NEWSBYJULIE NEUMANN

The thin ideal of beauty effects all of us. And we don't just see it in magazines and on TV. We hear it from our coworkers, friends and family. We hear it in our own heads, echos of a culture that prizes being skinny over being happy and healthy. How many times have you heard something like the following from friends, family or colleagues?

"She's too big for that dress."

"I'll feel better when I weigh 5 pounds less."

"You look great, did you lose weight?"

It's time to stop this stream of body hatred. It's time to enjoy beauty at every size and embrace a healthy ideal. Make a commitment to eliminate fat talk from your life this week, from October 19 to 23rd.

Fat Talk Free Week is an international campaign to draw attention to body image issues and the damaging impact of the thin ideal. It is also an opportunity to reach out to the women you love, including your self, and develop a more positive dialogue.

As the new Funny or Die video featuring ex-Baywatch babe Nicole Eggert demonstrates, America is scared to death of fat.

These boys find Eggert repulsive. The very sight of her has ruined their fantasy. They find her so repulsive, in fact, that they almost let themselves drown before asking her to save them. And apparently, being called fat is so insulting it warrants letting these guys die.

If this is supposed to somehow empower women to walk away from the abusive standards of our society, it loses any credibility by promoting Eggert's participation in Celebrity Fit Camp. The VH1 show is all about competitive weight lose and public shaming people for their appearance. Not exactly a supportive environment for healthy body image.

The primary thing that stands out to me is that Eggert is beautiful. I don't remember what she looked like during her days on Baywatch, though I'm sure she has gained some weight - but that does not mean she is unhealthy, ugly or obese. If anything her body is reminiscent of the models that Glamour is proudly promoting in their latest issue, which is receiving a lot of positive feedback:

What do you think of the video? Did it make you laugh? Did her attitude in the video make you feel empowered? Did it make you feel bad about your own body?

In France, a group of 50 politicians have proposed a new law that would require digitally enhanced photos of people carry a warning label. Though this issue has been approached in the past as a consumer protection issue in the UK, the French law would be the first to classify the digital enhancements as a health risk.

According to MP Valerie Boyer, the label should read, "Retouched photograph aimed at changing a person's physical appearance."

"We want to combat the stereotypical image that all women are young and slim," says Boyer. "These photos can lead people to believe in a reality that does not actually exist... In some cases this leads to anorexia or bulimia and very serious health problems."

Across the English Channel, 28-year-old Canadian designer Mark Fast was making the news at London Fashion Week. Fast put three UK size 12 to 14 models in his runway show, a decision that actually caused his stylist and casting director to quit.

Far from heavy, these models do resemble real women. Incredibly beautiful and genetically gifted women, of course, but more aligned with a healthy weight.

"There's this idea that only thin and slender women are able to wear Mark's dresses and he wanted to combat that," said Fast's managing director Amanda May. "We wanted women to know they don't have to be a size zero to wear a Mark Fast dress - curvier women can look even better in one."

While I applaud Fast's move at Fashion week, I doubt the French politicians will have much success passing their law, and don't I think it would be very effective if it did go on the books.

It comes down to a very simple fact - seeing is believing.

Social psychology experiments have shown that humans process and react almost simultaneously. We will see the picture and buy the perfection before we rationalize that, according to a small watermark, the image is not a perfect representation of reality. Besides, don't we already that what we see in a magazine is a perfected product? Whether it is computer enhancements, perfect makeup, an artful wardrobe or trick lighting, we know there is a scripted disconnect between the glossy pages and reality. Yet that knowledge has never made a difference in the past. Which is why I think warnings would be pretty much useless. Once we see the image, a good portion of the damage is done.

Following the same logic, I think a shift from coat hangers to real women on the runway represents a step forward. No matter how emaciated they look, we know the models really are that skinny, which reinforces the notion that the thin ideal is attainable if we work hard enough. By putting more curvaceous and healthy figures in the spotlight, the definition of beauty is expanded. What we see will actually match up to the healthier message we hear, that being pretty isn't about the size of your jeans. Not to mention the impact more realistic bodies have on the designers. They can actually create clothes for a variety of figures, not just the 2% of women who are as thin as modern models.

