Michelle Obama was at an elementary school promoting her Let’s Move campaign in the fight to end childhood obesity. She along with teachers and the student body worked out to the new remix of Beyonce’s “Move Your Body”. I have to say our First Lady has some moves, although you can tell that she is holding back because, after all she is the First Lady, But you kinda get the feeling that at a house party in private with no press or cameras that she can get her wind on for real!!! check out the video and hey dance along!!
Wow I have to say these ladies are really pulling it together, J-Hud, Jordin Sparks and Raven Symone, all look incredible these days. I think the most interesting thing is none of them were super big, definitely big by Hollywood standards but by average African American standards they were what is considered “Thick” not in a bad way but in a good and healthy (as far as attractiveness) way. But they are all so young and to be overweight, or more importantly not to have good eating and exercise habits at a young age when you have the propensity to carry extra weight is not good. Culturally Jennifer Hudson hit the nail on the head when she said that at her heavier weight she felt normal because all the women in her family and around her looked like that. Albeit just because something is common doesn’t make it a good thing. ( Raven is giving you a bit of Nicole Ritchie now huh? what with the hair color and jaw line and all)
Then My mind goes to the Queen of Soul Aretha Franklin, and how she has recently lost a great deal of weight and reformed her diet and exercise regime, and not only does she look great (which actually should be considered the inconspicuous benefit to eating well) but she might have extended her life by getting her body in balance internally and externally, while no doubt improving the quality of the life she is living. Keep up the stellar work sisters!!! We’re proud of you!
Aretha before:
Oh Lawd, I hope this is a unclothed as it gets! ( no leaked nude photos!)
I know that she must me so psyched that she has slimmed down just in time for bikini weather. The worst thing in the world is to not feel good about your body when you are shopping for a bathing suit. She looks good! I think the womanly hourglass figure is so beautiful. I have to say that I am glad today both the waif like, boyish, no hip aesthetic and the zaftig figure, eight silhouette are celebrated in terms of women in the public eye, however when it comes to the Fashion Industry we still have a long way to go. Hopeful the more women learn to appreciate and accept their forms regardless of what end of the spectrum they fall, the more that as consumers we demand to see ourselves reflected in the advertising and marketing!!!
Courtesy of Hello Beautiful
Jennifer Hudson recently revealed to the UK’s Grazia magazine that the entertainment industry that once discriminated against her is now more receptive since she’s lost weight.
She said, “In this slim world I do now realize I was being discriminated against. I’m offered more parts. There is much more excitement about me now.”
While it seems as though casting directors and the public in general have embraced her slimmer physique, Hudson says she’s still getting accustomed to being a smaller size.
“Last week I saw some footage of myself as I was five years ago and I was surprised. It was like I recognized myself but I didn’t. It seemed another world away.”
“I never thought I was overweight. I thought my old look was pretty normal. That was how all the girls looked growing up in Chicago. I didn’t have any problem with it. It makes me smile to think back to myself when I did ‘Dreamgirls’ with Beyonce. I did see all these women in Hollywood, all very slim and I thought, ‘Wow, these ladies are very into themselves.’ I loved that I stood out in a room. You knew when you saw this woman
We discussed this as our inaugural issue in Donnish Delights Taylor Owens Ramsey took the issue of double standards on as it pertained to Gabourey Sidibe and Jonah Hill, quite ironically Hill has just lost a ton of weight let’s see how his dance card looks in the next 6 months!
Just about a month ago I had the great “pleasure” of going through international security at JFK on my way to Italy. The lines were unusually long and slow, I couldn’t for the life of me understand why. When I finally reached the actual x-ray area it became clear, it was the full body scanner that was slowing things up. It was the full body scanner, since I had not flown internationally since the new body scans had been introduced I had completely forgotten. I know this has been the source of great controversy, I had seen the stories on the news and on the Internet about people being groped and prodded, there was even as story where a TSA officer asked a breast cancer survivor to remove her prosthesis. I couldn’t image it going that far. Actually things seemed to be moving along, I didn’t see any one refusing the scan.
I, a seasoned traveler had already taken my jewelry and outerwear off, had prepped my shoes for removal and was ready to grab my 3 bins (coat and shoes, computer and purse). I inched my things towards the x-ray machine and prepared to be scanned. When I was summoned forth I stepped into the contraption and assumed the position; hands above head legs apart, and just a moment later I was asked to pass through. I peeked at the monitor where I thought my image would appear, but the woman told me that is was not located there, but in another area of the airport. I have to say that I was kind of disappointed, I wanted to see what I looked like, I was having a thin day. The agent asked me to wait with her before gathering my belongings, “I have to wait until they clear you” she said with her hand on the walkie talkie attached to her shoulder. While I awaited clearance I decided to get as much information as possible. “How much does it show?” I asked, “Like do I need to suck in my stomach?” She laughed and said that it wasn’t that bad, and that’s all she said, then waved me on. As a collected and reassembled my belongings I couldn’t help but think, that at there are so many times during the day that I have to worry about my body, I worry when I pick out what to wear to Bikram, or to teach my ballet classes, I have to find the jeans or outfit that makes me look slim or makes me at least feel slimmer then I might be at the time. Now I thought I have to diet before I go to the airport so that my full body scan (which is probably more revealing then the outfit adroitly chosen to camouflage my body flaws shows) looks good. Just another added stress! So Rhianna I feel you girl. However I have to say that the cost to my ego is a small price to pay for being safe. *note, if you are going to the airport you might want to wear a pair of spanks!
