I’ve been wondering aloud about Kate Winslet’s very alleged tweaking for years now. For what it’s worth, Kate does look less “worked on” these days, but I still believe she had some eye work done several years ago and it took a while to “settle.” Why bring this up yet again? Because Winslet has returned to one of her favorite subjects: how natural she is and how difficult it was to grow up as a beautiful white woman in England. Don’t get me wrong, we all have difficulties and struggles. It’s just that Kate seems a bit heavy-handed with the “woe is me” act. Kate appeared on Running Wild with Bear Grylls and here are some assorted quotes:
Body image: “When I grew up, I never heard positive reinforcement about body image from any female in my life. I only heard negatives. That’s very damaging, because then you’re programmed as a young woman to immediately scrutinize yourself and how you look.”
What she tells her 14-year-old daughter Mia: “I stand in front of the mirror and say to Mia, ‘We are so lucky we have a shape. We’re so lucky we’re curvy. We’re so lucky we’ve got good bums.’ And she’ll say, ‘Mommy, I know, thank God.’”
She was bullied: “I was bullied at school. I was chubby, always had big feet the wrong shoes, bad hair. There was one girl who was particularly horrible to me. [Later], she was working on a beauty counter in a department store…I went up to her and said ‘I want to thank you for being such a bitch because it made me a lot stronger’.”
Kate began acting when she was still a teenager and while she wasn’t rail-thin, she was perfectly beautiful with a very attractive figure and she was widely praised and applauded for both her beauty and her figure. So… I’m not really understanding how she can claim that she never got positive reinforcement from anyone when she was younger? I also feel like it’s the wrong message to send that “curves are good/lucky/better” and everything else is bad/unlucky/worse. Shouldn’t the message be self-love and body acceptance no matter what, skinny or curvy or big-bootied or small-busted or whatever? To just own who you are without comparing and contrasting?
Photos courtesy of WENN.
I like her as an actress but she’s getting super annoying in interviews.
I’ve always thought she was an incredible actress, and has amazing screen presence. But I’m also finding her annoying the last few years and can’t quite figure out why.
I’ve always loved her, too, but yes, she is getting irritating.
She’s so full of shit! Anyone with a discerning and not fan girl eye can see that since her rise to fame, she’s had a lot of work done.not shaming her at all. This woman is so obviously yet subtle, different from who she was around the titanic ferver.
Although she received acclaim for the role that made her famous, the negative digs on her appearance were noted and she absolutely had work to make herself better. Liar!liar! All day long!
For me when people go on and on about this “I love my curves” they are just trying to convince themselves that they do. Because time and time again these same people go on a weight lose journey. I don’t get the whole thing. There is nothing wrong with being curvy and nothing wrong with being skinny. I have 2 nieces that are very thin.. they have their dad’s body type. Beautiful. And they struggled with that for some time because big butts were the rave. Now they are 20 somethings and they have grown to love themselves the way they are. I would love to have their long legs.. I’m not short..
Her message maybe better if it were to like the package you are in. What happens if her daughter’s natural body shape turns out to be thin.. how will she message that. And why all this talk of curves with a child that young.
i second your comment, i am in the same condition as your niece, plus society is hella hypocrite these days, if it was a kate moss saying im lucky im skinny it would have been considered as promoting anorexia, instead of promoting a body type let’s promote being healthy no matter what our size is
Your nieces are lucky then because they’re the ideal by society’ss standars.
Not really.. the majority of their friends are not thin. As a Black woman there is a difference. Most women in my family are curvy. My friends are such. In my experience Black women were not as obsessed with losing weight. So no being very thin and having that model body maybe society’s standards.. but not in the black community.
They do that because they’re constantly being told they’re fat by the people around them. Anytime my weight goes up, I can tell when people think I’m heavy. They will start saying are you sure you wanna eat that? Or offer me tips, like, that’s not good for you. As if I don’t know what’s good for me and what’s not. So when you defend your curves because what else are you going to do? Start sobbing and say I know I’m so fat? 😭. No you save face, say I love my curves, then hop on the treadmill, practically kill yourself so you can get down to an acceptable weight so you can stop all the bullshit people say.
