Thanks to Bean for making me watch this: The Tyra Banks Show in which she responded to the tabloids complaining that she’s gotten fat. I’m not sure I even knew who Tyra Banks was two weeks ago, but now I’m a fan.
Bank’s opening speech — which she delivered in front of a monitor displaying the “unflattering” swimsuit photo the tabloids all published, wearing the same swimsuit she wore in the photo — is stunning, smart, and justifiably angry. (And also displays a degree of body confidence I simply cannot imagine possessing).
Here’s a link to the youtube video of her speech, and here’s a transcript of an interview Banks gave to Larry King.
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Hi! I am not responding to this post at the moment, but wanted to mention that several responses I made to other posts last night seem to have disappeared. Could you perhaps check the filters? Thanks.
In response to this one: Wow.
I have heard of stories where the lie-about-weight thing gets expected to the point where women who list their actual weight on their DL are accused of having a fake card. It’s wonderful to hear the things she has to say, and also to see someone who is obviously in the “thin” category who is willing to say: yes, I’m 150-160 lbs.
I don’t know, I have mixed feelings on the issue. On one hand, yes, it’s great that she’s coming out in favor of a more realistic body image. On the other, she’s saying “kiss my fat ass”, which, I mean… Tyra, your ass isn’t fat. You’re, what, a size 10-12?
But perhaps I’ve just been sour on her ever since she donned the fat suit in one of her earlier episodes and went “undercover” as a fat woman. Which made her, you know, understand fat oppression. Obviously.
This is probably egregiously sexist of me, but I gotta say it: you lack-of-confidence is well-founded in this instance.
You would look ridiculous wearing that swimsuit.
Daran, who are you and what gave you the idea you could disparage someone who posted on this site?
Sheana,
Watching that clip, especially in the context of the show, I think she wasn’t calling her ass fat, but saying that people who thought there was something wrong with it could kiss her ass.
AJ, you’re so right, I don’t think people really know what real women weigh. Any woman who looks attractive must weigh 120 pounds, whether she’s wiry or curvy or tall or short.
Okay, Ampersand was the poster of this thread. 99% of guys look ridiculous in women’s swimsuits, whatever their size. But, that’s beside the point entirely.
I watched the Tyra Banks video and I’m quite proud of her for saying what she did. Meanwhile, body confidense has very little to do with what one wears and how one actually looks, with or without clothing. Body confidense is a state of mind. And Tyra’s got truckloads of it. As far as Amp admiring her, and suffering by comparison…Amp, you’re the one who continues to post these confidense boosting posts, YOU deserve plenty of props yourself.
It’s true that Tyra isn’t fat. She’s probably at least 5’10”, maybe taller, so even if she is 160 pounds right now, that doesn’t make her fat. Compared to her modeling peers, however, she may be 20 – 30 pounds above average. This still doesn’t make her fat. Otherwise, she’s a taller than average woman, who is slim without being gaunt.
I’m fine with her saying “you can kiss my fat ass”, because she’s consistent in her claiming fat as fine through the whole video. If she were just saying trash to the people who were saying trash about her, and using the “fat ass” expression as a trash exit, I’d have a problem with it. But it’s clear she LOVES her fat ass.
She looks fabulous, of course. Healthy and snazzy and sexy. I hope she keeps it up. And her “fat ass” comment is funny and defiant.
I stopped in on her show before she gained weight, and frankly she looked like concentration camp survivor (as most models do), which I didn’t think was attractive. At least I couldn’t figure out why anyone would aspire to look like that. And being that skinny cannot be healthy in the long run.
Good for you, Tyra, keep up the good work, and don’t take any sass from anybody.
She was never considered a “skinny” model to begin with. Yes, she was much thinner than the average woman, but as far as the model world goes, she was considered “voluptuous” which is code for ” has hips and boobs like a woman, not a 12 year old boy with implants”. All the tabloid surrounding her seems to be about her gaining weight after retiring from the model world. Well, no shit. I’m sorry, is she expected to remain model skinny for the rest of her life? She doesnt have to maintain a certain standard any longer, why the fuck should she continue? And why the hell is someones weight news? Pretty sad that certain media outlets have to photoshop someone heavier just to sell magazines.
Yes, yes, yes. After I got sick and lost almost twenty pounds, I made some offhand remark about how it’s really cold at 115 pounds (it is!). My openly anorexic then-roommate said, “I thought you were already 115 pounds.”
I was like, noooo, but you’re giving me some real insight into your body issues…
And, Amp – what Eva said. There really can’t be too much of this kind of message, and I think that it’s important for it to be coming from both sexes.
Amp I’m sending you oodles of kisses for posting this. I have seen a few magazine covers with the “Fat Tyra” b.s. but I hadn’t seen what she had to say about it. I think it really called me to task on how I have not taken her seriously in the past because she was “a model”. She is truly a woman of substance. I think the next time I see her show on t.v., I’m going to stop and see what she’s talking about.
