Marie Claire

Australia's Marie Claire put a celeb on their new cover...untouched. I think this was brave of them since we all complain how they shouldn't be airbrushing celebs. However, they are still getting backlash because they did not put someone's mom or their next door neighbor on the cover to represent real women. Yes, this might have been a good move, but they finally give us a celeb without retouching and we still complain. Though it was a small step it was still a step in the right direction. The magazines that sell are the ones with celebs on it, so I don't blame them for not putting a regular person on the cover. Yes, the celeb is beautiful and still skinny by average standards, but she has cellulite and while some might say that everyone does...that is exactly the point! We rip celebs to shred for being fat and having cellulite, but they are saying take a look in the mirror...we are just like you and what you see in movies and pictures are not really us. They have a team and airbrushing to make them overly beautiful. So quit bitching and either take them as they are or an unrealistic version of themselves. Doesn't matter which, but we can't have it both ways.

Fatties Begone!

So since alopecia has a lot to do with self-image and struggling with what others think about you...I'm going write about another article about looks. Lemondrop.com posted an article about the dating site beautifulpeople.com. If you haven't heard of the dating site it is exactly as the name implies...beautiful people allowed only. In fact, they follow this philosophy so strictly that if you have gained any weight over the holidays you get kicked off the site. This is if you are accepted in the first place by members voting if you are hot enough to join. If you go to the site, it shows two happy, attractive people looking seductively at you. I did not want to join, but check out the members who deem themselves attractive enough to join beautifulpeople.com and see if the site caters only to the Vegas type...you know the tacky button-ups with gel hair and big muscles or the tan, fake boob platinum blondes. Now, by all means if this is your type and you think you are hot because hotornot.com deemed you a 9.4, then join the exclusive site. What I found funny was that if you wanted to even browse the members as a guest, the question above the link is "Too ugly to join?". Then instead of taking you to a search page, it politely tells you in many languages that the site is so exclusive that is has received high volume of media attention and you still are not good enough to even look at the members. I'm not angry at the site as it does lay out its superficiality upfront, but it is humorous. Let me know what you think!

Here is the article, "Beautiful People Dating Site Cleanses Itself of Fatties," by lemondrop.com:
http://www.lemondrop.com/2010/01/05/beautifulpeople-com-hating-on-fatties/?icid=mainmaindl3link4http%3A%2F%2Fwww.lemondrop.com%2F2010%2F01%2F05%2Fbeautifulpeople-com-hating-on-fatties%2F

SORRY!

So sorry to those who have been reading my blog and I haven't posted any new ones! Holidays were upon us and I did warn you about me trying to keep up with this! I get my wigs at a small place in Destin, FL and I got a darker do while I was down there for Christmas. I love it and I think going darker was the right choice. Tell me what you think!

Lady Gaga

Lady Gaga recently made a comment that she rather be interesting than beautiful. That is a pretty brave statement for a girl in her early 20s, and as we can see she follows through with her motto. She could be beautiful, but daringly steps outside wearing lace and leotards. It makes me think of this one woman my mother told me about one time. She was an elementary school teacher with alopecia and every year she told her class why she had no hair. She would wear wigs that were pink and purple and short and long. She had no concern of being beautiful, but prefered to be interesting. Being a 23-year-old with no boyfriend and still caring about what I look like...well I prefer to be beautiul than interesting. Maybe I'm a coward, but I do admire those who can throw away the ideas of normalcy and embrace their individuality fully while showing it off to the world. Perhaps one day I can be outwardly beautiful AND interesting...