“I also feel like it’s the wrong message to send that “curves are good/lucky/better” and everything else is bad/unlucky/worse. Shouldn’t the message be self-love and body acceptance no matter what, skinny or curvy or big-bootied or small-busted or whatever? To just own who you are without comparing and contrasting?”
Self-love and body acceptance is exactly what Kate is advocating to her daughter. She wants her to love her body at her size. Don’t take it as Kate being “anti-thin” or “anti-skinny”.
Exactly. She’s teaching her daughter to accept her own body. She’ll hear enough garbage in the real world. But at home she’s learning to love herself.
No, she’s teaching her daughter to love curves – not how she is in her skin. Lucky to have curves means unlucky if you don’t have them. She’s making it a “them or us” mentality, and she’s shaming those who aren’t so “lucky” to have those curves.
Like others said above, if ever her daughter loses her curves, she could feel bad about herself because her mother won’t feel she’s lucky anymore.
I disagree with Jag
Kate probably sees that her daughter has inherited her type of body. This is a personal message to her daughter – your shape is beautiful. It probably is drawn from her own experience. This is unfortunate that she has said that in a public interview as someone will always interpret the message as “curvy is better”, but I am sure she was only trying to send her daughter a message “you are normal, you are great”. Most teenagers have enough insecurities as they are – those who have straight hair wish it could be wavy, those who have brown eyes wish they vere blue and vice versa. The most stunning girls can feel insecure.
Jag, I think you’re reading a pretty bad message into this and it’s simply not there. To get a teenager to love their body is next to impossible so you have to hammer it home. Kate’s talking about her and daughter’s body type and that they’re lucky to have it. Nowhere does she say that everyone else can suck it with their ugly skinny hips. I feel like the people who view this so negatively have issues with their own bodies, not with what Kate Winslet is saying to her daughter.
Jag,
I’m 53, and a teen before the incredible desire to be stick thin was so intense. Even back then, adults would tell us we were “chunky” if we gained 5 pounds! And I was a year round athlete, very fit! Due to this, my sister has struggled with anorexia her entire life and still does.
I am 5’5″, and felt fat at 145. When I quit smoking, I gained 30 pounds. Now, I’m invisible to society even though was always attractive. I bet every thin Hollywood actress shames their kids into being thin. So hurray for Kate for making curvy desirable”
I also disagree with Jag, and I’m getting so tired of this shaming nonsense. I took over raising my cousin’s child when she was twelve. She came to me as a petite child, and in short order, she became a tall young lady with very large breasts. I guess I shamed flat chested women by encouraging her to be proud of her body. When I started developing, I was horrified. I wore a sweatshirt to school for an entire year. There was no way I was going to pass this on to her. So I told her to be proud of her bust and butt and naturally blonde hair.
I refuse to accept that I’ve shamed skinny, curveless, non-blonde women. It’s ridiculous and really reaching to even suggest it. And I’ll add it’s extremely difficult to raise a voluptuous young teen. They’re leered at constantly, and it’s always a trade off to balance teaching modesty with self-acceptance.
Yup. She’s talking about how she relates to her body and how she tries to get her daughter to love and view her own body positively. That is her business. She is not talking about anyone else’s body and no one needs to take it personally.
I totally agree. And, we can’t ignore that thinness is still privileged in our society, regardless of the Pinocchio butt trend, so there needs to be a bit of extra affirmation sometimes. She isn’t body shaming others as much as affirming her daughter.
Aren’t we lucky that we’re healthy…. There, that would have been a better message.
Why? They can also be proud of their curves. The only thing she should also mention is that skinny bodys without curves are beautiful too.
Healthy and strong.
I do agree that if she said that they can love their curves while others can love their body types as well, it would have been okay what she said. But she unfortunately didn’t.
Aren’t we lucky that we can be so much more than what we look like? Aren’t we lucky that looks are not everything? THAT is the message i am giving my daughter.
