I’m pretty vain. Not about you or the guy down the street but I care a lot about how I look. I’d say my expectations for myself are likely more unrealistic than “what society expects of me”. I often wonder what makes me that way. I wasn’t abused as a child, I wasn’t bullied, and I didn’t have any other “triggers” that would make me focus on my appearance–other than the fact that I spent some time in my teen years a “bit” overweight. (No need for numbers here, they don’t matter now. It’s a thing of the past. I’ve also burned every picture from that era so don’t expect some lovely before and after creation.)

I played with Barbie, was a tennis player who loved the cute outfits and when I receive the Victoria’s Secret catalog in the mail, I still have about 3 minutes of unrealistic goal setting which usually ends with me heading to the gym.

This all has nothing to do with the societal movement to be thin or fit or whatever the trendy phrase is today. Playing with Barbie as a child did not incline me to believe a certain body type was “right” and I never believed that people on TV were what I was supposed to look like. That’s why the yearly outrage over the Victorias Secret fashion show makes me SO mad.

Maybe when we were all still in the dark about modest airbrushing, maybe when we shifted pant sizes make the former size 4 a size 2 to mess with women’s minds and maybe when Jane Fonda was the leader in fitness, I could understand the “pressure”. Maybe.

But now we know that magazines shape things up to make the models look better. (Sometimes they even airbrush limbs off on accident). Now we know that the average female is not going to look like something from Victoria’s Secret without working out 3 hours a day, every day, and eating minimally. And we know many guys who there who don’t even appreciate such a body type. We know all of this. And people are still very, very angry. You sound like feminists.

If you want to live your life making choices by whether or not a Victoria’s Secret model would do it, then that is your right. It is also your right to eat as you please, not exercise and deal with the ramifications of that. And every lifestyle in between.

My point here is that YOU are in control of YOU and a girl in lingerie shouldn’t irritate you, infuriate you or send you into a rant. If you’re comfortable with yourself, then it “ain’t no thang”. We claim that the media shouldn’t dictate aspects of our lives (political, monetary, etc.) What is the difference here? Why are people so intimidated by a company that historically portrays LINGERIE on skinny MODELS? You don’t have to watch it, you don’t have to buy it, and you don’t have to look like them.

For the record, if I looked like a Victoria’s Secret model…I’d walk around wearing wings, too.

But I don’t, so here’s me…all bundled up