Now, if politicians want to propose a law that requires magazine editors and ad agencies to forgo Photoshopping people all together, publishing their pictures as they actually appear in real life, we might start getting somewhere.

Photo Credit: Mark Fast

What drives people to starve and binge and purge?

Though there are a variety of stereotypical answers to choose from, none of these reasons can fully explain disordered eating habits. Anorexia is about perfection. Bulimia is about control. Overeating is about consolation. Eating disorders are genetic. Body image issues are a reaction to skinny models.

Yet there is no simple cure. No single method of therapy or proven combination of pills. No guaranteed way to fix things.

Our society reduces eating disorders to a weight issue. From doctors basing their diagnosis off a BMI chart to the media crucifying Barbie for creating an unrealistic ideal, there is an overwhelming emphasis on physical symptoms. But when you ask the men and women who are suffering, you hear a very different side of the story.

One simple question was asked on an online support forum. The respondents varied in age, career, economic status, sexual orientation and nationality. Yet they all are in recovery or currently suffering from an eating disorder. These are some of their answers.

What is your eating disorder "all about" for you?

"It's about life and the fact I can't deal with it." - AT

"Losing weight, self destruction, numbing, something to come home to, something to rely on, something to get lost in, a way of saying 'I'm not ok,' a way of saying 'fuck you all and fuck this life." - NO

"I was abused sexually, physically, and verbally and I'm still angry about it. I can't get over it." - PR

"I do think it's partially a control thing. I can't control things that are going on at work. I can't control the amount of stress and pressure I'm under. But I can control what I put into my body and how much I weigh. It's definitely a silly reason, but who ever said there wasn't one behind an eating disorder?" - TB

"Bulimia definitely helps me deal with stress. It's always there for me, because I often feel alone. It's something I do when I am bored/stressed/whatever. The weight loss is a side incentive for me." - TO

"Being frightened of intimacy, my own emotions, failure and sexuality. Being scrutinized and evaluated by others in terms of looks or intelligence. Feeling that I only deserve care and attention if I am "sick." Being emotionally and sexually abused as a child and being raped as an adult. Having a bulimic mother. Never, ever, feeling good enough." - VN

"At this point, it's about needing to be sick. Needing something wrong with me. I sabotage every chance at happiness I get." - PM

"Part of it is perfectionism, although to an outsider I probably look nothing like a perfectionist. People close to me see me as one though, which is a bit weird because for years now I've seen myself as a perfectionist who went over to the Dark Side. Seriously, it's like I couldn't be as good or as perfect as I was meant to be, things just weren't ever right, it all got too much, so I gave up completely." - CO

"My starving myself was saying to him, 'You may think you can hurt me, but I can hurt myself way more than you can." - LG

"I think that being thin equals being acceptable. I've spent most of my life feeling inferior and like a giant fuck up. I want to be successful, I want to be liked and accepted, and I feel like if I'm not thin, then I can't be any of those other things." - HA

"When this first started almost 10 years ago, it was definitely about punishment and control. I was abused growing up and I think this was a large part of how I chose to deal with it. Now I'm not so sure. Maybe punishment still plays a factor, but I know control doesn't anymore. This ED has control over me now and I can't delude myself into believing anything else anymore. I think more than anything this has just become ‘me' and I'm scared to try and live any other way. Sort of like breathing, I don't even think about what it's "about" for me, it's just there." - BA

"Ambivalence about life or death and finding a way to express that." - AS

Photo Credit: Meredith_Farmer

Anorexia has the highest mortality rate of any mental illness. The associated death rate in 15 to 24-year-olds women is 12 times higher than all other causes for that demographic. It is estimated that up to 20 percent of anorexics will prematurely die from complications related to their eating disorder. Though researchers are still studying the data, it appears the mortality rates for chronic bulimia is equally frightening.

Despite meeting hundreds of people on my road to recovery, I had never faced the death of a friend. But 2009 was the year my luck ran out. In the past two months, three fellow sufferers have passed away.