That’s all well and good, but kids (and most people) WILL worry about their looks at some point. Brushing the issue under the rug and saying “looks aren’t everything” isn’t gonna help your kid feel any better (even though it’s true!)
That was my mother’s approach. It did f*ck-all once I hit middle school. I would have loved to hear positive affirmations from her at that age. Not only was I starting to become aware of society’s expectations for my looks, but I was also getting bullied at school because I didn’t fit those expectations. The only things I ever heard about my appearance were negative.
I think the best message would be to show her daughter that other things in life matter, by taking her somewhere to see, experience and learn interesting things without a care for what she looks like instead of standing in front of a mirror and talking about their butts….
Yeah, it would.
But, girls think about their bodies and have to deal with others talking about them. When my niece says the kids at school make fun of her for having no butt and a fat stomach, telling her to think positively about her trip to Europe isn’t going to help. How kids think about their bodies matter.
I completely agree with you, Redd. I always cringe whenever I see comments like qwerty’s because that was my mother’s mentality. I can assure everyone that it just doesn’t work once the daughter hits puberty.
I’m with qwerty here. My parents never ever discussed body issues, and instead focused on what I consider to be more important things. They tried to instill a confidence in me that was more around my education, and the fact that I had virtually every opportunity possible if I worked hard enough. The body just isn’t that interesting when compared to a whole world of possibilities.
I agree TracySmiles & Francesca
I have 2 daughters and rather than focus on what our bodies looks like, I try to focus on what our bodies can do. Right now I am training for my first half marathon, and I say to them “Mommy ran 10 miles today” or “Let’s go and bike ride/swim/do yoga together”
I try to keep my focus away from how we look and on being active and healthy. Privately I am not this zen about my appearance but I don’t want my girls to inherit my obsession with the last 5lbs.
It’s clearly something that traumatised her as a kid. I felt terrible about my body and face as a child/teen and even though people will tell me I am attractive now, as an adult, I still don’t feel that because of that childhood insecurity about my looks. My insecurity didn’t come from other people though, it came from the media. I used to scrutinise my face in the mirror and wonder what the difference between my plain looks and the girls from Charlie’s Angels – er cheekbones. Who has cheekbones at 10?
“I was bullied at school. I was chubby, always had big feet the wrong shoes, bad hair. ”
Ha, I never thought that I would relate to Kate Winslet.
I felt just like her when I was in elementary school. I bullied back, though.
And I’m totally with you MooHoo: it’s so damn hard to get rid of this negative body image (no matter what triggered it).
And the ideal in western society is still being skinny. Look at all the models, at friends who are constantly on diets, at guys who only go for skinny etc.
curvy or skinny the most important is to be healthy.
Curvy is not opposite of skinny! Geez, what will overweight people adopt next to make it sound better? Curvy is about proportions of the body not about its weight!
Mary Alice,
I am fat. Happy now?
Signed,
A Curvy Fat Person
Ack. I’m about the same age as Kate. And when I was at school, being a perenially skinny rat, I, and others like me, were mocked for being skinny. I recall the ideal being boobs and bum, not rail thin. That might be because I was skinny so didn’t notice any fat mocking as it wasn’t directed at me. Or it might actually be the way it really was at the time, instead of the poor-me, narcissistic way Kate dresses up what is otherwise a good message.
Don’t know. Don’t care.
I think you are right, Kaiser. The real truth is that too many of us are downright mean and nasty to others. We should stop that and be kind. Then things would be better.
(I’m excepting my own brand of snark from that, of course, because a) I’m usually trying to be funny, and b) I’m almost certainly a raging hypocrite. Sigh @ me.)
I remember seeing Kate Winslet, many years ago & for the first time in a wonderful movie called Heavenly Creatures & immediately thinking she was going to be a major star. This indeed came to pass. She is always a true professional, highly watchable & interesting in her many varied roles. However, she is fairly representative of her middle class, thespian British background and despite her immediate, early success as an actress has never fit the Hollywood mould of being rail thin and has always fluctuated in weight. She is by her own admission a foodie from a foodie family, so one can understand that she might have unresolved issues with body image. It is a shame, as she is definitely a great character actress who will always work, regardless of her weight & shape.