” has hips and boobs like a woman, not a 12 year old boy with implants”.
From my point of view, most of them look like 12-year old boys without implants.
Whats even worse is when regular men DO enjoy regular womens bodies, we cant even be happy with that or dont believe them (generally because they still drool over magazine babes and models) and that affects our relationships.
I’m 5’0 and weigh 130 lbs. I have curves and 38-28-37 measurements. There are days I see those curves and feel like a walking cow. Drives my BF nuts because I honestly dont believe him when he tells me he finds me sexy, but I see him looking at women who are 6’0 and 100 lbs and it just doesnt make sense.
5′ and 130# can be sexy, and so can 6′ and 100#. He’s just responding to “sexy” and has a broad range of body types that flip that switch for him. (Or he’s a huge liar, but most straight guys I talk with have a pretty broad range; I certainly do.)
In my experience – limited because I’m not a guy – men, as a group, are not too demanding about what women they “look” at, not to mention ogle. Pretty much the entire requirement is that (for heterosexuals) it be female, and for emotionally normal males, above the age of puberty. Period. That’s it. That’s enough.
pheeno, he’d “look” if she was 6′ tall and weighted 350 lb. Or if she were 4′ tall and weighed 70 pounds. Or whatever.
Past that basic position, most guys have a preferred “type” or “types”, and since you seem to be your BF’s most preferred type (he’s just “looking” at the 6′ stringbean, looking is not buying) then I’d say you’re in good shape. At least he thinks so.
Depends on what “looking” means. If he glances at them on the street or on TV, that’s one thing. If he disappears into the bathroom for an hour with a copy of Elle, I’d worry. Not knowing anything else about your BF, but speaking from my perspective of 54 years as a guy, if your BF says he thinks you’re sexy, he actually does think you’re sexy. The fact that he might occasionally look with interest at a woman who has a body type that’s the antithesis of yours doesn’t change that.
So there’s some free advice. It may be worth exactly what you’re paying for it, but that’s what I think, anyway.
No, he doesnt disappear with mags *L* but his preferred “type” for lack of a better word is more along the lines of Marilyn Monroe. At the same time, he also thinks Angelina Jolie is hot. And while I agree her face is, her body is a stick. Im more muscular (massage therapy tends to give you a nice toned body) so the 130 is mostly muscle weight. I KNOW Im not “fat” or even “chunky” but there’s this stigma to weight that doesnt exactly reflect health and when you’re saturated with severely underweight images of women, anything above it seems “fat”. The media is calling a supermodel fat for fucks sake. If a standard that most women cant even meet to begin with is no longer acceptable, that leaves you pretty well fucked. Most days I feel hot and I work it like I was a supermodel. Other days you hear about Tyra Banks being too heavy and if thats the definition of heavy, then fuck it. There’s no point.
I used to be bone thin but not by choice. My medical condition virtually eliminated my appetite which made it difficult to enjoy eating. About five years ago, I entered the normal range for women (I’m currently 5’5″ and 143 lbs). And to be honest, I get FAR MORE attention now than I did back then. I’m healthier now so my skin isn’t constantly dried out. I have more energy which means I’m not always looking lethargic and bored. My hair isn’t so brittle and lifeless anymore either. There’s a lot about being underweight that was simply not attractive even when I was as thin as many models are today. Sure, there are some seeming advantages to being thin but if you compare them to the advantages of being a healthy size, then it’s just not worth striving for, not even if your goal is to be as attractive as possible.
pheeno, take it from a former ‘professional’: men are really not as picky as women are led to believe they are.
Yes, I understand that, but Im more interested in the body image issue and the contradictive messages that leave women confused than I am mens personal preferences. He isnt telling me a size 7 is too big, *IM* telling myself that and it drowns out his voice. And the images and expectations the media and society as whole seem to agree with my inner evil voice of critisism.
I hadn’t seen the whole introduction, so thanks Amp for publishing it. I like how Tyra never states outright that the photo in question is obviously photo-shopped to make her look even chunkier, but it was certainly apparent. As a woman who as hips and thighs that look pretty much just like that notorious picture , I was pleased that she made a point of saying how sexy she finds it. Yeah, Tyra, my husband seems to find my booty just fine, too!
In the last year or so, I have lost about 35 lbs. Subsequently, I have gained back about 10 of those and seem to have settled at a weight my body and my appetite are happy with. A friend recently mentioned that she hoped I wouldn’t go back to my lowest weight, as she thought I looked “gaunt”. This “gaunt” look still included those same thighs that Tyra got slammed for. The fact is, no matter how much weight loss I might achieve by dieting, that booty ain’t gonna be gone. My “fat ass” is a part of who I am. And I gotta agree with Tyra: it is one hell of a sexy ass!
