NEED FOR BODY POSITIVITY

 


NEED FORBODY POSITIVITY

 

Seeking beautiful, fair, homely girl for educated khatri boy…

Suitable match for very beautiful, slim, fair Christian girl…

Match required for Hindu boy, very handsome and fair…

These are some of the matrimonial ads from leading newspapers and matrimonial sites. Being slim and fair are considered the markers of ideal femininity and tall, dark and handsome forms the masculine equivalent. These are rigid ideas, created by the society, that box up and strictly limit the notion of how a man or a woman should be. These notions are perpetuated over the centuries, generations after through social institutions such as educational centres, family and mass media. We all have grown up not just listening but internalising aspects of how our bodies should be- muscular/lean, fair/dark, etc.

Films and TV commercials advertise these notions, playing upon the conventions of society in order to sell their products- from fairness creams to powders promising you those bulging muscular arms, they have it all.


What a young child or a conscious teenager misses out is the artificiality of the screen. What is being sold are unrealistic outcomes merely for the sake of marketing. Leading Bollywood actress Sonam Kapoor in a social media post a few years back went bare and revealed that she does not wake up with a naturally perfect skin, showing off her pigmentation and organicity with pride and admitted that it takes a village to supposedly ‘fix’ those ‘imperfections’, since that’s how they are addressed. Actress Kangana Ranaut also has gone on record to never endorse fairness creams.

Body shaming results in extreme self-consciousness and low self-esteem. It doesn’t allow people to embrace their organic self as well as makes them ignore their other qualities, as if looks are all that matters.  Children are often bullied based on their physical appearance which results in low confidence and at times acute psychological trauma.

Weight, height, skin tone are mere characteristics and not the essence of who we are. The society needs to be more sensitive towards this issue. Starting from basic family units to schools, universities and international organisations- all need to be made aware and sensitised towards ill effects of body shaming, and should aim at creating a more accepting and a more positive society.


 

By Hetika Kathuria

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