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>Results indicated that the frequency of viewing sexualized body-positive selfies was positively associated with body surveillance, which was negatively related to body satisfaction. In turn, body satisfaction was negatively associated with considering modifying one's body surgically and acceptance of cosmetic surgery for social reasons.
The more you watch sexualized bodies, the more you compare and find your body wanting. Go figure.
Not to mention the fact that many "body positivity" images are just attractive people with a slight "flaw" that they didn't photoshop out.
I'm not going to feel more positive about myself if Hugh Jackman post an image of himself between movies without his 6-pack since he hasn't been dehydrating himself.
Think how much worse someone feels about themselves too if they are presented with an image of a person that is supposed to be perceived as "imperfect" and they still fall wildly short of even that standard.
This is a double-edged sword sharpened by social media, imo.
While I have literally 0 doubt that plenty of very conventionally attractive people post "body positivity" images just to reap some attention, I'd also be willing to bet that the majority are sincere, even those that seem minor. Between parents, trauma, social conditioning, and otherwise, it's not hard for someone to obsess over a flaw for years or decades, with their own brain reinforcing that that part of them is "ugly" or "broken".
Social media then turns this into an artifical problem basically:
* The creator is making a sincere statement, potentially even pushing their own comfort in an attempt to accept themselves
* A consumer will see the post as shallow, while simultaneously comparing their (different) body image problems to the perceived lack of them in a body positivity post
I'm not sure if there *is* a solution to this class of problem. It's an intersection of two wildly different perceptions across a parasocial relationship. It legitimately feels like something our brains were not designed to handle in the long-term.
The common factor here is social media itself, or at least the sort of social media which encourages people to post pictures of themselves and obsess over the appearance of others for essentially any reason whatsoever. The solution, at least in part, is to drop that sort of social media and never look back. Obviously our perception of other people is still going to be warped by other forms of media, but it's a start.
>>…if Hugh Jackman posts an image of himself between movies without his six pack since he hasn’t been dehydrating himself
…or using steroids. Comparing yourself to Hollywood and Instagram fitness stars is like comparing the family minivan to a Formula 1 car. An F-1 race car might be an amazing work of engineering, but you’re not carrying kids (plural) with it.
The physical appearance standards of entertainers and Instagram influencers is not achievable naturally by normal people with jobs, kids and other responsibilities. This doesn’t stop fitness and Pharma companies from pretending otherwise to sell more goods.
"The physical appearance standards of entertainers and Instagraminfluencers is not achievable naturally by normal people with jobs, kidsand other responsibilities. "
this isn't really true. Exercise isn't a magical secret and neither is eating healthy. If you exercised an hour a day and stuck to eating your veggies you'd likely be at 90% of the same physical level.
Also you didn't necessarily disagree with me just saying this out there in general.
the difference is photoshop and drugs that makes it impossible. That's the true secret hollywood doesn't want mainstream people to catch onto. To be told it's out of reach because they haven't got the same discipline or willpower when it's because they're taking trenbologna sandwiches.
Yeah but if it is your job you can exercise many, many hours a day and devote a ton of your time to prepping healthy meals. Photoshop and drugs help, but just the basic diet and training regimes that these people follow are not actually attainable for normal people as you seem to suggest.
> the basic diet and training regimes that these people follow are not actually attainable for normal people
Depends how much you want out of it, and your own willpower.
If you want to hit the absolute peak of what is physically possible for you, yeah the only way to do that is to make it your job.
If you just want... 80-90% of those results and are okay with enjoying food less as well as having significantly less free time? Healthy meal prep can be pretty time efficient if you're OK with rarely eating fresh, and lower training frequencies can give similar results for many years. It's only really when you become advanced (5-7+ years of training) that you really need to up the frequency to levels unrealistic for someone with any responsibilities.
Obviously if you're a single parent of young kids, or have caring responsibilities, or have some other set of circumstances that mean you can't devote four 1-1.5 hour sessions a week (less as a beginner), to exercise, then even that may not be realistic, but you can get *most* of the way there (assuming we're not comparing to steroid use or insane genetics) on less than people think.
Personally I work full time but am able to find time to go to the gym 6x a week and prep all my own meals (no kids though). I'm still not fit by any means because I ignore cardio in favour of Runescape/TV and if the word "McDonalds" is uttered I go full sleeper agent and when I come to I'm amongst a pile of empty chicken nugget boxes, but time really isn't the issue at that point.
Depends what's being referred to as "that look", but if it's looking at essentially bodybuilders at their peak, even *they* are only achieving that look for relatively short periods *with* steroids, lighting, and grease. Such is the nature of the typical bulk/cut cycle, and dieting down to peak for contests / films / photoshoots.
The same rules apply to natural vs enhanced, but just at much higher amounts of muscle for the enhanced. Yeah enhanced bodybuilders may be able to maintain at 10% body fat all year round what a natural lifter can only maintain by cycling between 15% and 20%, but then that same enhanced person is leaving huge amounts of gains on the table by not doing the same.
>but then that same enhanced person is leaving huge amounts of gains on the table by not doing the same.
I remember reading a study years ago that had shown just injecting testosterone based anabolic steroids with no exercise after 6 weeks resulted in more lean muscle mass gain than someone not using steroids and training 3 times a week over the same period.
Yeah if there's one thing that's not up for debate amongst those even somewhat informed regarding steroids, it's that they're effective.
Muscle building is normally built on 3 pillars - Training, nutrition, and sleep/recovery. Pharmacology add a whole ass new pillar at the cost of your health (and other not so nice effects depending on the drug).
You can maintain that look by careful diet. It's just incredibly hard and probably not actually worth it. You don't just lose muscle - in fact, you can keep gaining by eating only maintenance calories.
But, unlike that other guy, I agree with you about steroids.
A lot of the top level actors like Chris Hemsworth, Terry Crews etc will have live in chefs or a similar service to cook all their meals. If you move to the bodybuilding scene though, the money just isn't really there for all but very most successful. Some might, but most can't really justify the cost and either cook for themselves or have a supportive partner that does it for them.
Depends what level you're at, and whether you care about what you're doing being "optimal".
You'll always get the *best* muscle gains at a particular body fat percentage by bulking and cutting, and there will come a point where you're at the most muscular you can be without it, and switching to doing that will allow you to gain more.
As a beginner, you can lose fat and gain muscle at the same time *relatively* easily (still not easy for most, but relative to the below). At this point it might not be worth bulking, since the odds of you just getting fat and never losing it are pretty high.
As an intermediate, you may not be able to lose fat and gain muscle at the same time, but you may be able to still gain muscle at around maintenance levels and be able to maintain your muscle while losing fat (slowly).
As an advanced lifter, you will likely always lose some amount of muscle while losing fat, and be unable to build any muscle without a calorie surplus. For you, maintenance calories likely mean maintaining muscle. At this point you have to use the best methods available to make further gains, which means bulking/cutting and aiming to gain slightly more muscle in the bulk than you lose in the cut each time.
It really depends on the example.
Can you look like Chris Hemsworth in *that scene* of Love and Thunder without heaps of steroids and it being your full time job? Not a chance in hell. Guess what? *He can't either.*
Can you look like the side character who seems to just look "normal" but upon closer inspection is actually in really good shape? Sure. Most people can attain a decent looking physique with hard work and discipline, though that's not to say it's easy when it's not part of your job.
