Our Bodies Are Not Trends

The recent trend for mega-skinny bodies is really concerning to me. When I was a teen and up until my early thirties, I was slender, and have never been particularly overweight, until the last six years when I’ve been disabled. So it was horrible to see that, yet again, the twig look was starting to resurface in the wider culture. Even more pernicious than the “heroin chic” look of the nineties and “indie sleaze” early noughties, it’s created by the weight loss Jag, which has resulted in many actors, musicians, managers and models looking ill.

Katy Perry (above); Sharon Osbourne , Ariana Grande, Adele, Rebel Wilson and countless others are buying into this fad, losing so much weight as to become skeletal. Normally, I don’t bother about the vacuous celebrity conveyor belt, but it’s becoming ubiquitous and impossible to ignore now. It’s even got a name: “Ozempic face”. How have we got here?

It’s dangerous on so many levels. Firstly, some celebrities have a cachet with younger, impressionable people, whose minds and bodies are still at the developmental stage. Next, regardless of how we consume pop cultural news, we subconsciously are made to feel less than, or not good enough. It could also trigger those who have struggled with eating disorders.

Finally, it’s irritating that bodies are regarded in terms of fads anyway. As long as a body remains healthy, that should be enough. These people are setting an extremely horrifying example of how to exist in the world. Shame on them all for teaching people to disappear.