when DID this becomer more attractive?!?! (pic.....i hope)

I've got room for all 8 of them ; )

but at the same time don't expect everyone on the internet to agree with you.

Yeah I guess that isn't something I really thought about because my intentions were not what some are making it out to be

I honestly don't think you are to blame :] I didn't see any bashinf in you post
The last 4 pages of "ewwwww skinny ewwww hisssssss" was the problem xD

Exactly.

It's bad enough that that there's tons of people who think my goals of being 16% body fat and muscular to be "ugly" and "un-feminine" but it doesn't help matters at all when they also think it's ugly to be lean even without the muscle mass being added.

If I wanted to look as plump-a-licious as Marilyn Monroe does in that picture, I wouldn't have come here. I had less body fat than that when I joined MFP.

Well that kinda makes me sad since my body is closest to Nicole's on that picture and I didn't starve myself to be thin I just always have been. Oh well, I am happy with who I am.

If anyone has a chance read a blog my sister wrote:
it's called "Tolerance for Skinny People Too"

http://revivingpollyann.blogspot.com/2012/01/tolerance-for-skinny-people-too.html - "its no better to go around saying, “You're unnaturally skinny!” and loading a thin person's plate up with extra food than it is to say to an overweight person, “Wow you are fat aren't you?” and steal their fork. Either way you are tearing the person down."

I couldn't agree more. At my smallest I was questioned all the time about if I was eating enough or that I looked like a waif. It really wasn't fair, it was just how my body was at the time. People are built differently and that is something people need to appreciate.

Yup! I'm smaller than usual right now because of a medication i'm on and everyone seems to have something to say about it. If I had packed on some pounds my friends wouldn't say "wow Rae you're getting chunky there, put down the fork!" but since my body is skinny apparently it's fair game.

To be honest, I think they're all beautiful, it's just a matter of perspective.
And as for the argument about Hollywood pressuring women to be thin and all, I think that only goes so far. The market as a whole has gone out of it's way to perfect and refine how all people look by using computer editing programs like Photoshop to make already beautiful people look even more beautiful. That's just how it is nowadays, but back then I'm sure it went on too. Women wore corsets, dieted, took pills... sounds pretty similar to what we do to ourselves nowadays, don't you think?

I don't know what you are talking about. All of those women are beautiful.

You should never shame any type of body. Even if they have a disorder (Which IMO none of them look that way, in fact a couple of them look rather fit!) pictures like that do nothing to help.

We should be bringing self confidence up in ever woman of every shape and size.

Agreed, very well said. This site is My FITNESS Pal. Not everyone is here to lose weight. If someone is here because they want to gain, a lot of you have just effectively told them you think they're disgusting. Something ugly is going on here but it's not the women in that photo.

Thank you.

I couldn't agree more. Pictures like this make me pretty sad to be honest, because shouldn't we be more worried about a person's health before their appearance? I think they all look absolutely great.

It's strange, because before I got in shape and lost the 60 pounds I did over the last year, I honestly thought it was completely unrealistic to look like the top row of women without starving myself or getting surgeries. It's not though, not at all. I'm closer to looking like that now than I ever have been in my life, and that is from the vigorous exercise routine I have kept up with for over 8 months, along with changing my eating habits.

I think most women who are "overweight" are under the delusion that "real" women are supposed to be voluptuous and curvy because the norm for women these days is that they ARE overweight. Being curvy doesn't necessarily mean you are overweight or "fat", and being thin doesn't necessarily mean you have an eating disorder or are "disgusting, gross, sick, etc". I also think that when I was younger, and before I gained a lot of the extra weight I did, I always thought I was fat even when I wasn't. I think the reason for that wasn't so much because of society or the media, but because I was what people call "skinny fat". I was not healthy, I was lazy, and I had no muscle tone. So no matter how much weight I lost, I still held onto that fat, flabby appearance.

I guess my point is, don't judge someone because of how they look. It's unfair and cruel. MFP is not meant for this type of trash talking, it is meant to support and help each other, whether you are here to gain weight, lose weight, or simply maintain a healthy lifestyle. I personally would relate better now with the top row of women, and I find it incredibly offensive what some of the people here are saying about their bodies. It's time for women to stop treating other women like pieces of meat on a rack to be bought / sold, objectifying them and passing judgement so brutally and in the same manner that they SCREAM about not wanting others to pass on them!!!

It's strange, because before I got in shape and lost the 60 pounds I did over the last year, I honestly thought it was completely unrealistic to look like the top row of women without starving myself or getting surgeries. It's not though, not at all. I'm closer to looking like that now than I ever have been in my life, and that is from the vigorous exercise routine I have kept up with for over 8 months, along with changing my eating habits.