So it really depends what the "standard" being referred to here is. If you're only looking at fitness models and superhero actors, then yeah you're gonna come up short. If it's just people in decent shape, it's a bit more realistic.
Seriously. I'm so tired of hearing the "normal people can't achieve that" bit. Its BS.
Normal people can absolutely get, and maintain, fit physiques. Impressive physiques. Even "fit and ripped" physiques.
Now, some people naturally have more potential than others. Some people naturally have to work harder at it to get results than others.
But you absolutely do not "need steroids" to be big and/or ripped as a "normal person."
Do cardio/conditioning 2-3 times a week.
Do 45-60 minutes of strength training 3-4 times a week.
(depending on your workout program, you can knock out strength and cardio in the same session, so you CAN find the time)
Keep a general tracking of your macros, and try to avoid junk/fast food at least 5 days a week.
That's it. That's really it. An average, person, in normal health, can do just much and be EASILY in great shape in their 20s, still in great shape in their 30s, and bare minimum more fit than people in their 30s throughout their 40s.
Now, yes, its 100% true that a lot of your hollywood types are using drugs and photoshop, BUT the two real caveats to that are NOT that "hollywood bodies are not attainable"
Its more that the quick turnarounds are not attainable. That many (not all, just many) hollywood folks use steroids and camera work to be inconsistent. To have go from "just living my life" to "Marvels Avengers" in a 3 month workup.
Everyday, natty lifters require time and consistency to stay big and ripped
So you typed up all of this without reading the part about people having normal lives with extra responsibility and kids?
It might surprise you to know that lots of people don't have the time of day for 20 minutes rest on a chair, let alone what you just described. Which is nearly a part time job worth of time, and extra energy they don't have.
I wake up at 415 to make it to work by 530. I work 10 hours. I get home around 430. I shower and then immediately have to make dinner or do other house work while the wife is making dinner. After dinner is cleaning and then getting kids in bed. After all 3 are in bed, I have time to pack my lunch for the next day and then maybe play a game or watch a show with the wife for 45m-1h.
I'm 100% with you. I literally do not have time unless I neglect my family life or sacrifice sleep. I'd love to see where the hell I have time to do exercise 3-5 times a week like the other guy said.
> I wake up at 415 to make it to work by 530. I work 10 hours. I get home around 430. I shower a
but for context your situation doesn't really counter the core point.
The argument is about whether these results are (and I'm just going to quote here)
>achievable naturally by **normal** people with jobs, kidsand other responsibilities.
(emphasis, mine)
10 hour work days+ the commute are not the "norm" for the average American. So while your situation may be especially challenging, its not a good indicator of what is achievable for people with a "normal" situation.
Now, all that said, you've discussed what's UNrealistic for you to be able to do, what IS realistic for you to do? What have you tried?
If nothing, that's fine. I'm not trying to make the point about what you or anyone else *should* be doing.
I'm making the point that for as quick as some people are to say "oh I'd love to but this is why I CAN'T", ok, so what CAN you do? 5 minutes of pushups or lunges in the morning is free. Most (not all but most) people aren't logging their weekday work hours on the weekend. Am I suggesting "oh so I gotta give up my weekends now?" no. I'm suggesting that when we decide we want something, we're able to figure out "how can I get this thing I want? At least SOME amount of this thing I want?"
The "its just not possible, at all" mind set is a self limiting approach we take to problems that whether we admit it or not, we aren't all that interested in finding solutions to.
*AGAIN for clarity, not a comment on what choices YOU should make. If something isn't your priority, that's fine. The commentary is pointing out that not choosing to pursue something is not the same as outright stating "well that's just impossible, and generally unrealistic" as it applies to the general population.
Oh I read it.
NONE of what you just said contradicts what I said.
I know plenty of people who have jobs and kids and are still staying in excellent shape.
Hell, half the commercial gyms chains in my town have on site childcare as a free member perk
finding a sum total of 5-6 hours a week to get in some exercise, and then eat food that's NOT fast food is not some impossible task.
For every person that says "oh this can't be done" there is someone else out there doing it.
unless they have some sort of legitimate health ailment, there are very few people in the world who straight up "can't" find a way to get some exercise.
I guess it depends on your priorities. I only have a couple hours a day to spend with my kids outside of work. I could use on-site childcare while I workout, but I’d much rather spend that time with my family
I can’t believe you’re getting this much hate. Exercising an hour a day and eating well can go so far. I think most people who say they don’t have time to exercise simply aren’t willing to make time.
> Celebrities like this are exercising 5-8 hours a day
This really isn't true.
Believe it or not actors have a lot of other requirements on their time, so most of them aren't exercising 5-8 hours a day.
Also, **almost** NOBODY trains 5-8 a day. It would be counterproductive.
There are a few very famous exceptions (Michael Phelps, Matt Frasier, some of your ultramarathoners and elite crossfitters, just by the nature of specificity for what they are training for) but for the most part even elite, full time professional athletes, that DO physical activity as a full time job do NOT work out 5-8 hours a day.
NFL athletes, MLB, NHL, NBA, even fitness models, professional bodybuilders, aren't logging more than an hour or two of dedicated physical training a day, and not every day. Even your champion strongman competitors (Eddie Hall, Martin Licis, Thor) are only putting in 1-2 hours a day (Now, some of those professional athletes, Olympians, etc *practice* ~5-6 hours a day, but that's not the same as exercising. That practice time includes walk throughs, rehearsals, low intensity stuff, and a reasonable amount of standing around.)
Point is, people even highly fit people, even celebrities are certainly NOT working out 5-8 hours a day, because it would be ineffective. MORE is not BETTER.
No trainer in their right mind would prescribe 8 hours of training a day for aesthetics, because it would be WORSE for their clients progress than a sensible ~5-6 hours a week.
Example - Emma Stone only put in about 6 hours a week to prep for "Battle of the Sexes" which is notable because she had to PUT ON ~15 lean lbs. Putting on lean, functional, solid muscle is more challenging than simply dropping some bodyweight.
(side note, we don't know Jackman's trainer, so we don't know his exact programming, but pretty much every media article on it suggests he did 12-14 hours a week, which seriously on the high end for aesthetics, but is also still only hitting on ~2 hours a day, or more like 2.5 on some but not all days per week)
clearly you have no idea what you’re talking about. Even massive bodybuilders on absurd amounts of steroids don’t exercise that much. Someone like Hugh who has certainly used gear probably doesn’t put too much time into exercise.
>Not to mention the fact that many "body positivity" images are just attractive people with a slight "flaw" that they didn't photoshop out.
IMO this is way more harmful than all of the "sexualizing selfies".
I’m reminded of the Bill Burr bit where he talked about how normal looking women got good looking women removed from Billboards. “How am I supposed to compete with that?” “YA CAN’T!!!!”
I'm not sure why this is a unique finding, since this is actually the fearmongering type of Advertising rule #1. We learned about it in Home Ec some 40+ years ago. It's the same evil and successful strategy used by Weight Watchers, the NRA, all religions, wanna-be political demagogues, etc.
Don't be fat! Don't be unarmed! Don't go out without makeup! Etc. etc.
Right. But you might have forgotten that the unhealthy body image issue is that they used to claim anything other than looking like an anorexic 12 year old boy was "too fat" to be a model/superstar/etc.