I understand what Kate means…In a world where models look like twelve year old boys (and, this is not ususally natural, I’ve read the stories about models starving themselves and popping pills to stay super skinny) a curvier girl can feel dumpy…but I get what you are saying, too, kaiser…Kate should try to make her daughter feel good about herself, without seemingly saying, if your not curvy, your not beautiful. But most importantly, wouldn’t it be great, if Kate said, it doesn’t matter what size anyone is or what they look like, go to school, learn, learn, learn, be kind and help others, that is what makes a beautiful person. That is what is important, not what size you are!
but to your point.. every woman is not a model.. and every thin woman is not starving herself. They are not anorexic or trying to be a size 0. Some are naturally the way they are. I don’t like that all of a sudden any woman that is not curvy is not suspect and has to justify why she is thin. I see women of all shapes and sizes. And that is what the world is. Women of all shapes and sizes. Whatever size you are is right of for you if you are happy.
It has become the norm to shade women that are not curvy. Saying eat a sandwich or eat a burger. My nieces when they were young ate like men. Genetics said they would be tall and lean like their dad.. I guess I’m sick of the skinny shamming and negativity about women being lean.
I guess, the point I was trying to make is, letting girls know that what they look like, is not the most important thing. Your brain and your heart, are what is most important!
That’s why she’s not talking about skinny women or their bodies.
You get skinny shamed? Huh, I always get fat shamed. When my weight goes up, I always get are you sure you want to eat that? Etc, etc, oh this isn’t good for you. And I always felt like I wasn’t skinny enough for men and got rejected for it. In my experience, thin is in. Not curvy. In my experience, the richer the man, the skinnier they prefer their women. Maybe you can move to my area and I’ll move to yours! I was in heaven when I finally got down to a size 8 after working out and watching my diet like a maniac. It kills me when little petite women at work are like, omg, I’m up to size six, I’m so fat! I would much rather be skinny then have to fight my weight everyday. I wish women would just appreciate their natural body type, instead of trying to conform and torture themselves trying to be something they’re not.
I do see her point..when princess Kate is apparently raked over the coals when she’s not stick thin..maybe that filters down..but I DON’T like the idea of thanking a bully for being cruel..their intent was not to help but to belittle in order to inflate their own self worth at another’s expense.
Well my 14 yr old is very self conscious about her curvy butt and athletic build, even though she is very fit and strong, so teaching her to appreciate her shape is important. Rail thin still seems to be the magazine- ideal shape for some reason. So I definitely reinforce the “curves are fabulous” thing with her. And we talk about dressing to flatter your body- curvy girls look better in some styles than thin girls, and thin girls look better in some styles than curvy girls. Enjoy what you are, and be confident. What kills me are the 14 yr old boys who seem to love making comments about butt sizes- no wonder these girls are so self conscious about it. Catcalling in middle school- it’s crazy.
Oh, Kate … Do you really not get the ‘smug’ you have going on?
I used to love Kate, but she started losing me when she gave her Oscar acceptance speech and praised her fellow nominees by name–who were all seated in the front row–except for Angelina Jolie. She said, while looking at all of the nominees, “I ‘know’ I’m missing someone, but I just can’t think of who that is” or something similar. It just seemed a bit ‘mean-girlish’ to me because that was the year Jennifer Aniston showed up in her sausage dress with John Mayer on her arm to ‘present’ when both Angie and Brad had been nominated for Best Acting Oscars. I just started seeing Kate in a different light after that incident.
I used to like her, but in later years, she seems to… I don’t know, she seems mean-ish to me. I like her in several movies, and her tv series she did, but her personality in interviews, and in a way, her smug expressions when posing turn me off , maybe her face has hardened and cannot do anything about it.
I’d not pay to see her unless the movie got very very good reviews.
So that’s why Brad didn’t stand up and clap when she won! (until Angelina told him to, she mouthed “get up” and was clearly a bit embarrassed by his behavior).
I mean, if you’re talking directly to your 14 year old you have to be specific. Saying “love your body!” isn’t enough – WHAT do you love about your body? I’m not bothered by her telling her kid they’re lucky to be curvy.