Hair is a MAJOR issue for Black Women. (holler if you feel me) It has a great deal to do with how we feel about ourselves and our image. I am the baby of nine, there are 6 girls and 3 boys in my family. I remember with great distinction the time before hair relaxers were a household item. In our house we had “hair washing day”. We would go in shifts, the older girls washing theirs and then mine. For that Saturday or Sunday my mother was a permanent fixture at the stove hot comb in hand pressing out one head after the other. I was always last. I recall the smell of hair and pressing oil wafting through the first floor of our home. Since the girls were the majority in the house I never thought that this hair ritual cost me precious hours of free play time and that if I had been a boy instead of waiting form my fuzzy plaits to dry and be pressed out, I could be whizzing around the corner on a big wheel. Later Revlon liberated my mother from the stove, at least where pressing and curling hair was concerned.
I think I got my first relaxer when I was 11. It was an old school lye relaxer that burnt and smelled but did the job. After 45 minutes of toil, my hair was a close to Barbie’s as it was ever going to get. There were no more edges to contend with (Edges are what black people call the hair line when it is fuzzy) and my “kitchen” ( the nape of the neck, where the peas of kinky hair appear) were all but vanquished, that is until the new growth started to show letting you know that it was time once again to have your hair touched up. Hair straighteners were life altering for the black women. For years though the desired aesthetic of straight, silky hair like that of Caucasian women was obtainable through pressing out the hair, with the slightest hint of humidity the illusion dissipated. With a permanent relaxer all those worries were a thing of the past.
Later I went back to my natural kinky state, it was in the early 90’s. Oddly though I felt liberated in a way, no longer beholden to what we now call the “creamy crack” of a relaxer, it took a long time to feel myself attractive with my kinky halo. What was more interesting and telling was the reaction I got from others. All of the sudden Black men referred to me as “sista” on the street, when my hair was twisted, I was “rasta” and though I lived downtown in the west village, where ever I went people assumed I lived in Brooklyn. It was then that I realized that in the African American Community hair was in some way used as an identifier, if you were natural you were “down” if you had a relaxer you were assimilating, or just not down. I didn’t quite understand it and I certainly didn’t prescribe to it. My hair has never been a political statement, if it was saying anything at all it would be that this is what I find attractive for me at the time. My hair is like a bag, or shoes, or a pair of earrings, it is an accessory, it has nothing to do with how I feel about my blackness (or anyone else’s for that matter) It does not herald my consciousness, or lack thereof, it is for me just hair.
Black women have long been at odds with and/or conflicted about their hair, it’s type, and grade, it is part and parcel of the light skin/dark skin issue and societies concept and perception of beauty- that of which we traditionally do not fit into. Recently I took out the double strand twists that I had been wearing for about a year, I put them as an homage to the passing of Farrah Fawcett, it was what I called my Charlie’s Angel hair. About a month ago I released the beast of my Afro and let her run wild. I had forgotten what it was like to be “natural” and have an glamorously unruly head of hair and I love it, however there was that transitional moment when I looked at myself in the mirror and thought that I did not look attractive. I had to get used to it, again. Now am rocking what I call my rock Star look!
Below is a video of , Cassie, Solange and Selita Ebanks talking about “Good Hair”, what that is and what it means to them with Lisa Price
I collected several of my mother’s dresses from back in the day that are labeled a size 8 and I can’t get my baby finger in them even though I am a 2011 size 6-8, I knew then that there was something hinky going on with sizing. I have noticed through out the years whether I stay the same size or get a bit fuller my clothing size stays relatively the same, or I go to one brand and I’m a 6 and another and I’m a 10 (which brand to you think I buy:) Clearly when you can fit a size 4 instead of a 6-7 you feel better about yourself and it encourages you to buy the garment but does it matter that it’s somewhat of a lie? This is really becomes an issue (as stated in the segment below) when one shops on line, what is the real size? would you rather have the truth of your size (even if it meant looking at a larger number in the back of your clothing) or would you take the hassle of the hunt for a garment that fits so long as the tag makes you feel good. * we have to remember that the tags are inside of our clothing and no one reads them but us!!!
