There are reports Victoria’s Secret may be planning to set up shop in Australia. As if we don’t already have enough companies spruiking their pornified and false idea of empowerment for women? This guest blog post by Lindsay and Lexie Kite, PhD students at the University of Utah, couldn’t be more timely. The 25-year-old Kite […]
Two young women dead thanks to the fetishisation of female body parts British woman Claudia Aderotimi was only 20 when she died last week after travelling to the US for a procedure to give her a bigger ‘booty’. She paid more than £1000 ($1600 AUD) for silicone injections to give her the look she thought […]
Who is really benefitting from this show? I’ve watched a couple of episodes of The Biggest Loser Families and find myself cringing at the extent of degradation and shaming. To see Sarah-Jayne begging through tears not to have to stand on the scales the first time, was harrowing. It was as though she was being led […]
How can you nourish something you hate? Collective Shout colleague and Managing Director of BodyMatters Australasia Lydia Turner has written an important piece for Healthy Weight Week highlighting the conflicts of interest in anti-obesity research. She urges a health-based, not weight based approach to health. This week marks the start of ‘Healthy Weight Week,’ brought to […]
Not satirising the culture. It is the culture Critics of the December-January French Vogue photo spread featuring little girls as mini women decorated in gaudy make up, swathed in luxurious adult women’s clothing, assembled on beds, fawning on animal skin rugs, pouting bright red moist lips under a banner ‘Cadeaux’ – little presents to be unwrapped – […]
Dear readers of my blog, I started writing this blog a year ago. In this time I’ve written about issues affecting women and girls, from body image, to eating disorders, to harmful cultural and media messages, to the objectification of women and sexualisation of girls in the media and popular culture. I’ve written about the […]
The latest category of women targeted for cutting “Your quest to be the perfect bride has ended. Your wedding will still go on, it just won’t be perfect”. In the latest in a long-line degrading reality shows which both generate then prey on female insecurity comes Bridalplasty, billed as “The only reality show where the […]
Girls’ Mag Watch: More Stereotyped and Limiting Messages for Girls This is the second installment of my review of magazines for girls and young women, published by Generation Next. For many girls, the magazines they read are their lifestyle bibles. How should they look, dress, act and relate? What’s important in life? Who should they look up […]
Nothing about the Witchery images recognises that children are anything other than miniaturised adults. The images invite you to ‘read’ the children as adults It’s always a pleasure to publish the work of Dr Emma Rush. A lecturer in ethics at Charles Sturt University, Emma is lead author of two significant reports on the sexualisation […]
The backlash against corporate exploitation of women “Women are frequently positioned very differently to men in media. Often shown as passive, vulnerable, scantily clad, headless, and sometimes dead…” Today a guest post from eating disorder prevention specialist and member of Collective Shout’s core team, Lydia Turner. It’s reprinted from the Fierce, Freethinking Fatties blog. In recent […]
Girls’ mag wrap September-October issues For many girls, the magazines they read are their lifestyle bibles. How should they look, dress, act and relate? What’s important in life? Who should they look up to? My analysis of the September and October issues of Girlfriend, Dolly, Girlpower, Totalgirl, Disney Girl and Little Angel shows that girls […]
Extreme Dolce & Gabanna photo shop exposed This image: Took two days to turn into this: The contrast is striking, highlighting once again how common is the false portray of cultural icons. It’s almost shocking to […]
