As blogs and headlines blaze about American Idol winner Jordin Sparks -- and her body size -- I can’t help but wonder what messages her many fans are taking to heart, and stomach.
Jordan is curvy. And people call that “fat,” “overweight,” or “obese.” If that’s the common perception of a celebrity who isn't stick-sized, then millions of fans, who are also not skeletal, are probably thinking, “what about me?”
And so begins the tragic fall into weight loss attempts, everything from extreme diets to slimming pills, vomiting to chewing and spitting out food. The attempts to tame hated flesh become habits that morph into eating issues and, eventually full-blown eating disorders -- anorexia, bulimia, binge eating disorder. (The latter leads to obesity and, based on my research, bingeing is more harmful to health than simply being overweight).
And then the girls grow up. What happens when they meet partners, maybe have kids, try to raise them, and later age into mid and late life?
The adult women that I interviewed for Lying in Weight, all traced their eating disorders to hurts and hits taken in adolescence (or at even younger ages). The problem begins, but doesn't end there. Women are still dieting, bingeing and purging at 68. The oldest women in the book is 92.
By putting pressure on a 17-year-old girl to get thinner, in a very public way, obesity-bashers are pushing this girl, our society’s “idol,”and all her fans, to desperately take up just the kind of behaviors that set girls up for a lifetime of eating problems.
The way to tackle childhood obesity is not to call Jordin Sparks “a vision of unhealth.” Rather praise her for what she does so well, singing and performing, and for who she is. A fabulous person.