I have one conspiracy theory that I believe in and it's not really a conspiracy, rather it's the way women are pitted against each other. It starts at the 1998 Emmy Awards where Calista Flockhart wore an open backed dress. Jennifer Anniston was interviewed on that red carpet and I remember her looking around and saying this "There are people here making me feel fat.". I do believe that Calista is naturally thin and the stress of being on tv caused her to lose even more weight. I also believe that on that red carpet an invisible gauntlet was thrown and picked up by a large number of working actresses. The previous year, Picture Perfect came out and Jennifer looks amazing in it but the following year, she was significantly thinner, all the actresses on Friends got thinner as the show went on. Sarah Michelle Geller got much thinner on Buffy after 1998, pretty much every young actress lost weight and was praised for it in the media. The early 2000's just fed off that and introduced a new level of fat shaming (which always existed, I remember when the actresses on The Facts of Life were called The Fats of Life and not understanding it because I thought they were the most beautiful girls I'd ever seen) that was exacerbated by tabloid tv and US Weekly and it's competitors. Actresses internalized this physique and it trickled down. There was a bit of backlash when the media decided to go after Calista that was not couched in any concern for her health but rather blaming a woman for other women's desire to look like her even if they had to hurt themselves to do it. If you have ever seen her 1999 interview with Connie Chung you know what I mean. It was the media patting itself on the back for usually fat shaming women by saying "Look! We pointed out that this one actress is too thin so we're doing a feminism now here's an ad for Nutrisystem (which Jennifer Anniston worked for when she just starting out)".
The best thing about the Bridget Jones book was that when she is at her lowest weight, she's also at her lowest point and deeply unhappy. The book doesn't highlight it but it's there if you are keeping track of her posted weight, I've never seen the film so I don't know if that is in it. A number on a scale didn't fix anything.
I have one conspiracy theory that I believe in and it's not really a conspiracy, rather it's the way women are pitted against each other. It starts at the 1998 Emmy Awards where Calista Flockhart wore an open backed dress. Jennifer Anniston was interviewed on that red carpet and I remember her looking around and saying this "There are people here making me feel fat.". I do believe that Calista is naturally thin and the stress of being on tv caused her to lose even more weight. I also believe that on that red carpet an invisible gauntlet was thrown and picked up by a large number of working actresses. The previous year, Picture Perfect came out and Jennifer looks amazing in it but the following year, she was significantly thinner, all the actresses on Friends got thinner as the show went on. Sarah Michelle Geller got much thinner on Buffy after 1998, pretty much every young actress lost weight and was praised for it in the media. The early 2000's just fed off that and introduced a new level of fat shaming (which always existed, I remember when the actresses on The Facts of Life were called The Fats of Life and not understanding it because I thought they were the most beautiful girls I'd ever seen) that was exacerbated by tabloid tv and US Weekly and it's competitors. Actresses internalized this physique and it trickled down. There was a bit of backlash when the media decided to go after Calista that was not couched in any concern for her health but rather blaming a woman for other women's desire to look like her even if they had to hurt themselves to do it. If you have ever seen her 1999 interview with Connie Chung you know what I mean. It was the media patting itself on the back for usually fat shaming women by saying "Look! We pointed out that this one actress is too thin so we're doing a feminism now here's an ad for Nutrisystem (which Jennifer Anniston worked for when she just starting out)".
The best thing about the Bridget Jones book was that when she is at her lowest weight, she's also at her lowest point and deeply unhappy. The book doesn't highlight it but it's there if you are keeping track of her posted weight, I've never seen the film so I don't know if that is in it. A number on a scale didn't fix anything.