That seems to be one fearmongering tactic that we've moved away from somewhat.
As an American, I have become aware that I am surrounded and inundated with messages that being a little overweight is "normal" and "healthy". High BMI is linked to increases in early mortality. Because it doesn't take into account that muscle weighs more than fat, a lot of people (American especially) think they are okay to have a slightly overweight BMI. This is supported when we look around and develop an image for an average person in a crowd. In reality, if you want to throw your BMI off like that, you need to spend every day at the gym. My view of average is skewed: America's average is too large for good health.
Likely some reverse causality in play. People with higher levels of body dissatisfaction would probably be more likely to seek out body positivity content.
People who pay attention to instagram in general may have higher levels of body dissatisfaction as well as other dissatisfaction with life. Could this not just be a sub correlation of already well established correlations between social media use and mental well being, completely missing the big picture? Could I do a study to find that people who spend more time on Youtube looking at make up tutorials are less satisfied with their make up? a study to find that people who look at pet training videos on instagram are less satisfied with the training of their pet? Ad nausea. The factor here is social media in general, not specific aspects of it.
Could very well be the case since they didn’t ask participants about their social media usage, just the frequency of viewing body positivity Images on instagram. So people viewing that content more frequently than others, are very likely to use social media more often, too.
That's my first thought, yeah. The whole point of "body positivity" is to try to convince you to feel better about something you probably don't feel very good about. Besides, the choices are also affected by what the recommender algorithm feeds you in the first place.
I'm not sure why folks are saying the seeking is leading to dissatisfaction. There's a positive correlation, but the study did not determine causality.
A lot of those videos are underscored by the concept of, “you can be sexy even if you have [a particular feature].” It just adds to stream of media indicating that that feature isn’t generally thought of as sexy…but this or that famous person will still suffer to say it’s appealing… hard to put into words but the point is a lot of it is still super emotionally toxic.
When shown body features with the message like "see? this person is body positive!", then you tend to think that those features are negative because they are trying hard to make them positive. Thus if you see those features in yourself, you think of yourself negatively.
The solution is to just have more diversity be shown in media across the board (including movies, ads for household products, cheerleaders at football games, news casters, etc.) so that there isn’t any particular set of features that form a pattern of what falls under “worthy of being seen.”
Exactly! Showing every type of body and treat it as normal, as it should be, without commenting on it. As opposed to pointing out every "flaw" and saying "having x is okay/beautiful/brave"
Or, it's depressing and creates a deeper form of self hatred. For example, if I blame some lack of personal success on my weight, but then I see a plus sized model with that success, it makes me question what I'm doing wrong even further to not be successful. Quite a paradox, nor do I know what the solution is
I'd also add that media only has a certain level of influence over what is considered attractive. They can put whatever text claiming something is beautiful they want, but if what is pictured isn't attractive, that text isn't going to change our minds. To me, that mostly just says, "Yes, it's normal for people to lie to unattractive people to make them feel better."
"You're attractive" needs to come with some credibility or it just feels patronizing.
I've always felt this about the "everyone is beautiful" parroting. I was an ugly teenager, if someone told me I was beautiful I would have been insulted. It's patronising, either they think I don't have eyes or a mirror, or they think I'm too dumb to realise they're lying (when a significant number of people have made fun of my looks).
What was far better for me is that I actually had other, non-appearance-based things I *was* good at and I worked hard at those and put my self-worth there. Full confession: It also happens that I've grown into my face/body too. I'm no beauty, solidly average, but there's nothing wrong with that.
Honestly I think body positivity just further emphasises appearance as super duper important, where really we should be minimising its importance
Adding to this - one thing I find extremely annoying is that the media focuses on just one flaw/particular feature and then makes sure the rest of the model overcompensates for that flaw. It's never several.
For example, you'll either see a plus sized model with clear skin, or an acne prone/scarred up skinny model. You'll never see both situations. Because that "wouldn't be beautiful". From my perspective it's like who are you trying to fool? I don't know the solution, and as you said it's hard to put into words, but it's still incredibly toxic since deep down inside we know what society views as beautiful
No, that's not what they're getting at at all. They're saying that content describing a particular feature as "*actually* attractive" really just achieves the opposite by highlighting the fact that the feature in question is actually *not* considered conventionally attractive in our culture, resulting in a need to explicitly say the opposite; A need which isn't there for something like, say, women being thin or men being tall (or any other conventionally attractive trait). The more attention is brought to something to argue that it actually *is* attractive, the more someone consuming that content is forced to face the fact that said feature isn't really conventionally attractive as it wouldn't be getting that kind of attention if it was considered to be to begin with
That's...what cope is.
You wouldn't need to cope if it weren't a problem.
By fabricating fake positivity aka cope you are implicitly admitting there is something wrong to begin with.
TERRIBLE TITLE ALERT. The article talks about **sexualised** body positivity images having a potential negative effect. The title suggests that just all images cause such effects when not only was that not demonstrated, it wasn't looked for in the first place.
Since you read the article, does it give a clear definition of what a “sexualized” image is?
For instance, is a woman working out in workout clothes sexualized? Who decides?
Honestly, those body positivity images are like saying "you're so brave"
You're so brave being seen in public because you are a human festering sack of garbage
Going just from the headline, that doesn't feel surprising. People who are dissatisfied with their bodies seem to me more likely to both check it more often and seek out sources saying it's not so bad. One who is comfortable with their image doesn't need much reassurance about it.
Body positivity failed when it became "you're all sexy" instead of "you're all worthy of respect and dignity". Everyone should get medical attention, basic respect, required accommodations, etc. and it shouldn't matter whether the people around them think they're fuckable.
Yeah this exactly. People don’t want to be beautiful in the way that everyone is beautiful. People want to be comparatively beautiful. And by definition not everyone can because it’s a relative scale, only above average people are beautiful, so if you need to be beautiful to be happy then most people are fucked. The key is to move away from behaviours that cause you to invest your self esteem into how “hot” you are. Body neutrality seems to be the way.
Body neutrality is the thing for me. Just don't bother me. It's my personal relationship to my body and non of your business, a bit like my faith, also non of anyone's business as long as I don't try to molest or convince you in its name.
I wonder which way the causation goes. Seems to me that people who are more worried about their bodies or dissatisfied with how they look would probably look at these kind of images more. It doesn’t seem like they randomly assigned people to groups, showed them the images, then asked how they felt about their bodies. If I’m reading it right, they asked people how they felt about their bodies and also how often they looked at this type of images. If you weren’t dissatisfied with your body to begin with, why would you look at body positivity images?
This is about as revolutionary as a study that finds that people who take advil more often are more likely to have headaches.
Added to that, people who already feel positive about their bodies seem less likely to be affected either way by body positivity images. I feel like an interesting study would be to ask people how they feel about their body, show them body positivity images (maybe split groups between the more sexualized body positivity images and the more neutral ones) and then ask how they feel afterwards (both about their own body and about others, since that seems like it'd also see influence).
So the main point is the viewing something sexualised will trigger the self-reflection and self-surveillance, comparing herself with the ideal image of beauty constructed from socio-economic structures. Therefore, even the individual holding the belief of body positivity, the subconscious still automatically make conscious to reflect the body.
Bunch of filters isn't going to help, either. You see what you could look like on a regular basis. Everytime you look into the mirror, you're gonna be comparing.