I knew these young women from an online eating disorder support forum. And with thousands of members coming and going, the odds were against our group. I have been part of that community since 2003. Without their honest and unwavering support, I wouldn't have made it to treatment in 2005. Even when I wasn't actively posting, I tried to keep an eye on all my beautiful friends struggling with this ugly disease. Some are healthy and no longer need an Internet message board to stay sane. Many are still there, six years later, fighting for recovery. Others have gone silent without an explanation. Though we hope for the best, that they got better or bored, we know the thing that brings us together could end our lives at any moment.

But we know exactly what happened to Jenn, Katrien and Jen. One of these young women was undergoing treatment for leukemia when her kidneys and liver failed. Weakened by years of bulimia, her organs could not take the stress of a blood marrow transplant.

The other two took their own life. Suicide is the leading cause of death for anorexics. For many years, doctors blamed this on frail bodies being unable to withstand even the most halfhearted attempts. But a recent study attributes the high death rate to the use of extremely lethal techniques with a low rescue potential. Hanging, taking a drug overdose and jumping in front of a train were the most popular methods. Whether you weigh 90 pounds or 290 pounds, it's unlikely you'll survive getting hit by a train.

Why is suicide the answer for so many? The toll that a chronic eating disorder takes on your body, and more importantly your mind, is devastating. More than a diet gone awry, eating disorders are a deadly disease with no proven cure. People struggle for years to develop a healthy relationship with their body and food, but only a third fully recover. When you see no end to the pain, the logical solution is to end it yourself. If you've been slowly killing yourself for years, it is much easier to take that last step on to the railroad tracks.

Farewell Jenn, Katrien and Jen. I hope you have finally found peace.

Perhaps the biggest question on Equal Pay Day is why, in a society where women have made significant professional progress, we cannot close the wage gap. As Jen pointed out in her Fair Pay post this morning, the average woman earns 78 cents for every dollar a man makes. Race compounds this gap, with African American women and Latinas lagging even further behind.  But, it also appears that weight could be a factor as well.

A recent study, published in Equal Opportunities International, compared the weight and gender of Fortune 1000 CEOs.

• 5% of male and female CEOs at top companies were obese (body mass index greater than 30), which is much lower than the U.S. average of 36% for men and 38% for women of similar age
• An estimated 45-61% of top male CEOs are overweight (BMI between 25 and 29), which is higher than the U.S. average of 41% in similarly aged men
• Only 5- 22% of top female CEOs were overweight (BMI between 25 and 29), which is lower than the U.S. average of 29% among similarly aged women

What does this mean? Discrimination based on body type is a real concern when it comes to women and the wage gap:

"The results suggest that while being obese limits the career opportunities of both women and men, being ‘merely overweight' harms only female executives - and may actually benefit male executives," said Mark Roehling, associate professor of human resource management at MSU. "This pattern of findings is consistent with previous research indicating that, at least among white Americans, there is a tendency to hold women to harsher weight standards."

If a high BMI is keeping women out of leading management positions, it is affecting the wage gap as well. By limiting access to the highest paid positions through weight discrimination, our society creates yet another barrier between women and equal pay.

It would be impossible to talk about body image this week without mentioning Susan Boyle. The 47-year-old Scottish woman became a viral sensation after her surprising performance on Britain's Got Talent. However, due to the physical antithesis of what our society has come to expect from pop stars, the judges smirked and the live audience laughed when she first appeared on stage. But her stunning rendition of "I Dreamed a Dream" turned the snickering response into a standing ovation.

Though many have held up Boyle's popularity as proof that we should never judge a book by its cover, it raises an important question. What if Boyle had stepped into the spotlight and, instead of silencing the audience with her incredible voice, she had croaked out her show tune as expected?

In his Huffington Post column, psychotherapist Dennis Palumbo writes:

"The unspoken message of this whole episode is that, since Susan Boyle has a wonderful talent, we were wrong to judge her based on her looks and demeanor. Meaning what? That if she couldn't sing so well, we were correct to judge her on that basis? That demeaning someone whose looks don't match our impossible, media-reinforced standards of beauty is perfectly okay, unless some mitigating circumstance makes us re-think our opinion?"

