Thought this Letter to the Editor in The Australian today from Leanne Torres in response to my Jennifer Hawkins piece yesterday deserved reprinting:
IT’S wonderful, in theory, that a major women’s magazine is willing to admit its own “flaws” by publishing a picture of a woman whose body has been untouched by technology’s scalpel. However, like Melinda Tankard Reist (“Mags’ flawed obsession with the body perfect”, Commentary, 5/1) I too think the choice of Jennifer Hawkins as an example of a woman brave enough to bare her flaws is mind-boggling.
Putting an untouched nude picture of one of the world’s most beautiful women on the cover of Marie Claire with her so-called imperfections has not given me enlightenment but makes me want to avert my eyes so as not to feel any further shame for my imperfect form. If Marie Claire really wanted to inspire women, it would have found a more realistic mentor to champion the healthy perception of body image to young women. But that just wouldn’t be marketable now would it?
As a woman who has battled with her own self-esteem demons all her life, I now find a new challenge ahead of me as I raise my three-year-old girl to appreciate the body she was given and to carry with her the wisdom that the true beauty of a female lies deep within her imperfect skin.