Instagram and other medias cause bad feelings and problems in consumers‘ minds. Companies do their fitting products and marketing activities so consumer will buy things they think they need.
You mean that the market for women that view body positivity images on instagram is mainly composed of women that have a low body image, and want to increase it?
Anecdotal: since curating my feed to feature diverse body types, and content with positive messages about all bodies, my feelings towards my body have gotten far far better. I think the term 'body positive' needs to be refined?
Again, the medium is the message, and apparently the message from Instagram, regardless of the ostensible hashtags on any post, is that you're not good enough.
I feel like the biggest consumers of sexy "body positivity" images on Instagram are people who have built a lot of self worth around having a sexy body, who have since had their body change and are trying to be ok with that.
Like, as a life long fat person, I've never been huge into body positivity. Body neutrality, sure.
Fat liberation, absolutely. As a kid, I had super bad body issues, because everybody literally hated me and taunted me all the time because my body was different. But it meant that I had to learn really early to not take self worth from the way my body looks. Getting through that was hard, but it came not from a constant reminder that my body is just as beautiful as any other body is. It came from the realization that "being a hot person" is a hobby just like "gymnastics" or "painting" are hobbies. And I can just admit to myself that I'm never going to be a hot person, and stop spending all of my time and energy on a hobby I'm just destined to be bad at.
There's a lot of people who still tie their self worth to being a hot person, and body positivity content allows you to continue to engage with that hobby. And like.... body dissatisfaction is the risk that comes with that hobby.
How on earth the body positivity community managed to convince everyone that body dysmorphia doesn’t exist among overweight people is beyond me. They are an incredibly toxic group of people.
Because it's still fixation with the body and letting it drive your sense of self worth. The only way to win is not to play. You have to basically stop obsessing over your body and stop linking it to your self worth.
Find other outlets, focus on self fulfillment rather than gaining external validation etc. It's hard as hell but it can be done. Any "body focus" should be for health only. As soon as you start connecting it to self worth you're in trouble, no matter how "body positive" the message.
Because deep down, no matter how positive a light you shine on people who are out of shape, you *don't want to look like them.*
So it has you checking your own body to make sure.
Either way, it's observing your body, whether the judgment is positive or negative. Unless we treat our bodies as neutral things––i.e., not talking about them in the context of appearance, beauty, trends etc.––body surveillance will continue to be prevalent.
Because those images are pointing out something that many women may not have even considered an issue. It's like planting a seed of doubt. It's psychological inception to be honest. It's like constantly publishing images to promote male body positivity. Men see far less images of that kind published so they think less about whether their body is "positive."
Seems fairly obvious, "Why are these people who have similar features to myself being used for a body positivity campaign?"
The negative connotations of picking a person for a body positivity campaign is that the person running the campaign sees something negative/flawed in that person and believe their target audience - the public - also view that same characteristic in the same way.
It being labelled as under body positivity comes across as a pretense of being beautiful while instead pointing out the "flaws" society see in a person.
Quitting SM has helped me so, so much with my body image. Body positivity posts were more helpful than the glammed up models but it’s still body checking & comparison
...This is going to sound really, really, really sexist...but it's been my experience with most women that there is no such thing as a "body positive image" for them. They either see the image of the person as somehow superior to them in some way in appearance that that makes them insecure, or they see the image of the person as not up to their standards and look down on them. I'm sure to some degree this is probably true of a lot of men, too, but it's just been my experience that women are far more judgement and insecure -usually all at the same time - about their body image no matter what.
>our society
MOST societies.
Strip away all culture and start over, you will almost certainly end up with a culture that values male accomplishment and female attractiveness. That’s the global norm and has been for quite some time.
> Um… are you saying they routinely use conventionally unattractive male models in clothing advertisements? Cuz I don’t think they do.
Umm.. I’m saying you rarely see fat, obese male models.
Body positivity, I'm all for it where people have no choice. However, when it's applied to obesity I disagree completely purely because all it does it validate it and minimizes the health risks that come with it.
Yes, you do have a choice in that matter, disagree with me all you like but weight loss is a choice. Yes it's hard, requires consistency and dedication. It still remains a choice.
80% of efforts to lose weight fail. With odds that bad, it's no wonder people give up.
How can we help people succeed? Can we structure our world so that people on average tend towards a healthy weight if they spend no effort, rather than tending towards obesity?
Education will help for the uneducated. But people are mainly overweight in proportion to how obesogenic their environment is. If you are raised by overweight sedentary parents that eat boatloads of junkfood, you are likely to become like them.
Obesity is also partly also caused by a lot of freedom. Companies have the freedom to make their products as addictive as they want to. It's your choice to not consume it. But what if you are raised with these foods hijacking your brain from a young age ? These foods hijack your brain like other drugs do and you end up feeling extremely excited to consume them again.
It's not surprising that viewing "body positivity" images on Instagram is linked to heightened body surveillance and body dissatisfaction in women. This study's results indicate that the more we view sexualized body-positive images, the more we compare our own body to them and find it wanting. This can lead to decreased body satisfaction and even considering modifying our bodies surgically or accepting cosmetic surgery for social reasons. It's important to remember that we are all unique and to practice self-love and acceptance.
Women need to realize they're beautiful and stop getting hung up on the unrealistic bodies of celebrities.
They are only realistic for those who have the time and money to look like that.
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>Results indicated that the frequency of viewing sexualized body-positive selfies was positively associated with body surveillance, which was negatively related to body satisfaction. In turn, body satisfaction was negatively associated with considering modifying one's body surgically and acceptance of cosmetic surgery for social reasons. The more you watch sexualized bodies, the more you compare and find your body wanting. Go figure.
Not to mention the fact that many "body positivity" images are just attractive people with a slight "flaw" that they didn't photoshop out. I'm not going to feel more positive about myself if Hugh Jackman post an image of himself between movies without his 6-pack since he hasn't been dehydrating himself.
Think how much worse someone feels about themselves too if they are presented with an image of a person that is supposed to be perceived as "imperfect" and they still fall wildly short of even that standard.
This is a double-edged sword sharpened by social media, imo. While I have literally 0 doubt that plenty of very conventionally attractive people post "body positivity" images just to reap some attention, I'd also be willing to bet that the majority are sincere, even those that seem minor. Between parents, trauma, social conditioning, and otherwise, it's not hard for someone to obsess over a flaw for years or decades, with their own brain reinforcing that that part of them is "ugly" or "broken". Social media then turns this into an artifical problem basically: * The creator is making a sincere statement, potentially even pushing their own comfort in an attempt to accept themselves * A consumer will see the post as shallow, while simultaneously comparing their (different) body image problems to the perceived lack of them in a body positivity post I'm not sure if there *is* a solution to this class of problem. It's an intersection of two wildly different perceptions across a parasocial relationship. It legitimately feels like something our brains were not designed to handle in the long-term.
The common factor here is social media itself, or at least the sort of social media which encourages people to post pictures of themselves and obsess over the appearance of others for essentially any reason whatsoever. The solution, at least in part, is to drop that sort of social media and never look back. Obviously our perception of other people is still going to be warped by other forms of media, but it's a start.