At the same time that Boyle's video was making the rounds via YouTube, a different trio of famous faces challenged our expectations of beauty in a different way.  For example, in the "Stars Without Makeup" issue, French Elle created three covers featuring Monica Bellucci, Sophie Marceau and Eva Herzigova without makeup or retouching.

The women are breathtaking and wonderfully real all at once. More than the lack of cover-up and blush, it is the lack of Photoshop that impresses me. With their pale lips and shadows under their eyes, they look very different from the flattened glamour we expect from cover girls, and that is incredibly refreshing. Of course they are still genetically blessed, but we can see they are actual people, not plasticized goddesses that never have a blemish.

Which bit of pop culture gave me more hope this week?  French Elle. Rather than enforcing the belief that only the extraordinary are worthy of our admiration, those three covers show that even our stars have flaws. And when we see our icons as real human beings, we chip away at the myth of perfection.

A new study published in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association, indicates adolescent vegetarians are more likely to have an eating disorder than their peers.

The study was designed to investigate the relationships between vegetarianism, weight and dieting behaviors in teenagers and young adults. Researchers found that 15 to 23-year-old vegetarians had healthier dietary intakes and were less likely to be overweight. But they also displayed a higher incidence of disordered eating behaviors, including restriction, binging and purging. The highest risk group was young adults who'd formerly been vegetarians, with 27% displaying symptoms of an eating disorder.

On the surface, the simple explanation is that adolescents and young adults with eating disorders stop eating animal products to lose weight. Any diet that allows you to reject an entire food group can be manipulated to benefit an eating disorder. Vegetarianism can also be a convenient excuse for someone looking to minimize or skip meals. In these instances, refusing meat is manipulated as a method of restriction, which is distinctly different from vegetarianism motivated by morality or health concerns.

It's important to realize that just because an eating disordered person is a vegetarian, it doesn't mean they chose a vegetarian diet because of their eating disorder.  Yes, I am a vegetarian, and I am a recovering bulimic and anorexia. I began cutting meats out of my diet when I was 11 years old, which was before I had an eating disorder. My vegetarianism continues to be an ethical choice and has nothing to do with weight loss.

But I do think my vegetarianism and eating disorder share a common trait: thinking beyond the plate. In a society that encourages inhaling mass-produced junk food on a daily basis, conscious eating is rare. Very few people actually contemplate what they put in their mouth or how it will affect their body. Such blind consumption contributes to a slew of health issues, including an obesity, heart disease and diabetes. To be aware of where your food came from, to consider the impact it will have on your body, is exceptional. At its best, this attitude leads people to adopt a vegetarian diet. At its worst, this awareness contributes to a destructive mental illness.

It only makes sense that people with eating disorders would also have moral opinions about where their food comes from. When you spend hours and days and years obsessing about the effect food has on your body, it makes sense to start thinking about the food itself. You consider the ingredients, the processing and ultimately the origin. Spend enough time pondering these answers and becoming a vegetarian seems inevitable. But that does not mean the vegetarianism is disordered, it merely means the disorder helped bring you to vegetarianism.

Even when they coexist, a vegetarian diet and an eating disorder do not need to be codependent. You can recover from an eating disorder without consuming meat. My treatment team was very respectful of my beliefs. They helped me setup a meal plan that incorporated alternative sources of protein. One of the advisers even made special trips to the natural food store and brought me black bean burgers every week. They proved it was possible to refrain from meat while learning to eat again.

I would like to end this post with some advice to concerned parents. Adolescent vegetarianism is not an eating disorder. It can be a very healthy and responsible diet. So if your child decides to become a vegetarian, actively support that choice. The first step is to engage them in a conversation. Talk about their reasoning, make sure they understand the beneficial impact this can have on our society and their long-term health, and make sure it isn't an unreasonable attempt to lose weight. Then ensure they still eat a balanced diet and get all the nutrition they need. That may mean cooking special meals or additional dishes, but try not to make them feel uncomfortable or left out at family meals. Do not, under any circumstances, shame them for their choice. Support their decision now and you'll build the foundation for a lifetime of healthy eating.