I do think it’s important for moms to teach their daughters to love themselves and see the beauty in their bodies. At the same time, you have to do so without making your daughter feel as if she’s better than others because of her body type.
My momis very curvy and had trouble accepting it and being happy with herself. Of course, when I ended up being shaped the exact same way, I started to feel the same way she did. Especially since I had listened to her talk bad about herself for so long.
I get what Kate is trying to do here.. Just not sure if she’s going about it the right way or even if there IS a right way to do it.
Kate was called fat during her Titanic days. And maybe Mia was teased for not being super skinny ( which is still the ideal, let’s not pretend otherwise).
And if she has issues with body image since her childhiod, I get why she talks about them. These things stay with you forever.
100% agree.
Yes, that was the beginning of my dislike of James Cameron, who referred to her as “Kate Weighs-a-Lot.”
She is so beautiful. I bet her daughters are too. Like one of you said, curvy or thin, the most important thing is to be healthy and happy.
I think it’s fine to say be glad you’re curvy. Saying that is NOT the same as saying oh my god skinny people suck! People need to stop projecting so much every time anyone says anything.
But the way she’s phrasing it is that they are above everyone else. So if her daughter gets a growth spurt and ends up being tall and skinny, she’ll no longer be “lucky to have curves” and thus might feel bad about herself.
The same with if she gets a desk job and loses that fantastic butt they say they have.
There are better ways to build up self-esteem without making it “them or us” and shaming other body types.
Not really. All she’s saying is “we are lucky, we have nice looking bodies, one part of our body that looks nice is our curvy bottom.” She said absolutely zero negative things about other bodies, just emphasized what is good about her own daughter’s body and how she likes her own, similar body.
To be honest, I feel like this sort of sentiment is just as damaging as being negative. Either way, it places so much focus and importance on how you look.
I’m pretty average looking. Not ugly, but not pretty (at least not without significant effort) and definitely not beautiful. I’d never minded, and it never occurred to me that that might be a problem. I had other things going for me. But then when I was around 13-14, body image became the hot topic, and suddenly people were rushing to reassure me I was beautiful and pretty and perfect. I’m not, and I was fine with that.
It was like getting a D on a English paper and having everyone tell you you’re as talented as Shakespeare. Except that doesn’t happen, because it’s ok if you aren’t exceptionally smart, or a great athlete, or musician, or artist. But it’s not ok to be an unattractive or even just regular looking woman.
I know those people were just trying to make me feel good about myself, but it had the opposite effect. For the first time I realised just how much people valued beauty. Not just appreciated it, but valued it. That it was of such importance it was assumed anyone without it would feel worthless and need to be pandered and lied to.
I feel it’s far better to just accept that some people are better looking than others as a fact of life instead of reinforcing the idea that being anything less than a great beauty is soul destroying. Instead of telling everyone they’re beautiful, treat it like you would any other attribute. You wouldn’t tell your kid they were a mini David Beckham when they can’t even make contact with the ball, or tell them they have the voice of an angel when they’re tone deaf. Real beauty is a rare thing. Appreciate it when you see it and stop making it into something we all must have.
I love this post. Well said.
Good point. I don’t agree with everything, but I can relate to the compliments stuff. It hurts when someone says something just to make you feel good.
Nice post. I’m 58, and I feel so lucky to have grown up in a time when people didn’t focus quite so much on appearance as they do now. Don’t get me wrong, it was very much a part of the culture – women were expected to be pretty, and there were other damaging things, like women were expected to be “sweet” – but I never even thought about my weight or body type or anything like that. Girls didn’t taunt each other over how they looked, at least that I knew of. There was Twiggy, but nobody in my “real life” tried to be that skinny. It was unheard of to have plastic surgery except a “nose job” if you had a really, really bad nose. I’m not saying it was perfect, but things seem to have gotten so much worse as far as this eternal selfie taking ripping apart every feature of your face, contouring liposuction filler Botox madness. Where everyone is expected to achieve perfection in their looks instead of just accepting who you are on the outside and growing who you are on the inside. What happens to this generation when their looks start to fade? What inner resources do they have to fall back on? It’s revolting and sad.