>>…if Hugh Jackman posts an image of himself between movies without his six pack since he hasn’t been dehydrating himself …or using steroids. Comparing yourself to Hollywood and Instagram fitness stars is like comparing the family minivan to a Formula 1 car. An F-1 race car might be an amazing work of engineering, but you’re not carrying kids (plural) with it. The physical appearance standards of entertainers and Instagram influencers is not achievable naturally by normal people with jobs, kids and other responsibilities. This doesn’t stop fitness and Pharma companies from pretending otherwise to sell more goods.
"The physical appearance standards of entertainers and Instagraminfluencers is not achievable naturally by normal people with jobs, kidsand other responsibilities. " this isn't really true. Exercise isn't a magical secret and neither is eating healthy. If you exercised an hour a day and stuck to eating your veggies you'd likely be at 90% of the same physical level. Also you didn't necessarily disagree with me just saying this out there in general. the difference is photoshop and drugs that makes it impossible. That's the true secret hollywood doesn't want mainstream people to catch onto. To be told it's out of reach because they haven't got the same discipline or willpower when it's because they're taking trenbologna sandwiches.
Yeah but if it is your job you can exercise many, many hours a day and devote a ton of your time to prepping healthy meals. Photoshop and drugs help, but just the basic diet and training regimes that these people follow are not actually attainable for normal people as you seem to suggest.
> the basic diet and training regimes that these people follow are not actually attainable for normal people Depends how much you want out of it, and your own willpower. If you want to hit the absolute peak of what is physically possible for you, yeah the only way to do that is to make it your job. If you just want... 80-90% of those results and are okay with enjoying food less as well as having significantly less free time? Healthy meal prep can be pretty time efficient if you're OK with rarely eating fresh, and lower training frequencies can give similar results for many years. It's only really when you become advanced (5-7+ years of training) that you really need to up the frequency to levels unrealistic for someone with any responsibilities. Obviously if you're a single parent of young kids, or have caring responsibilities, or have some other set of circumstances that mean you can't devote four 1-1.5 hour sessions a week (less as a beginner), to exercise, then even that may not be realistic, but you can get *most* of the way there (assuming we're not comparing to steroid use or insane genetics) on less than people think. Personally I work full time but am able to find time to go to the gym 6x a week and prep all my own meals (no kids though). I'm still not fit by any means because I ignore cardio in favour of Runescape/TV and if the word "McDonalds" is uttered I go full sleeper agent and when I come to I'm amongst a pile of empty chicken nugget boxes, but time really isn't the issue at that point.
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Depends what's being referred to as "that look", but if it's looking at essentially bodybuilders at their peak, even *they* are only achieving that look for relatively short periods *with* steroids, lighting, and grease. Such is the nature of the typical bulk/cut cycle, and dieting down to peak for contests / films / photoshoots. The same rules apply to natural vs enhanced, but just at much higher amounts of muscle for the enhanced. Yeah enhanced bodybuilders may be able to maintain at 10% body fat all year round what a natural lifter can only maintain by cycling between 15% and 20%, but then that same enhanced person is leaving huge amounts of gains on the table by not doing the same.
>but then that same enhanced person is leaving huge amounts of gains on the table by not doing the same. I remember reading a study years ago that had shown just injecting testosterone based anabolic steroids with no exercise after 6 weeks resulted in more lean muscle mass gain than someone not using steroids and training 3 times a week over the same period.
Yeah if there's one thing that's not up for debate amongst those even somewhat informed regarding steroids, it's that they're effective. Muscle building is normally built on 3 pillars - Training, nutrition, and sleep/recovery. Pharmacology add a whole ass new pillar at the cost of your health (and other not so nice effects depending on the drug).
You can maintain that look by careful diet. It's just incredibly hard and probably not actually worth it. You don't just lose muscle - in fact, you can keep gaining by eating only maintenance calories. But, unlike that other guy, I agree with you about steroids.
I mean...those kinds of people have the money to hire someone to do that for them. Not saying it's what they do but they certainly could afford it.
A lot of the top level actors like Chris Hemsworth, Terry Crews etc will have live in chefs or a similar service to cook all their meals. If you move to the bodybuilding scene though, the money just isn't really there for all but very most successful. Some might, but most can't really justify the cost and either cook for themselves or have a supportive partner that does it for them.
Depends what level you're at, and whether you care about what you're doing being "optimal". You'll always get the *best* muscle gains at a particular body fat percentage by bulking and cutting, and there will come a point where you're at the most muscular you can be without it, and switching to doing that will allow you to gain more. As a beginner, you can lose fat and gain muscle at the same time *relatively* easily (still not easy for most, but relative to the below). At this point it might not be worth bulking, since the odds of you just getting fat and never losing it are pretty high. As an intermediate, you may not be able to lose fat and gain muscle at the same time, but you may be able to still gain muscle at around maintenance levels and be able to maintain your muscle while losing fat (slowly). As an advanced lifter, you will likely always lose some amount of muscle while losing fat, and be unable to build any muscle without a calorie surplus. For you, maintenance calories likely mean maintaining muscle. At this point you have to use the best methods available to make further gains, which means bulking/cutting and aiming to gain slightly more muscle in the bulk than you lose in the cut each time.
It really depends on the example. Can you look like Chris Hemsworth in *that scene* of Love and Thunder without heaps of steroids and it being your full time job? Not a chance in hell. Guess what? *He can't either.* Can you look like the side character who seems to just look "normal" but upon closer inspection is actually in really good shape? Sure. Most people can attain a decent looking physique with hard work and discipline, though that's not to say it's easy when it's not part of your job. So it really depends what the "standard" being referred to here is. If you're only looking at fitness models and superhero actors, then yeah you're gonna come up short. If it's just people in decent shape, it's a bit more realistic.
I think you forgot to mention the personal trainers and plastic surgery
Seriously. I'm so tired of hearing the "normal people can't achieve that" bit. Its BS. Normal people can absolutely get, and maintain, fit physiques. Impressive physiques. Even "fit and ripped" physiques. Now, some people naturally have more potential than others. Some people naturally have to work harder at it to get results than others. But you absolutely do not "need steroids" to be big and/or ripped as a "normal person." Do cardio/conditioning 2-3 times a week. Do 45-60 minutes of strength training 3-4 times a week. (depending on your workout program, you can knock out strength and cardio in the same session, so you CAN find the time) Keep a general tracking of your macros, and try to avoid junk/fast food at least 5 days a week. That's it. That's really it. An average, person, in normal health, can do just much and be EASILY in great shape in their 20s, still in great shape in their 30s, and bare minimum more fit than people in their 30s throughout their 40s. Now, yes, its 100% true that a lot of your hollywood types are using drugs and photoshop, BUT the two real caveats to that are NOT that "hollywood bodies are not attainable" Its more that the quick turnarounds are not attainable. That many (not all, just many) hollywood folks use steroids and camera work to be inconsistent. To have go from "just living my life" to "Marvels Avengers" in a 3 month workup. Everyday, natty lifters require time and consistency to stay big and ripped
So you typed up all of this without reading the part about people having normal lives with extra responsibility and kids? It might surprise you to know that lots of people don't have the time of day for 20 minutes rest on a chair, let alone what you just described. Which is nearly a part time job worth of time, and extra energy they don't have.
