Fit to Fat: Tyra Bank’s Model Behavior

After fourteen years of being a model, Tyra Banks was used to seeing herself on the cover of magazines and on TV. But last week when airbrushed photos like the one seen on the right, were published on the Internet and in tabloid magazines declaring the former super-model fat, her reaction was anything but ordinary. The 5 foot 10 inch star was furious, publicly speaking out on both Larry King Live, where the 160 pound model stated,"...When [the media] say that my body is 'ugly' and 'disgusting,' what does that make those girls [who look up to me] feel like?", as well as addressing the issue on her daytime talk show by wearing the same bathing she donned in the doctored photos. Admittedly, since her official retirement from the modeling world in 2005 Tyra has gained some weight, but she is by no means fat.

All this attention comes after a firestorm of controversy shook the entertainment world. It seems there has always been pressure on women in show business to be young, beautiful and most importantly thin. But what had once been an unrealistic expectation has since become a dangerous obsession as millions of women develop deadly eating disorders in an attempt to mimic the waifish frames of high fashion models. Beginning with the success of Twiggy in the 1960's, the image of women’s figures in the media has progressively shrunk. Interestingly when Twiggy began modeling her slim frame made her unique and separated her from other models. Today however, thin is the status-quo among fashion models. In recent history celebrities such as Mary Kate Olsen, Jamie Lynn Siegler, Nicole Ritchie, Portia DeRossi, Calista Flockhart, and Lindsay Lohan have all admitted to battling eating disorders. Fueled by the controversy, the world of high fashion has been blamed for imposing such strict standards on runway models. In November of 2006, Brazilian model Ana Carolina Reston, pictured in a runway show on the right, died from complications due to anorexia. At the time of her death, the 5’8” model weighed a mere 88 pounds, and had a body mass index of 13.4. For an adult anything under 18.5 is considered underweight.

As tragic as the model's death is, she is by no means an exception.
In fact, the frail frames of runway models during the annual Fashion Week were so dangerously skinny as to draw the attention of the world. As a result, fashion designers in Spain insisted that models maintain a BMI of 18 in order to appear in the show. Those that did not meet the weight requirement were banned. Nevertheless, young starlets remain dangerously underweight, influencing an entire generation of young teens who are developing life-threatening illnesses. According to the National Eating Disorders Association, the number of women suffering from anorexia nervosa has reached an all-time high affecting between .5% and 1% of the female population in America, roughly every 1 in 100 women. More shocking still is that anywhere from 5 to 20 percent of those affected will die from it. On the Internet, chat rooms and blogs claiming to be pro-ana and pro-mia, short for anorexia and bulimia, have cropped up offering tips on how to sustain and hide the disorder from friends and family.

With all the controversy recently being brought to this deadly phenomenon, one would expect that a super-model such as Tyra Banks, who has described herself as fuller-figured, would have received support from American media outlets. Especially considering the young age and increased likelihood of death for those who suffer from eating disorders. Instead, however, the former Victoria’s Secret model was forced to defend her ten - pound weight gain, using the cover of People Magazine to pose the question to an increasingly superficial society, “You Call This Fat?” Is it any wonder that so many young girls are made to feel sickly thin is beautiful? And that while it may be tragic for so many young starlets to waste away to nothing, but it's an even worse fate for them to gain weight. Why can there not be an happy medium? Why is there no room for more than one conception of beauty in America? Isn't there room for more than one ideal in our psyche so that so many don't feel ugly.