It’s already happening. People from where I live are dying on the plastic surgery table, many of them are victim of false doctors, who see the opportunity to get easy money because the demand has never been so large.
Sorry… what? Is “58” a typo? (No, I’m not being sarcstic, and I apologise if it sounds like sarcasm.)
It sounds like a fairy tale from a long, long, long time ago.
Where did you grow up?
I’m only a few years younger than you (in my early fifties), and can’t remember any basic difference whatsoever in how women were perceived or indeed how they “judged” each other in the 1970s or 1980s.
Sure, fashions were different, and most mportantly, the internet wasn’t there to foster and propagate the worst of human instincts and ignorance, but that only means some phenomena were less visible on a global scale and less intense, not that they didn’t exist – and how!
(The late 1970s could be atrocious, especially for attractive young girls, because of the post-sex-revolution pressure to regard virginity as something ridiculous and sleep around, to put it bluntly. “Sweet” may have been likable in practice, but was certainly not something generally encouraged where I lived.
But I digress.)
I remember when I was eleven and twelve, my best “friend” and neighbours taunted me for having “fat” thighs (those same thighs that were later their envy, ha!) , having a “fat” nose (again, nothing wrong with my nose, but it wasn’t “fashionable” among them at that point).
I also remember joining in taunting another schoolmate for being very skinny.
(Yes, I am still ashamed of it, but that’s not the point.)
i remember myriads of cases of body-shaming! it was totally ordinary, just like it is today.
I grew up totally fixated on bodily image – as did most of my schoolmates and “friends”.
FWIW, am a European, grew up in South America and several European countries, because we moved a lot.
Regarding Kate Winslet, I think she is and somewhat smug disingenous – has been forever, IMO – and is teaching her daughter how to fixate on the body, instead of other things. Not a good idea, I think.
Yes!! Great post.
I disagree. Beauty is not rare; it is everywhere. She’s not telling her daughter “you’re so gorgeous and prettier than anyone else!” She’s saying what she likes about her own body in order to model self-love for her daughter. Liking the way you look just the way you are is not a bad thing.
But you can like the way you look without thinking you’re beautiful. I’m perfectly happy with how I look, even though how I look is not particularly attractive. I like my weird nose, I like my chunky thighs, I like my lopsided boobs. But I can like all that while knowing none of its beautiful. It doesn’t have to be one or the other.
When I was little I remember watching a beauty pageant and making negative comments about myself when my mom walked past and said, “You are beautiful as is. Mother Teresa is one of the most amazing women on this planet, and she would never win the contest you’re watching. Why don’t you try to follow that standard instead?” Always stuck with me, even thirty years later.
That’s something worth keeping. People would be much happier if they had this in their minds, me included.
Omg, perfect post. 😄
It’s true, but here’s another perception. I was very blonde, with very blue eyes, and told I was very pretty constantly. My other always knocked down my looks because she didn’t want me to be “vain.” And people always thought I was stupid. So by college, I figured out to dress down – actually I dressed very proper and preppy while my sister dressed much sexier. Most guys didn’t look at me twice anymore. Ok by me.
Now, I’m middle aged, fat and couldn’t give a d$mn. Looks are all BS, but we make it the most important thing about people.
“she was widely praised and applauded for both her beauty and her figure.”
No, she wasn’t.I was 19 when Heavenly Creatures hit the screens. I remember perfectly what was said, written.The general tone of the comments showed admiration for her talent but was rather brutal for her silhouette/figure, nasty remarks about her waist,thighs( regarding the scenes were the girls are in their underwear or bathing suits).
After Titanic, many people wondered why Cameron chose an ugly/fat girl to play the object of the affection of the hearthrob Di Caprio (implying they were in very different leagues in terms of physique).
She was praised for her talent but these praises were usually followed by “non classically beautiful”, “pretty in a common way”.
Not that it matters at the end. Beauty or figures are not what I value the most in actors.