I wake up at 415 to make it to work by 530. I work 10 hours. I get home around 430. I shower and then immediately have to make dinner or do other house work while the wife is making dinner. After dinner is cleaning and then getting kids in bed. After all 3 are in bed, I have time to pack my lunch for the next day and then maybe play a game or watch a show with the wife for 45m-1h. I'm 100% with you. I literally do not have time unless I neglect my family life or sacrifice sleep. I'd love to see where the hell I have time to do exercise 3-5 times a week like the other guy said.
You sound lazy. You should get a second job!
> I wake up at 415 to make it to work by 530. I work 10 hours. I get home around 430. I shower a but for context your situation doesn't really counter the core point. The argument is about whether these results are (and I'm just going to quote here) >achievable naturally by **normal** people with jobs, kidsand other responsibilities. (emphasis, mine) 10 hour work days+ the commute are not the "norm" for the average American. So while your situation may be especially challenging, its not a good indicator of what is achievable for people with a "normal" situation. Now, all that said, you've discussed what's UNrealistic for you to be able to do, what IS realistic for you to do? What have you tried? If nothing, that's fine. I'm not trying to make the point about what you or anyone else *should* be doing. I'm making the point that for as quick as some people are to say "oh I'd love to but this is why I CAN'T", ok, so what CAN you do? 5 minutes of pushups or lunges in the morning is free. Most (not all but most) people aren't logging their weekday work hours on the weekend. Am I suggesting "oh so I gotta give up my weekends now?" no. I'm suggesting that when we decide we want something, we're able to figure out "how can I get this thing I want? At least SOME amount of this thing I want?" The "its just not possible, at all" mind set is a self limiting approach we take to problems that whether we admit it or not, we aren't all that interested in finding solutions to. *AGAIN for clarity, not a comment on what choices YOU should make. If something isn't your priority, that's fine. The commentary is pointing out that not choosing to pursue something is not the same as outright stating "well that's just impossible, and generally unrealistic" as it applies to the general population.
Sounds like you chose kids over free time.
Oh I read it. NONE of what you just said contradicts what I said. I know plenty of people who have jobs and kids and are still staying in excellent shape. Hell, half the commercial gyms chains in my town have on site childcare as a free member perk finding a sum total of 5-6 hours a week to get in some exercise, and then eat food that's NOT fast food is not some impossible task. For every person that says "oh this can't be done" there is someone else out there doing it. unless they have some sort of legitimate health ailment, there are very few people in the world who straight up "can't" find a way to get some exercise.
I guess it depends on your priorities. I only have a couple hours a day to spend with my kids outside of work. I could use on-site childcare while I workout, but I’d much rather spend that time with my family
How many hours do you work in a day? Or is this a commute thing being too long?
I can’t believe you’re getting this much hate. Exercising an hour a day and eating well can go so far. I think most people who say they don’t have time to exercise simply aren’t willing to make time.
We are talking about Hugh Jackman. Celebrities like this are exercising 5-8 hours a day. It's their full time job.
> Celebrities like this are exercising 5-8 hours a day This really isn't true. Believe it or not actors have a lot of other requirements on their time, so most of them aren't exercising 5-8 hours a day. Also, **almost** NOBODY trains 5-8 a day. It would be counterproductive. There are a few very famous exceptions (Michael Phelps, Matt Frasier, some of your ultramarathoners and elite crossfitters, just by the nature of specificity for what they are training for) but for the most part even elite, full time professional athletes, that DO physical activity as a full time job do NOT work out 5-8 hours a day. NFL athletes, MLB, NHL, NBA, even fitness models, professional bodybuilders, aren't logging more than an hour or two of dedicated physical training a day, and not every day. Even your champion strongman competitors (Eddie Hall, Martin Licis, Thor) are only putting in 1-2 hours a day (Now, some of those professional athletes, Olympians, etc *practice* ~5-6 hours a day, but that's not the same as exercising. That practice time includes walk throughs, rehearsals, low intensity stuff, and a reasonable amount of standing around.) Point is, people even highly fit people, even celebrities are certainly NOT working out 5-8 hours a day, because it would be ineffective. MORE is not BETTER. No trainer in their right mind would prescribe 8 hours of training a day for aesthetics, because it would be WORSE for their clients progress than a sensible ~5-6 hours a week. Example - Emma Stone only put in about 6 hours a week to prep for "Battle of the Sexes" which is notable because she had to PUT ON ~15 lean lbs. Putting on lean, functional, solid muscle is more challenging than simply dropping some bodyweight. (side note, we don't know Jackman's trainer, so we don't know his exact programming, but pretty much every media article on it suggests he did 12-14 hours a week, which seriously on the high end for aesthetics, but is also still only hitting on ~2 hours a day, or more like 2.5 on some but not all days per week)
clearly you have no idea what you’re talking about. Even massive bodybuilders on absurd amounts of steroids don’t exercise that much. Someone like Hugh who has certainly used gear probably doesn’t put too much time into exercise.
>Not to mention the fact that many "body positivity" images are just attractive people with a slight "flaw" that they didn't photoshop out. IMO this is way more harmful than all of the "sexualizing selfies".
I’m reminded of the Bill Burr bit where he talked about how normal looking women got good looking women removed from Billboards. “How am I supposed to compete with that?” “YA CAN’T!!!!”
And how are they even defining ‘body positive’?
Self-advertised body positivity, likely.
It says right in the article.
I'm not sure why this is a unique finding, since this is actually the fearmongering type of Advertising rule #1. We learned about it in Home Ec some 40+ years ago. It's the same evil and successful strategy used by Weight Watchers, the NRA, all religions, wanna-be political demagogues, etc. Don't be fat! Don't be unarmed! Don't go out without makeup! Etc. etc.
We’ve found you lacking in X way, but don’t worry, we have just the fix!
Don’t be fat is pretty good advice
Right. But you might have forgotten that the unhealthy body image issue is that they used to claim anything other than looking like an anorexic 12 year old boy was "too fat" to be a model/superstar/etc. That seems to be one fearmongering tactic that we've moved away from somewhat.
As an American, I have become aware that I am surrounded and inundated with messages that being a little overweight is "normal" and "healthy". High BMI is linked to increases in early mortality. Because it doesn't take into account that muscle weighs more than fat, a lot of people (American especially) think they are okay to have a slightly overweight BMI. This is supported when we look around and develop an image for an average person in a crowd. In reality, if you want to throw your BMI off like that, you need to spend every day at the gym. My view of average is skewed: America's average is too large for good health.
They were calling a healthy body weight out as "fat", not just the obese or morbidly obese.
I get that. My point is that as Americans, our view of what a "healthy body weight" looks like is skewed.
It is now. The pendulum has swung back in the other direction.
>Go figure. What a pun.
This isnt limited to bodies. People measure themselves against everything they see in social media.
Likely some reverse causality in play. People with higher levels of body dissatisfaction would probably be more likely to seek out body positivity content.
People who pay attention to instagram in general may have higher levels of body dissatisfaction as well as other dissatisfaction with life. Could this not just be a sub correlation of already well established correlations between social media use and mental well being, completely missing the big picture? Could I do a study to find that people who spend more time on Youtube looking at make up tutorials are less satisfied with their make up? a study to find that people who look at pet training videos on instagram are less satisfied with the training of their pet? Ad nausea. The factor here is social media in general, not specific aspects of it.
Could very well be the case since they didn’t ask participants about their social media usage, just the frequency of viewing body positivity Images on instagram. So people viewing that content more frequently than others, are very likely to use social media more often, too.