Backwards Beauty

I've been wanting to write about these travesties for awhile now, and while this particular post might seem to sway from my intended topic about alopecia, it is actually getting to the root (pun intended) of why alopecians struggle with their disease: self-image and what society considers normal. Normal is a vague interpretation by one or a collection of individuals. It is different in every society and the only thing normal about families, are that each is abnormal. However, the fashion/beauty world likes to twist the minds of young women to think what should be normal. A small minority of people who have no idea what normal is if it smacked them in their pompous, botox-injected faces.
Ralph Lauren made headlines recently when they distorted a pictured of model Filippa Hamilton (a young girl of only 23 and a size 4) into a double zero model in need of a serious cheesburger. Then they fired her, for what she claims as being too fat for their label. Ralph Lauren of course denies it, but are her accusations really unfounded? The fashion and media industry have been pushing for thin since Twiggy, causing a multitude of unhealthy eating disorders, so girls can look like "perfection." Tabloids are the worst in scrutinizing celebrities about their weight, calling them fat one day and then too skinny the next, accusing them of eating disorders and drug problems. For fashion though no one is too skinny for them, and as designer Karl Lagerfeld insists "No one wants to see curvy women" in reaction to Brigette magazine's decision to only feature "ordinary, realistic" women in its spreads. He also called us realistic women "fat mummies" who don't like to be reminded of our weight issues. Sweet, isn't he? Unfortunately, Mr. Lagerfeld is right in that no one over a size 2 will be walking down the runway in high fashion, unless you want to be deemed the "plus-sized" model. With the average American woman as a size 10-14, albeit some of it is due to the obesity epidemic, average equals normal. Even Barbie, who has gotten a lot of flack for being too perfect and detrimental to self-image, has finally been criticized negatively for her body by *gasp* shoe label Louboutin, claiming her arches are too fat. Well, if Barbie is going to be deemed as the doll with cankels on the next People magazine, what hope is left for the rest of us "realistic" women? Plus, men's primal instinct is to desire women with wider hips because they are supposed to have healthier babies. So eat up women, healthily of course!
In the Hungary the idea of beauty is getting even more distorted. The country has recently crowned its Miss Plastic 2009! A beauty contest, with girls that had nothing done less than a boob and nose job, was held to promote plastic surgery. Plastic surgery in Hungary used to have a stigma against it, and is finally seeing the light into obtaining perfection. Forget that it is serious surgery...let's all get a boob job and forget about those pesky dangers! Why settle for that cute, button nose you were born with when you can have Angelina Jolie's!? You don't see Bernini and Michaelangelo sculptures and paintings as stick thin figures with double Ds because curves and realistic breasts were and still are considered beautiful! How are women supposed to feel good about their natural beauty when you have jackasses saying "...it's time for Hungarian women to care about their appearance. They are the most beautiful in Europe."? If they are so beautiful, then why do they need plastic surgery? Isn't he essentially saying they are only caring about their appearance and can only be beautiful if they have plastic surgery? I think I'm going to schedule for an expensive teeth whitening tomorrow just so I can show men I care about my appearance...kiss my ass Hungary.
The reason why I bring these articles up is because of the serious affect it has on what people view as normal and as beautiful in today's society. Young women all over the world are being forced to fit into these seemingly perfect molds, but we are letting the minority askew what really is normal. Natural beauty and a natural body is not a bad thing, and I thank the few that have taken a stand in the fashion/beauty world to promote that message, but we still have a long way to go. As for me, I skip over the magazine articles that describe how to get the luxurious, silky locks and wish I could do all the neat hairstyles they feature. I struggle with my own idea of beauty because normal is having hair while bald is never "in." I can no sooner strut into a room without my wig as a chubby 14-year-old girl tries to feel like a model in skinny jeans. Yes, I have my own long way to go on self-image, but couldn't the media make it a little easier on us?

True Life

I just finished watching True Life: The True Adventures Of. It was a very compelling collection of behind the scenes compiled into one True Life episode. The producers talk about the situations these young kids had to face and how real it was to portray them in these episodes to the world. In my own words with my blog I am allowing anyone and everyone to see how I live with alopecia. I am not being broadcast on international television and sifting through blogs on the internet might be like finding me as the needle in the haystack, but I am opening up to whomever wants to read my story. Check out the True Life episode on MTV.com. It was really interesting to see what the producers thought of their subjects.

Concierge Concerns

So, I found this quite amusing. I was out one night with some people from my building and we ran into one of our concierges. He is a very nice person who takes his job seriously and always shows his concern for the tenants. Well, he asked me about my wig and was worried that I had cancer, and if there was anything my building could do they would be happy to help, as there were others in the building with cancer. I live with my dad right now, but I travel a lot for work and my concierge thought I was flying in for treatments. Not that cancer is amusing, but I do get this type of reaction a lot from those who do not know me, but know I wear wigs. When I was little, my mother told me that a man came up to her and offered his support since we were new in town and mentioned that his child also had cancer. My mother embarrasingly had to tell him that her daughter was not dying, but she felt horrible that his was. I hold some guilt about this dilemma, because having alopecia is very hard and traumatizing, and yes I have my illnesses because of it, but I am not dying. Do I have a right to be upset about living with a non-deadly skin condition when others who look like me are fighting for their lives?