As irritating as she is, I can’t believe they thought she was ugly in Titanic. She was one of the first celebrity women I had a crush on when it came out! I still wouldn’t call her looks common; in Rose’s first scene, when she’s all dressed up to board, she looks every bit the classic beauty.
I was too young to follow any kind of celebrity gossip when Titanic came out, and I never would have guessed. I loved the movie and thought she was very beautiful.
Her daughter’s age is so tricky. Of course she has to specifically praise her body type. She wants her to have a positive self image.
IIRC, Kate’s weight was always mentioned when she first started out. I think being called fat can stick with you forever. It is easier to brush off 100 complements than it is to forget one hurtful criticism.
Women can’t win at all. If we’re curvy, we feel the pressure to be skinny; if we’re skinny, we want to be curvy because “curves are womanly”. In my early teenage years, it was “the bigger, the better” about boobies, ass and thighs, so many of us were self-conscious about our looks. And people on tv and magazines saying that “men want something to grab” on an attempt to help heavier girls to feel better didn’t help at all. I think society doesn’t know how to enforce self-acceptance detached from what others think about you. And like someone said above, beauty is sickly overrated.
I agree it would be great if the world at large focused on what’s important instead of looks, etc- but it’s going to take a few more lifetimes, I’m afraid. I get what Kate is trying to do, bec I did the same- but the fact is, it is very rare for any tween/teen to feel confident in their physical appearence, period. It was an amazing moment for me when a year or so out of high school, the high school gorgeous girl ( and she truly was lovely) told me she hated to go to school everyday bec she felt so ugly compared to everyone else. Happily, she got to college and began to see herself in a better light. So we can certainly try to reinforce positive body images, but sometimes I think some of the body issue is hard-wired into the teen psyche.
I think it’s really hard to figure out what the right thing to say to children. We find out years after using a certain narrative that they took it other than intended (i.e. “Curves are better”) and when we try to change it, we send another unintended message. My kids are always saying back to me things I said that I had no idea was being interpreted the way it is.
Honestly I think the most important thing is to keep the dialogue open and listen to the children when they discuss these matters, listen to what they are saying.
It’s funny, my hairdresser and I just had this conversation last night-when we were young, Kate Moss and Gisele had the bodies everyone wanted-very thin or lean-and now everyone wants more of a butt and big boobs. We talked about how it’s just like things going in and out of style but god, it’s tough when you’re younger and trying to conform to whatever is “attractive” at the time. I’ve always been a thinner person and I’ll never forget a girl in school telling me her boyfriend thought I looked “disgusting” when she was projecting a bit about having curves. Kate could’ve worded this better, but I think her message was just love what you’ve got to her daughter because she knows first hand how criticized you can feel about your body as a young woman.
I think it was more that she was acting in the mid-90s, and her shape was out of fashion. I’m sure it did cost her jobs but it also got her into corsets.
I always told myself if I ever had a daughter, I would make sure that I did everything I could to make her a strong woman. That included teaching her to love her body , whatever shape she happened to have. When I was about 12, I started getting hips and boobs. My dance teacher told me I was getting fat, and my shape was “all wrong” for dance. I was devastated, and it was one of the reasons why I developed and eating disorder that I have battled for 30 years. So…maybe KW is annoying, but I’m glad that she is teaching her kid that all shapes are ok. Unlike say, Kris Jenner whose 17 yr old has had more plastic surgery than most 50 yr olds.
I get the feeling she’s projecting her body issues on her daughter. Or something. The use of “we” repeatedly in that statement seems off to me. Naval gazing maybe? Like she’s saying her daughter should be thankful that she looks like her? If she still has issues with her own figure (which given the industry she’s in she probably does) she can’t put that in her daughter. She’s the parent, not a best friend. I have no idea for sure obviously, but her obsession with looks is getting to be obnoxious.
+1. Good observations.
But unlucky to be so insufferable. She and Leo are two people whose personal lives I prefer to not think about past 1998. They’re just too annoying and disappointing.