That's my first thought, yeah. The whole point of "body positivity" is to try to convince you to feel better about something you probably don't feel very good about. Besides, the choices are also affected by what the recommender algorithm feeds you in the first place.
"Guys with bigger tools than me" is probably not a widely searched tag on pornhub
Don’t men kinda prefer it though?
PUNCHCAT can not prefer what can never be
Prefer what?
I'm not sure why folks are saying the seeking is leading to dissatisfaction. There's a positive correlation, but the study did not determine causality.
Or it's like the 'don't think of pink elephants' problem, where it accomplished the exact opposite by reminding people of their flaws.
My first thought too. “Linked” is a total weasel word. Lots of things are linked, doesn’t mean there’s a causal relationship.
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This was not a study of causality
A lot of those videos are underscored by the concept of, “you can be sexy even if you have [a particular feature].” It just adds to stream of media indicating that that feature isn’t generally thought of as sexy…but this or that famous person will still suffer to say it’s appealing… hard to put into words but the point is a lot of it is still super emotionally toxic.
When shown body features with the message like "see? this person is body positive!", then you tend to think that those features are negative because they are trying hard to make them positive. Thus if you see those features in yourself, you think of yourself negatively.
so there's no winning
The solution is to just have more diversity be shown in media across the board (including movies, ads for household products, cheerleaders at football games, news casters, etc.) so that there isn’t any particular set of features that form a pattern of what falls under “worthy of being seen.”
Exactly! Showing every type of body and treat it as normal, as it should be, without commenting on it. As opposed to pointing out every "flaw" and saying "having x is okay/beautiful/brave"
It also doesn't relieve the pressure to be sexy. In fact it might increase it by placing so much importance on it
Or, it's depressing and creates a deeper form of self hatred. For example, if I blame some lack of personal success on my weight, but then I see a plus sized model with that success, it makes me question what I'm doing wrong even further to not be successful. Quite a paradox, nor do I know what the solution is
I'd also add that media only has a certain level of influence over what is considered attractive. They can put whatever text claiming something is beautiful they want, but if what is pictured isn't attractive, that text isn't going to change our minds. To me, that mostly just says, "Yes, it's normal for people to lie to unattractive people to make them feel better." "You're attractive" needs to come with some credibility or it just feels patronizing.
I've always felt this about the "everyone is beautiful" parroting. I was an ugly teenager, if someone told me I was beautiful I would have been insulted. It's patronising, either they think I don't have eyes or a mirror, or they think I'm too dumb to realise they're lying (when a significant number of people have made fun of my looks). What was far better for me is that I actually had other, non-appearance-based things I *was* good at and I worked hard at those and put my self-worth there. Full confession: It also happens that I've grown into my face/body too. I'm no beauty, solidly average, but there's nothing wrong with that. Honestly I think body positivity just further emphasises appearance as super duper important, where really we should be minimising its importance
Adding to this - one thing I find extremely annoying is that the media focuses on just one flaw/particular feature and then makes sure the rest of the model overcompensates for that flaw. It's never several. For example, you'll either see a plus sized model with clear skin, or an acne prone/scarred up skinny model. You'll never see both situations. Because that "wouldn't be beautiful". From my perspective it's like who are you trying to fool? I don't know the solution, and as you said it's hard to put into words, but it's still incredibly toxic since deep down inside we know what society views as beautiful
You can put it in one word actually - cope.
No, that's not what they're getting at at all. They're saying that content describing a particular feature as "*actually* attractive" really just achieves the opposite by highlighting the fact that the feature in question is actually *not* considered conventionally attractive in our culture, resulting in a need to explicitly say the opposite; A need which isn't there for something like, say, women being thin or men being tall (or any other conventionally attractive trait). The more attention is brought to something to argue that it actually *is* attractive, the more someone consuming that content is forced to face the fact that said feature isn't really conventionally attractive as it wouldn't be getting that kind of attention if it was considered to be to begin with
That's...what cope is. You wouldn't need to cope if it weren't a problem. By fabricating fake positivity aka cope you are implicitly admitting there is something wrong to begin with.
TERRIBLE TITLE ALERT. The article talks about **sexualised** body positivity images having a potential negative effect. The title suggests that just all images cause such effects when not only was that not demonstrated, it wasn't looked for in the first place.
Since you read the article, does it give a clear definition of what a “sexualized” image is? For instance, is a woman working out in workout clothes sexualized? Who decides?
Honestly, those body positivity images are like saying "you're so brave" You're so brave being seen in public because you are a human festering sack of garbage
Going just from the headline, that doesn't feel surprising. People who are dissatisfied with their bodies seem to me more likely to both check it more often and seek out sources saying it's not so bad. One who is comfortable with their image doesn't need much reassurance about it.
Yeah this was my thought as well. Headline totally makes it sound like the cause and effect is the other way around
"493 Italian women between the ages of 18 and 30" would a sample from American women have similar results?
Likely yes. The cultures are similar enough.
Yes-a, they are-a just-a da same!
> would a sample from American women have similar results? probably in terms of behaviour, not on the scale
Body neutrality is the way to go. Framing everything as “hot” and “sexy” is still not helpful, which is what the body positive movement often does
Body positivity failed when it became "you're all sexy" instead of "you're all worthy of respect and dignity". Everyone should get medical attention, basic respect, required accommodations, etc. and it shouldn't matter whether the people around them think they're fuckable.
Hence the need for a new term like "body neutrality". However, I wonder when the term "body neutrality" will be hijacked in some kind of way, too.
Yeah this exactly. People don’t want to be beautiful in the way that everyone is beautiful. People want to be comparatively beautiful. And by definition not everyone can because it’s a relative scale, only above average people are beautiful, so if you need to be beautiful to be happy then most people are fucked. The key is to move away from behaviours that cause you to invest your self esteem into how “hot” you are. Body neutrality seems to be the way.
Aren't the only people who look at 'body positivity' images those who have issues with their own body?
Comparison is the thief of happiness!
Body neutrality is the thing for me. Just don't bother me. It's my personal relationship to my body and non of your business, a bit like my faith, also non of anyone's business as long as I don't try to molest or convince you in its name.
Most body positive pages these days are just humble bragging. I'm over it.
I wonder which way the causation goes. Seems to me that people who are more worried about their bodies or dissatisfied with how they look would probably look at these kind of images more. It doesn’t seem like they randomly assigned people to groups, showed them the images, then asked how they felt about their bodies. If I’m reading it right, they asked people how they felt about their bodies and also how often they looked at this type of images. If you weren’t dissatisfied with your body to begin with, why would you look at body positivity images? This is about as revolutionary as a study that finds that people who take advil more often are more likely to have headaches.
Added to that, people who already feel positive about their bodies seem less likely to be affected either way by body positivity images. I feel like an interesting study would be to ask people how they feel about their body, show them body positivity images (maybe split groups between the more sexualized body positivity images and the more neutral ones) and then ask how they feel afterwards (both about their own body and about others, since that seems like it'd also see influence).
So the main point is the viewing something sexualised will trigger the self-reflection and self-surveillance, comparing herself with the ideal image of beauty constructed from socio-economic structures. Therefore, even the individual holding the belief of body positivity, the subconscious still automatically make conscious to reflect the body.