But the one time I was forced to watch the Tyra Banks show in a waiting room, the guests and Banks were all talking about tips to make you look better, and were definitely playing into the insidious “make women feel inadequate” fiction that the “beauty” product industry loves so much.
I mean, good for her for taking a stand, but let’s see her do some substantive, informative, non-judgmental shows about the real issues of body image and self-hatred that afflict so many women (and men for that matter).
What really got to me when I saw that picture on magazine covers at the grocery checkout was that almost every other magazine had an “OMG so-and-so has an eating disorder!” story on the front. Well, gee, whydya think?
I praise Tyra for taking a stand (also, I thank Amp for posting).
while getting an uneasy feeling from giving Tyra such lavish praise …she acts really compassionate, but she’s not a saint here:
The career of Tyra Banks (and others) is based on manipulating the insecurities of those who *actually fail to meet the standards personified by supermodels like Tyra Banks*.
Yeah, I’m not about to give Tyra TOO much credit. I mean, the woman wore super high heels with her bathing suit on the show, presumably to make her legs look thinner. So, if she’s completely OK with being “fat” (and I don’t think she’s fat–just curvy, and bigger than she was when she was modeling, which is fine), then she shouldn’t try and minimize her curvaceousness, b/c that sends a mixed message.
My sister is really really thin (naturally) and she has the same problem that “fat” people do (whatever the cultural values for ‘fat’ may be and however over the top they are) in that people have actually stopped her on the street and asked her if she had anorexia (this was when she was younger).
I am always amazed just at how caught up our society is in how people look. I used to live in Egypt and though girls there have issues about their weight and other issues I consider very damaging (use of skin lightening creams e.g.) there is just a lot less of this nasty commenting – by strangers – about whether the other person is too fat or too thin. (In fact the traditional Egyptian view about weight is that roundness is good and when I was considering that I was getting fat I was getting complimented by in-laws for filling out and becoming more attractive. But these were IN-LAWS not people on the damn STREET who minded their own bloody business.)
I also never heard of this model Tyra whatever before and saw her swimsuit picture in a checkout counter and thought well I would look even fatter in that and it just makes me go home and look for a drapery to wear.
“moving one way makes her look thin and moving another way makes her look fat.”
Yeah, but does she even LOOK fat in the tabloid photo? I’d say that if we’re calling that “fat” (i.e., near the upper end of the weight/size curve for women) then we’ve seriously lost track of what the average adult female body looks like.
That’s not fat, my friends, that’s average. And her appearance on the show, with leg-slimming high heels, complimentary camera angles et al, is slimmer than average.
For the sake of argument , let’s say she gained another 50 lbs more . So what ! I don’t see much here . If some people find her fat SO WHAT ! If she feels ok about herself who are others to make a fuss ? Does her weight reflect on her current job ?
I see no reason she should be held to the standards of a runway model when she doesn’t happen to be working at that job .
In the tabloid photo, she looks thin-to-average relative to the “woman” curve, and fat relative to the “model” curve, which overlap in only a few narrow places.
I can’t say whether the tabloid photo is photoshopped or not, but if it’s not, I think I see how the angle and pose caused her arm to overlap her waist in a way that makes the hourglass contour disappear. Not too difficult.
Thinking about it, and about the tabloid obsession with “OMG Celebrity gets fat!” stories, and “OMG Celebrity gets anorexia!” stories both, I think female readers of tabloids may buy up these things to console themselves about the difference between the “woman” curve and the “model” curve: the sort of ha-ha, fall-from-grace thing can be appealing when grace is something doled out to a very few people whose genetic predispositions one will never share.
I watched Tyra for a time when I was home on maternity leave, and although her show suffers from many of the usual flaws that other like shows do (sensationalizing topics, for instance), weight consciousness seems to have become an issue that she sincerely cares about. She hosted several shows highlighting the poor treatment of obese women in society and admitted her own prejudices about people who are overweight. In this light, I imagine that her response is informed not only by the fact that she is not even close to being overweight, but the fact that the attention paid to her weight and the weight of others is damaging to many people, not just herself. It not only reinforces an incredibly unrealistic ideal, but it proceeds from the assumption that it’s perfectly okay to critique someone — in public no less — out of the blue based on that so-called ideal.
i think what they said about you ios hecka mest up cause you aint fat an people can be crool sometimes. so i think tyra is telling the truth, because i honestly look up to her,she is my idol, i love her. so whoever put that on there should be ashamed because thats not funny. would you like it if someone did that to you?so thats all i have to say, and tyra if you do read this, which i hope you kdo,i wqant you to publish it beacause i really truly thinlk that was irresponsible and childesh,but you know what the funny thing is that i am only 13 years old! tyra i hope u feel better, because i think your an awesome person and who ever posted that picture must have been jealous beacuse she is beautiful. i love and totally respect you. love your number one fan, and friend! MEGAN