Guys…its all right…but tell u one thing 4 u to remember “beauty never lasts”… Think about this, u always wish to have a very cool and curvy body for men to see us that way,then u get that wish,u get a very handsome guy,then…. U know , u get to marry that guy..then finally get pregnant AND loose that awesome shape..
Thx for reading~
These quotes are from an NBC show with Bear Grylls where he takes celebrities on adventures in the “wilds”. I know understand how context is everything and you really need to see the whole picture. You would understand the how of the comments above. I don’t think she was boasting but if you heard how she said it, it would cast a different shade. .She was on it a couple of nights ago. They were in the Snowdian(spelling?) mountains and did an overnight. She was quite the gal! As far as work goes, I don’t think she has had anything done. The show was natural light and she had a bit of mascara on but otherwise she looks her age. Beautiful but her age.
Well, to be fair, it has been decades since the hourglass was in favour, fashion-wise. The stick figure is still in fashion. Women with hips are NOT in style currently.
EHHH. Women with hips aren’t on runways, no. But in popular culture? The Kardashian look is trendy, as evidenced by any number of trends they’ve driven: contouring, inflated lips, butt implants, VOCAL FRYhahaha, and all the eyerolls.
I have a shape similar to Kates, and I was so ashamed of my body growing up. I get the idea behind not focusing on your child’s looks or body at all, it’s a very noble idea, and exactly what my mother did. Sadly all that did was reinfoce my thoughts that my body was something to be ashamed and embarrassed by, since my own mother couldn’t even bring herself to acknowlege that I was more curvy than other girls in my class… A logic I think would make perfect sense to most young teenagers. I think a well-rounded approach of complimenting your child’s positive attributes, both personality-wise and superficially, is perfectly OK in most circumstances.
i think there are valid points about body image and what helps and hurts all through this thread. but i especially like the comment from Nia about the fact that these are quotes without context, or intonation or inflection. I’m thrilled for the one person who had confidence to love herself even though she doesn’t consider herself beautiful and was happy with who she was from an early age. but aren’t we all just projecting our own feelings, securities or insecurities on to this woman and her daughter. do we know this is the only conversation they ever have about body image? why do we always think we are all experts even as we acknowledge our own insecurities and self-doubt. i also agree with the many posters who have said telling her to feel lucky and trying to help her daughter appreciate her curves doesn’t automatically imply that thin is bad. why can’t we all embrace a continuum of shapes. and for those who feel that curvy is in, remember that kardashian curvy also means you have a flat tummy along with big boobs and a big butt which is practically impossible to achieve without a genetic predisposition or costly outside help. kate curvy means accepting it all.
i am not above providing my own experience example. i know i’m not beautiful but i’m still hurt by a comment a friend made to me twenty-five years ago (i was thirteen) after i had spent some significant time trying to help her see how attractive she was. she said, “you know __________? (a boy in our class). you know how he’s not cute but he’s not ugly either? that’s what you’re like.”
i may have known i wasn’t pretty or conventionally pretty but i didn’t need to be told that way. this was a person who was a friend and who already knew my insecurities in the same way i knew hers. i don’t lie awake each night thinking about it, but i have certainly never ever forgotten it, and it sits at attention in the ball of insecurity lodged near my heart. certainly i wouldn’t believed her if she had laid it on and told me i was beautiful either but i am certainly attractive enough in my own peculiar way to have some people see beauty in me.
for myself, at first meeting, i’ve thought some people weren’t all that aesthetically pleasing, but as soon as they began talking and were interesting, they grew more physically attractive. sometimes it’s the opposite — i was so crazy about my college boyfriend that i didn’t notice he had acne until four months into our relationship when the honeymoon glow started to wear off. Sometimes it’s that I think people aren’t attractive with a resting face but come gorgeously alive when they are talking. or the opposite. bottom line, our culture values appearance highly and it’s hard not to constantly assess and reassess yourself in the age of the digital selfie. i think it’s fine to try to help a young person embrace who they are, and as an actress kate has had plenty of those insensitive friend type comments to carry around with her, in addition to the opinions of all and sundry on the internet.
Kate Winslet – snap out of it and go for better roles!