… Tyra Banks is up there on my hero’s list. This whole recent brouhaha of her being told she’s fat and not hot anymore has blown my mind, but I’ve been chuffed at her responses.
“If I had a lower self-esteem, I would probably be starving myself right now. That’s exactly what is happening to other women all over this country,” the talk show host said. (You can watch what she said on her show’s website.)
She’s 5’10” and 161 lbs., which means she’s in the “normal” range for BMI. When she was doing the catwalk she was closer to 130 lbs., which is on the low end of the normal range. Tyra Banks is what a healthy, tall woman looks like, and if people think she’s fat, it’s only because our sense of what a normal healthy female body looks like is so fucked up. I really do believe that one of the reasons so many women are overweight in America (aside from all the driving and bad food) is that what’s considered attractive requires near-starvation. If we had healthier images of women’s bodies, that goal might seem a lot more attainable to people.
But the point is: I know I’d happily trade bodies with her, as would most women in America. As if most men would turn her down, too. Puh-leeze.