I think most women who are "overweight" are under the delusion that "real" women are supposed to be voluptuous and curvy because the norm for women these days is that they ARE overweight. Being curvy doesn't necessarily mean you are overweight or "fat", and being thin doesn't necessarily mean you have an eating disorder or are "disgusting, gross, sick, etc". I also think that when I was younger, and before I gained a lot of the extra weight I did, I always thought I was fat even when I wasn't. I think the reason for that wasn't so much because of society or the media, but because I was what people call "skinny fat". I was not healthy, I was lazy, and I had no muscle tone. So no matter how much weight I lost, I still held onto that fat, flabby appearance.

I guess my point is, don't judge someone because of how they look. It's unfair and cruel. MFP is not meant for this type of trash talking, it is meant to support and help each other, whether you are here to gain weight, lose weight, or simply maintain a healthy lifestyle. I personally would relate better now with the top row of women, and I find it incredibly offensive what some of the people here are saying about their bodies. It's time for women to stop treating other women like pieces of meat on a rack to be bought / sold, objectifying them and passing judgement so brutally and in the same manner that they SCREAM about not wanting others to pass on them!!!

AGREE!!!!!

The funny thing is, I read an interview with Kiera Knightley a few years ago and all I remember from it was that she talked about how much she hated her body because she had no curves. I actually felt really bad about it, because she is a beauitful woman. Of course, I would never in a million years have her body type, because my body isn't shaped that way. If I were in perfect shape, Kiera probably would have said she was jealous of my body.

The point is, everyone is different. Sure, I can look at a picture like that and think, wow, those top row women aren't my ideal, but somebody else could look at the same picture and think they look amazing. We're all our own worst critics, which is why I think this picture created such an inflammatory response. This entire thread is just evidence of our own self confidence issues.

Real women have skin on them. How's that?

Very true! The top row look awful in my opinion, all the men I know like real curves! :happy:

^AGAIN with this crap. "real" curves? the girls on top are fit & still have hourglass shapes. Well I guess men will never find me attractive since I'm 'thin'. Oh wait at work (I'm a dancer) & my husband at home always comment on my butt & hips and small waist and being 'curvy' So you can definilty be 'thin' and curvy. You don't have to be overweight to be curvy. This thread is very insulting to thin people. How would overweight people feel if someone posted a picture of 4 obese women and 4 fit women and said "eww since when is fat okay?" People would throw a fit! its no different.

Exactly!!
You don't have to be "big" to be curvy. If you have a decent waist-booty/hip ratio - you're curvy! Whether you're a size 1 or a size 12.

j

Honestly, different women have different body types, metabolism, fitness level, and goals. So we look different. And shocker, different men have different preferences as well. Some like thin women, ever with or without muscle definition showing. Some like a more 'average' size body, again either with or without muscle showing. Some actually prefer women that are a little overweight, some prefer women that are very overweight. Some like big boobs, some just want a handful, some want a small tight butt while others want a big booty, some want blondes and others want brunettes or redheads, etc. Nobody can say what men 'really' like b/c there are just as many preferences out there as there are body types to match with them.

Just to put all your minds to rest, ladies, all of the women in the original post are attractive - at least to me, and I suspect to quite a lot of other men as well. Imagine a scale of 1 - 10, with 1 being anorexic and 10 being morbidly obese. In my opinion, the only physically unattractive numbers there would be 1, 2, 9 and 10. That is not to say people in these ranges can't be attractive overall, but that those bodyweights do not appeal to ME.

Everyone has a different opinion, and the balance on this scale seems to have slid more to 1, and away from 10.

As to the matter of curviness - to me a curvy woman is someone with a pronounced bum against her back and thighs, breasts with a good shape and a waist that is defined from her hips. Other people have different opinions of this, but fat does not equal curvy.

It never did. If you want to know what's attractive to heterosexual men, why would you look to WOMEN's fashion magazines? Instead, look to p0rn-- watch lots of it-- there's LOTS of body-type variation, which should suggest that men are attracted to women of VARIED body types.

i think the older pics are hotter of those women. how do i get the pic to put that on facebook?

I'm totally in support of the more curvy women [Marilyn is my idol!] but there's also no reason that someone who is naturally thin needs to be called unattractive...I know plenty of naturally thin females who have tried to gain weight & just can't. So them being called unattractive because of their thinness is kind of the same as calling a larger woman unattractive because of her higher weight...Just sayin'