This has really pushed my button!

Why do you need the media to tell you how to be healthy or what sort of body you should have? We have a million different resources where we can go to see what a REAL healthy body looks like. All we can do is teach our kids, or ourselves if need be, that those photoshopped pictures are basically cartoons and unrealistic. It's something each person has to come to terms with on realizing that those are FAKE images and FAKE people. Ignore it if you don't like it, but it's there. I see more and more NEW images showing the anorexic models next to REAL people and people know that the real people look soo much better. Who wants to look like skeletor??? Not I.

It's interesting how the more they push these images at me the more I find myself disliking skinny... and then I feel bad because all body types should be appreciated. *sigh*

I am not a "fat acceptance" kind of person, but this is going too far.

I hate it how advertising is pushing the boundaries of what we are to consider beautiful human body with "photoshop gone too far approach".

What I don't understand is why people would choose to let someone else dictate their preferences to them.

Because when it's around you all the time and it's held up as a model of beauty and fashion, it's hard not to let it affect the way you feel about yourself even if you are close to conforming to the model. It's constant.

And look at the effect it's having on young people, male and female; puberty is the very age they shouldn't be dieting and should be letting their body find its own natural size, and it's the time they start getting really neurotic about body fat, partly because they are finding their own style and identity and end up trying to look like the trendy models in the pics. You grow up with that around you and it's bound to have an effect.

It is interesting how as the nation gets fatter and fatter, the images on ads become more and more skinny and unrealistic.

I have often marveled at this same phenomena myself.

To those claiming to simply not choose it - that doesn't come easy as a child, when your brain isn't yet able to form critical thinking skills, and you are bombarded with it growing up. It actually takes UNlearning, as opposed to learning, to reverse the images and ideas in your head.

Media affects us. Anyone who says otherwise is dismissing the idea of culture (to which we are saturated in from birth to death.) No one exists in a vacuum.

Realization is the key to a present state of mind that allows the clutter of media to dissipate

It's culture is by design and not to be taken for face value, so to speak. In my opinion the more fat society gets the more negative emotions such as stress, shame, guilt, depression, insecurity and body dissatisfaction is going to happen.

Funny how you make clear you're not one of THOSE PEOPLE who accept and love their fat bodies.

This probably isn't the response you wanted, but that's a gorgeous picture. Is the model unhealthily skinny? Oh god yes. But you can't deny that the dress looks fabulous on her, that the shot is showing off all her best features, and even her little nude flats are adorable. Fashion boils down to any other art form-- the ultimate achievement is creating something pleasing to the eye. And I would say this is very pleasing. Do I wish there were more "curvy" fashion models? Yes, but I have long come to accept the fact that NOBODY, regardless of body size, will look as good as these models do all glammed up. It's called: hair and makeup, extensive training, and expert photographers and photo editors. I'm sure even this girl can look frumpy and not attractive when not on camera...

Because when it's around you all the time and it's held up as a model of beauty and fashion, it's hard not to let it affect the way you feel about yourself even if you are close to conforming to the model. It's constant.

But it isn't around me all the time, or even a little of the time. This is the first (and I'm sure only) time I've ever seen this picture or this person.

Also this idea that whatever is put in magazines (or wherever this was) becomes accepted as attractive, I'm not buying it. If the 'norm' of the ads became totally out of shape people with raggedy dirty ripped up clothes, rats nest hair, missing teeth, etc etc it would not suddenly become a new standard of beauty.

I like it. She looks pretty.

It is interesting as far as advertisement goes... but her head is as wide as her waist...

I really don't see what the big deal is. It's just exagerated proportions and angles.

I do object to the shoes though. I find them ugly.

This could do with some context.
That dress is part of a Mad Men 60s inspired collection and in the 60s, the Twiggy bodytype was high fashion. This campaign is in keeping and some people *are* just that thin.

I agree that there should be a broad range of shapes advertising fashion, but that shouldn't exclude the skinnies.

I get what you're saying, but the thing is Coco Rocha really IS that thin, I've seen her in person.

I'm sure that picture is photoshopped, but she actually is a very small woman. Just thought I'd throw that out there.

^^^ this. Her arms look like they've been photoshopped (either that or she has really skinny forearms, if it was me I'd start doing wrist curls to counteract that) - however her legs have a nice shape and she has nice calves. She clearly is tall with a small frame, and she doesn't look unhealthy. She looks like a tall, small framed person with a low-ish body fat percentage, she doesn't look starved (if she was starving herself she would not have shapely calves, she'd have wasted looking legs)

The issue I have with supermodels and the message being put "out there" to kids, is that the supermodel look is only achievable by those who are tall with small frames. However, when you look at fitness models and female athletes, they come in all heights and frame sizes, and also different sports can attract different body types, e.g. the front row players of a rugby team have a very different body type to a gymnast, but both are really strong.

I don't think we can really change how the fashion industry is, tall, small framed people make good fashion models because of the way clothes hang on them and how they look on the catwalk, in photos etc. It's not like there's a conspiracy against short, large framed people.... but when it comes to role models, then I'd much rather my girls look to female athletes or fitness models for how they want to look (and more importantly, what they can do), not fashion models. The older one has a fairly slender build (takes after her dad, tall and medium framed), but the younger one takes after me and is short and has inherited my large rib cage. I don't want them to start aspiring towards looks that are unachievable, I want them striving towards being strong, fit and healthy, and looking good because they're strong fit and healthy, not because they achieved some desired "look" from a magazine or fashion show. And yes as a parent I'm going to do what I can to steer them in that direction.