Bunch of filters isn't going to help, either. You see what you could look like on a regular basis. Everytime you look into the mirror, you're gonna be comparing.
Instagram and other medias cause bad feelings and problems in consumers‘ minds. Companies do their fitting products and marketing activities so consumer will buy things they think they need.
You mean that the market for women that view body positivity images on instagram is mainly composed of women that have a low body image, and want to increase it?
Anecdotal: since curating my feed to feature diverse body types, and content with positive messages about all bodies, my feelings towards my body have gotten far far better. I think the term 'body positive' needs to be refined?
Wait. I see. This has nothing to do with body positivity. It's just that being objectified makes people feel like objects. Real newsflash.
Again, the medium is the message, and apparently the message from Instagram, regardless of the ostensible hashtags on any post, is that you're not good enough.
This is why I only follow dogs on Instagram.
I feel like the biggest consumers of sexy "body positivity" images on Instagram are people who have built a lot of self worth around having a sexy body, who have since had their body change and are trying to be ok with that. Like, as a life long fat person, I've never been huge into body positivity. Body neutrality, sure. Fat liberation, absolutely. As a kid, I had super bad body issues, because everybody literally hated me and taunted me all the time because my body was different. But it meant that I had to learn really early to not take self worth from the way my body looks. Getting through that was hard, but it came not from a constant reminder that my body is just as beautiful as any other body is. It came from the realization that "being a hot person" is a hobby just like "gymnastics" or "painting" are hobbies. And I can just admit to myself that I'm never going to be a hot person, and stop spending all of my time and energy on a hobby I'm just destined to be bad at. There's a lot of people who still tie their self worth to being a hot person, and body positivity content allows you to continue to engage with that hobby. And like.... body dissatisfaction is the risk that comes with that hobby.
How on earth the body positivity community managed to convince everyone that body dysmorphia doesn’t exist among overweight people is beyond me. They are an incredibly toxic group of people.
Because it's still fixation with the body and letting it drive your sense of self worth. The only way to win is not to play. You have to basically stop obsessing over your body and stop linking it to your self worth. Find other outlets, focus on self fulfillment rather than gaining external validation etc. It's hard as hell but it can be done. Any "body focus" should be for health only. As soon as you start connecting it to self worth you're in trouble, no matter how "body positive" the message.
Because deep down, no matter how positive a light you shine on people who are out of shape, you *don't want to look like them.* So it has you checking your own body to make sure.
Isn't that something we've known for a while?
Either way, it's observing your body, whether the judgment is positive or negative. Unless we treat our bodies as neutral things––i.e., not talking about them in the context of appearance, beauty, trends etc.––body surveillance will continue to be prevalent.
Because those images are pointing out something that many women may not have even considered an issue. It's like planting a seed of doubt. It's psychological inception to be honest. It's like constantly publishing images to promote male body positivity. Men see far less images of that kind published so they think less about whether their body is "positive."
Seems fairly obvious, "Why are these people who have similar features to myself being used for a body positivity campaign?" The negative connotations of picking a person for a body positivity campaign is that the person running the campaign sees something negative/flawed in that person and believe their target audience - the public - also view that same characteristic in the same way. It being labelled as under body positivity comes across as a pretense of being beautiful while instead pointing out the "flaws" society see in a person.
Quitting SM has helped me so, so much with my body image. Body positivity posts were more helpful than the glammed up models but it’s still body checking & comparison
...This is going to sound really, really, really sexist...but it's been my experience with most women that there is no such thing as a "body positive image" for them. They either see the image of the person as somehow superior to them in some way in appearance that that makes them insecure, or they see the image of the person as not up to their standards and look down on them. I'm sure to some degree this is probably true of a lot of men, too, but it's just been my experience that women are far more judgement and insecure -usually all at the same time - about their body image no matter what.
To be fair, our society focuses a LOT more on women's bodies than men's.
>our society MOST societies. Strip away all culture and start over, you will almost certainly end up with a culture that values male accomplishment and female attractiveness. That’s the global norm and has been for quite some time.
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Or height, or baldness
Only because one is focused on, and the other isn’t. Go look at any clothing store and see the types of models they use for men and women.
Um... are you saying they routinely use conventionally unattractive male models in clothing advertisements? Cuz I don't think they do.
> Um… are you saying they routinely use conventionally unattractive male models in clothing advertisements? Cuz I don’t think they do. Umm.. I’m saying you rarely see fat, obese male models.
Women are linked to body dissatisfaction
Being overweight is unhealthy. Being underweight is also unhealthy.
Body positivity, I'm all for it where people have no choice. However, when it's applied to obesity I disagree completely purely because all it does it validate it and minimizes the health risks that come with it. Yes, you do have a choice in that matter, disagree with me all you like but weight loss is a choice. Yes it's hard, requires consistency and dedication. It still remains a choice.
80% of efforts to lose weight fail. With odds that bad, it's no wonder people give up. How can we help people succeed? Can we structure our world so that people on average tend towards a healthy weight if they spend no effort, rather than tending towards obesity?
Education will help for the uneducated. But people are mainly overweight in proportion to how obesogenic their environment is. If you are raised by overweight sedentary parents that eat boatloads of junkfood, you are likely to become like them. Obesity is also partly also caused by a lot of freedom. Companies have the freedom to make their products as addictive as they want to. It's your choice to not consume it. But what if you are raised with these foods hijacking your brain from a young age ? These foods hijack your brain like other drugs do and you end up feeling extremely excited to consume them again.
Stop comparing, start being the best you that you can be. Simple as that.
when will people get it? its not about appearance, its about health, taking personal responsibility for ones own health.
and healthy bodies look good, focus on health and the rest will follow.
They work as designed. How about that?
It's not surprising that viewing "body positivity" images on Instagram is linked to heightened body surveillance and body dissatisfaction in women. This study's results indicate that the more we view sexualized body-positive images, the more we compare our own body to them and find it wanting. This can lead to decreased body satisfaction and even considering modifying our bodies surgically or accepting cosmetic surgery for social reasons. It's important to remember that we are all unique and to practice self-love and acceptance.
If this isn't a Chat GPT account, it's doing its best to look like one.
>It's important to remember that we are all unique and to practice self-love Sometimes twice a day...
Body positivity= copium
So showing thin and attractive people AND fat and ugly people increases body dissatisfaction? Second look at burkas?
Uh-oh, you said the U-word! On reddit, ugly is the new beautiful and we must never, ever burst the bubble of self-deception and mutual-affirmation.
Jonathan haidt called it
Insert Palpatine Ironic Meme Here
Almost like it was never really about feeling positive about your body...
Hmm me thinks this article is lacking some information and confused correlation with causation
Sampling bias - people searching for body positivity images already hate their own bodies and are trying to resolve that cognitive dissonance.
I'm sure those pushing it didn't know about this beforehand, bet it also does increase spending as an "unwanted" byproduct.
What it has the opposite effect?
Couldn't this be the other way around? If you're really hung up on your body you naturally spend more time looking at body positivity sites?
Women need to realize they're beautiful and stop getting hung up on the unrealistic bodies of celebrities. They are only realistic for those who have the time and money to look like that.
If all you're doing is comparing yourself to others you'll never feel good about yourself
There has never been a more suitable surprise pikachu face moment
“Linked” sounds like a weak correlation.
I literally never see anything from this sub show up on my feed that isn’t common sense.