some peoples’ genes are make them more likely to do one thing. This isn’t news, it’s been uncontested for over twenty years.
Simply because genetics play a role in how we act does not mean we can write off the behavior as involuntary. Eating disorders are among the most treatable and require nothing more than cognitive therapy. There is no medication to treat eating disorders short of SSRIs, which is primarily prescribed because of the side effect of weight gain. If you want to look at the role of “nature vs nurture” in eating disorders, you would find it more effective to examine their prevalence across different cultures rather instead. And if you did that, you would see that eating disorders are primarily a phenomenon of the culture where they are manifested. Anorexia nervosa is primarily a Western phenomenon; it’s virtually unheard of in cultures that emphasize women be “plump.”
There is no question that eating disorders are a learned behavior.
I’m not defending the law, but I don’t think those are analogous.
I assume the law against hiring skinny models is meant to prevent people from becoming too skinny due to industry pressure.
There’s no pressure for waitresses to be fat, so an analogous need for that law doesn’t exist.
[I originally wrote “for **weight**resses to be fat”, completely by accident.]
I dunno; I’m the first one cheering on the anti-anorexia outcry, but she looks in pretty good shape to me (totally NSFW, dude). She’s got breasts, and you can’t count her ribs.
Kate Moss and the heroin chic brigade, on the other hand…
Hey!
The average woman, not to mention the average shoe wearing American, has deformed feet from wearing ill fitting shoes.
:dubious:
Actually, current studies show that being extremely underweight is significantly more dangerous then being normal or overweight.
About.com Link
JAMA Link
Neuroepidemiology Link
Miscarriage
Osteoporosis
Amenorrhea
Possibly diabetes
Can I see a cite on that? I know some people do, but it’s not as common as it used to be. My grandmother’s feet were indeed misshapen from years of squeezing into those 50’s shoes. But I seldom see people my age with deformed feet–I know mine are just fine.
Wow, Exapno, those photos are pretty awful. I don’t follow fashion news at all, so I haven’t seen pictures like those.
Twiggy? She was naturally thin growing up–wasn’t she about 5’6 and ninety pounds when she modeled? Granted, she was a teenager and stopped doing that after only four years, but she wasn’t dieting. I’m super short, but my measurements/BMI are very close to what a model’s would be, and I’ve never dieted consciously–some people do just have a svelte look and a super high metabolism. Is it so strange to believe some of them go into modeling?