Photo credit: malias

Like baseball and ballet recitals, attaining the perfect bikini body has evolved into an all-American pastime. Starting with spring break and extending through Labor Day, women and girls across the country strive to lose weight, tone their tummies and find a flattering swimsuit. You must earn your fun in the sun with a suitable figure.

We are a nation suffering from bikini body disorder. So People magazine is patting itself on the back for putting a 48-year-old TV star in a two-piece bathing suit on the cover. While this editorial decision does challenge one ideal, the article staunchly supports another. The Valerie Bertinelli story is all about losing weight. Thanks to a rigid diet and exercise routine, the actress was able to whittle her figure down to a stereotypically accepted size 6. Apparently middle aged women can be sexy, but they have to drop 50 lbs. first.

This wasn't Bertinelli's first People cover. In April 2007, she was featured for her public declaration to slim down. "I need to do this in front of millions of people so I can't mess up," Bertinelli says. "It is freeing because I can say it first: I know what you're thinking - I'm fat." According to the current issue, she rarely made public appearances at her high weight of 172 lbs. This is obviously a woman with serious body image issues. But two years and a Jenny Craig endorsement later, she's bearing it all on the beach, promoting herself as a health and weight-loss activist.

Because age is one of the ways our society discriminates against women's bodies, the story initially appears inspirational. "A bikini? I'm too old for bikinis!" cries Bertinelli. "Then I realized, Wait a minute. Why not a bikini?" But the article quickly devolves into a glorified diet ad.

At times, it goes a step further, eerily echoing eating disorder rhetoric. "I'm just one jalapeno popper away from being 40 lbs. heavier again," says Bertinelli. She adds that every time she looks in the mirror, "My eyes go immediately to the parts I don't like, the jiggly bits."

This type of story reinforces extreme dieting and negative body image. Bertinelli claims, "We all just need to appreciate our bodies for what they are, jiggly bits and all." But she obviously could not do that herself. Not only did she diet down to 132 lbs. in nine months, she got down to 123 for the photo shoot, hiring a personal trainer and restricting her calories to rock bottom levels. Now she vows to "stay vigilant" and keep working on her waistline.

Far from a tale of body acceptance, Bertinelli's bikini quest exemplifies our twisted obsession with weight loss. It supports the cliché that no matter how old you are, no matter how much you've accomplished professional or personally, there is always room for improvement. And for American women, that improvement starts on the scale.

The personal is political, but does that mean political pundits should critique the size of your thighs rather than your values and actions?

Meghan McCain was pulled into the public eye when her father decided to run for president. Once the race was over, she made a conscious decision to stay in the spotlight, keeping up McCainBlogette.com and joining the Daily Beast as a columnist. As a young woman promoting, and sometimes criticizing, the Republican Party, she had to see the hits coming. And when she went after GOP darling Ann Coulter, she pretty much painted the bull's eye on herself.

It doesn't surprise me that mud starting flying, but I am incredibly disappointed it was directed at her body rather than her brain. Laura Ingraham had plenty of criticism for McCain's beliefs, but the conservative radio personality couldn't resist taking a dig at her size as well. Which doesn't surprise me either, but it highlights the way our culture reduces women to physical objects.

What do McCain's curves have to do with it? Why did Ingraham think belittling her physical appearance was an appropriate way to criticize her political ideology? When will our words become more important than our weight?

In an interview with Glamour this summer, McCain shared a surprisingly balanced body image. "I got to a point where I was like, I just don't care. You think I'm fat? Fine. I don't care how much you weigh." And she is already fighting back against Ingraham's comments. Despite the personal nature of the attack, McCain is keeping it professional, effectively focusing on an issue that goes beyond party lines.

Regardless of whether or not McCain makes a serious mark in politics, she is already having an impact on the fight against society's objectification of women.