Courtesy of Huffington Post: full entry here
“The Today Show” took a look at the difference in clothing sizes among retailers, after the New York Times’ most e-mailed article on Monday was “One Size Fits Nobody.” Said report, in a nutshell:
Take a woman with a 27-inch waist. In Marc Jacobs’s high-end line, she is between an 8 and a 10. At Chico’s, she is a triple 0. And that does not consider whether the garment fits in the hips and bust. (Let’s not get into length; there is a reason most neighborhood dry cleaners also offer tailoring.)
Uh-huh. Exactly as we suspected.
Writer Stephanie Clifford told Ann Curry that men’s sizing was standardized around the time of Civil War uniforms, but there were no measurements put in place for women and eventually designers started dabbling in the dark world of vanity sizing. Clifford also believes that sizing issues have upped the outrageous amount of clothing returns — $194 billion last year.
I have been rollin’ in the deep with Adele for a while now. Her soulful sound and heartfelt lyrics are so on point and a rarity in our times. I adore her, but I have wondered how it is that a girl who looks like a …well a regular, real girl managed to get a deal and rise to be a number one artist without someone trying to changer her. I think that she is not only beautiful, and sexy, and talented, but having heard her on a few interviews she has a wicked sense of humor. I think seeing a woman that looks like a real, live, woman instead of a company manufactured concept of what women should look like or a pre-pubescent porn star in the making is refreshing. Here’s what she had to say in Rolling Stone Magazine
Adele’s album 21 has returned to the #1 spot on the Billboard album chart. That’s its fourth week overall at the top, giving 21 the longest run at #1 since Taylor Swift’s Speak Now topped the charts for six weeks starting last October. 21 has also become the first album of 2011 to go platinum: according to Nielsen Soundscan, the disc has sold 1.03 million copies in seven weeks. That’s slightly more than her first album, 19, has sold since it was released in 2008.
Adding to Adele’s heat, she’s the cover girl of the new issue of Rolling Stone. Inside, she opens up not only about her music, but also about her body image. Adele is not a rail-thin model type, and she doesn’t care — she tells the magazine, “I don’t like going to the gym. I like eating fine foods and drinking nice wine. Even if I had a really good figure, I don’t think I’d [show] my [boobs and butt] for [anyone].” But that’s not to say Adele doesn’t appreciate the amazing figures of some of her pop colleagues. She tells the magazine, “I love seeing Lady Gaga’s boobs and bum. I love seeing Katy Perry’s boobs and bum. Love it. But that’s not what my music is about. I don’t make music for eyes. I make music for ears.”
(Source: Ohio State University: Journal of Counseling Psychology)
Women’s appreciation of their bodies is only indirectly connected to their body mass index (BMI), a common health measure of weight relative to height, according to recent research.
The most powerful influence on women’s appreciation of their bodies is how they believe important others view them, the study suggests. On the flip side, the more women are able to focus on the inner workings of their body – or how their bodies function and feel – rather than how they appear to others, the more they will appreciate their own bodies.
And the more a woman appreciates her body, the more likely she is to eat intuitively – responding to physical feelings of hunger and fullness rather than emotions or the mere presence of food.
“Women who focus more on how their bodies function and less on how they appear to others are going to have a healthier, more positive body image and a tendency to eat according to their bodies’ needs rather than according to what society dictates,” said Tracy Tylka, associate professor ofpsychology at Ohio State University and senior author of the study.
Other studies have suggested that about 50 per cent of women appreciate their bodies. This work is geared toward examining how they arrive at their satisfaction with their bodies, and how they avoid any pitfalls that might interfere with their positive thinking.
Ultimately, the researchers say, it boils down to respect. If women are going to treat their bodies well – through nourishment, health screenings and exercise, for example – they first have to like their bodies.
“And it turns out we look to whether others accept our bodies to determine whether we appreciate them ourselves,” Tylka said. “It’s not our weight, but instead whether others in our social network appreciate us. That implies that people should be convinced to be less judgmental and to focus less on weight.” continue
You know you hate to admit it but you watch the Jersey Shore too! Well the Guidolishous show’s standout Nicole “Snooki” Polizzi has shed some major poundage! Looks like she’s been hitting the gym and not the nightclub, or maybe she switched her drink to Bethenny Frankel’s Skinny Girl Margarita! I don’t know but what ever she’s been doing she looks great. At 4’9 her petite frame can’t handle the slightest bit of overage. Also she tends to carry her weight in her middle which is extremely unhealthy for women, and at such a young age it really can’t be good. I hope that she keeps it up, and off for her health and her image. Hopefully she did it thoughtfully and safely. From what I hear about the rules that Florence set down in order for Jersey Shore to shoot there it will be like prohibition all over again, she might even loss more!
Here is Snooki when she came stumbling into our homes via VH1
and here she is now! not bad huh! she’s like a mini guidette juice head!
Creating a healthier body image through Acceptance, Appreciation and Respect
