This is from an old article but interesting none the less. Brings to mind another study about how African American girls have a higher view of self than American white girls. Even those that are overweight. I remember when my students from Laos used to talk to me... to them chubby was a sign of good health and wealth. Hee hee.
SAF -seems the humor got lost, but I am glad that you know you aren't that bad....
Hard to tell sometimes on the net...
By the way.. I agree with the heat thing... and ya'll are hotter there than we are.... actually looking forward to cooler temps in the UK... seasons would be nice.
Ouch about that M. Arts thing..still get in shape and be able to protect yourself....hmmmmm
Anyway here's an article.... old but interesting.
It takes effort -- and maybe anorexia -- to be model-thin July 21, 1998
ELLEN CREAGER
Free Press Staff Writer
When model Christie Brinkley needs to get skinny, she consumes a liquid diet of fruit and vegetable juices.
Waif-like ice skater Peggy Fleming eats a slice of toast for breakfast and a half-cup of rice for dinner.
Model Elle Macpherson chooses between lunch or dinner, but not both. She also does 500 sit-ups a day.
You want to look like a model or movie star?
Have the body mass index of an 8-year-old.
Models and female movie stars' dubious secrets of fitness and dieting are shared by author and former model Diane Irons in her new book, "The World's Best-Kept Diet Secrets" (Sourcebooks, $14.95).
"The difference is, their looks have become their fortune, so they have pulled every trick in the book to get thin and stay there. Their livelihood depends on it," Irons says.
While Irons' book is fascinating because it dares to share the outrageous measures to which models and actresses will go to stay slim, a more alarming new report comes from Dr. Patricia Owen, professor of psychology at St. Mary's University in San Antonio.
Just about the time the government was compiling its sobering information about fat Americans and hefty BMIs, Owen and graduate student Erika Lauren compiled 500 models' statistics from the Web sites of modeling agencies and collected measurements of Playboy centerfolds from 1985 to 1997. They calculated the BMIs of both groups.
The result? One-quarter of each group met the American Psychological Association's weight criteria for anorexia nervosa -- a BMI of 17.5 or below. Virtually all the centerfolds were underweight, and so were three-quarters of the models. Centerfolds have gotten increasingly thinner and less curvy over the years.
"If these models are exemplars of beauty, then the measure for women is that to be beautiful, starvation-level thinness is required," Owen says.
BMI figures compiled by the Free Press from Irons' book and celebrity Web sites confirm Owen's research and extend it to actresses.
Actresses Julia Roberts and Cameron Diaz and singer Diana Ross all have BMIs under 17.5.
Supermodels Kate Moss, Niki Taylor and Elle Macpherson have BMIs under 17 and exist at "third world starvation BMI criteria," Owen says.
Lisa Dergan, Playboy's Miss July, has a BMI of 18.3, which is underweight and typical of centerfolds, whose BMIs hover at 18.2 in Owen's research (however, Michigan's Karen McDougal, 27, became 1998 Playmate of the Year with a healthy BMI of 19). Very few weight and height statistics are available for heavier actors and actresses.
In light of the new National Institutes of Health report on American obesity, the figures are ironic.
"The models are getting skinnier and skinnier, and we're getting fatter," Owen says.
"And women think, if the models are beautiful, what does that make me?"
Sane, perhaps?
