Sharing Young Women's Stories - Equality Rights Alliance

560 signatures!

2011-04-06T21:37:09+10:00

Thanks to you, 560 signatures have been sent to Minister Garrett to promote positive Body Image in just 10 weeks!

The campaign has now come to an official close and we would like to thank each and every one of you for your continued support. We also want to give a big shout out to all those working behind the scenes we thank you.

Missed out on signing the petition? No worries! Why not send him your own email.

Copy and paste the wording below and send it to Minister Garrett and email to Peter.Garrett.MP@aph.gov.au or post it to his address

The Hon Peter Garrett MP
Minister for School Education, Early Childhood and Youth
PO Box 6022
Parliament House
Canberra ACT 2600

Dear Minister Garrett,

Body Image matters for young women. Yet media, fashion and advertising industries continue to promote unrealistic and unhealthy images of women. This goes against the Voluntary Industry Code of Conduct for Body Image. To celebrate 100 years of International Women’s Day in 2011, I’m asking you as Minister for Youth to put the Code of Conduct into force. In the next 12 months, let’s secure 100 media, fashion and advertising agencies as compliant with the Code of Conduct. Let’s publicly promote these 100 agencies and let’s give young women a chance to see images of natural women with real beauty.

Sign your name and postcode then send it off.

400+ signatures!

2011-04-01T15:48:53+11:00

To date, over 400 people have signed the online petition to tell Minister Garrett, he needs to do more to promote positive Body Image!

You only have until Wednesday 6 April to sign the petition to fight negative Body Image.
Already signed? That’s great! Let’s see what else you can do:

Find just 5 people to share, sign and send the eCard.
Tweet, Facebook, blog, text, email about the campaign today.
Spread the word, anyway you can!

The more people we get to sign the petition, the more attention we’ll get.

Let’s work together to take action and be part of change today!

Motion on Body Image Passed!

2011-04-06T21:06:30+10:00

The motion on Body Image was passed yesterday!

On Wednesday 23 March, Senator Louise Pratt (WA, Australian Labor Party) and Senator Sarah Hanson-Young (Australian Greens) moved that the Senate:

a) acknowledges the Government’s continued commitment to improved media representation of women through the 2010 launch of the Voluntary industry code of conduct on body image (the code);

b) recognises that body image is an important health and wellbeing issue, as evidenced by research, including:

i) the recently released report, Australian Guides say … 2010: An insight into the minds of girls and young women in Australia today, which shows that 63 per cent of girls aged 10 to 14 years, and 75 per cent of those aged 18 to 30, believe that the media think the most important aspect of being a girl is to look ‘pretty and thin’ and that pressure to look good was listed by survey respondents as one of the top 10 worst things about being a girl,

ii) Mission Australia’s National survey of young Australians 2010: Key and emerging issues, which states that body image is the top personal concern among 11 to 24 year old Australians, a highly regarded survey which had 50 240 participants, with 53.9 per cent of the respondents being female,

iii) research published in 2000 by the Faculty of Health, Queensland University of Technology, which showed that anorexia nervosa is the third most common chronic illness after obesity and asthma for adolescent girls in Australia, and

iv) a report published in the Annual Review of Medicine, dated February 2010, which states that anorexia nervosa has the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric order with the death rate higher than that of major depression;

c) applauds the important work of Equality Rights Alliance, led by YWCA Australia, to promote and strengthen the code; and

d) notes that as Australia’s largest network of organisations advocating for women’s equality, women’s leadership and acknowledgement of the diversity of women, Equality Rights Alliance celebrated 100 years of International Women’s Day held on Tuesday, 8 March 2011, with ‘Sharing Young Women’s Stories’, a project to promote positive body image.

Question agreed to.

Source: The Senate Proof Body Image Speech [pdf]
Open Australia: Senate Debate – Body Image
Proof Issue: Hansard Tuesday, 22 March [pdf – page 22]

Campaign continues for another two weeks

2011-03-27T18:21:53+11:00

Due to an overwhelming response, we’ve decided to continue the online campaign to fight negative Body Image for another two weeks. Let’s keep send those eCards!

You now have until Wednesday 6 April to share, sign and send the eCard straight to Minister Garrett!

Also, thanks to your support over 100 have been sent to Minister Garrett. If you still haven’t sent one, send one today!

If you’re in Canberra and want to send a physical postcard, drop by at our office at:
Level 5, CPA Building
Hurry, as we only have a small stack left!

Be part of our Body Image campaign and let us know what you think.

Only 2 days to go!

2011-04-06T21:03:43+10:00

Our Body Image campaign is coming to a close! For the past eight weeks over 300 eCards have been sent straight to Minister Garrett to do more about promoting positive Body Image. Let’s see how many more we can send.

You have until Wednesday 23 March to sign the petition to promote positive Body Image

Already signed? Thank you! Let’s spread the word.
Can you find five people to sign and send an eCard to Minister Garrett?
The more we send, the more attention we’ll get!

What are your thoughts on the issue? Leave a comment and let us know!

How are you celebrating IWD?

2011-04-06T21:04:30+10:00

What an exciting week so far!

Here is a snapshot of the National Women’s Alliances fabulous International Women’s Day celebrations:

Representation and normalisation for love

2011-03-27T18:22:28+11:00

Why I blog about my outfits

Hello, I’m Natalie and I blog about my art, my body and my activism. It’s hard to describe what I do and what I talk about for a new audience because I’ve realised I have taken my own audience for granted up until now. So, to introduce here my activism for fat bodies and body image it feels quite overwhelming and scary. I’ll start at the beginning though – I am fat. When I say this to strangers they usually tell me, “oh but you’re not fat!” when in actuality I am fat. I have reclaimed the “f word” in a culture that has demonised it and the bodies it lives within. Western culture rewards bodies that fall into the norm, and so if you’re not the norm (most of us!) or if you’re not working towards the norm (by NOT dieting, NOT wearing “flattering clothes” or NOT being ashamed of our body) you fall into a category of person that is often ignored, insulted and patronised. It’s not just the media that does this, the practice of demonising bodies that aren’t typical follows us into our daily lives; when we go to the doctor for a cold and are admonished for being fat, when we go to lunch and feel ashamed about eating too much in public, or when we are with friends and talking about the ways in which we hate our bodies.

New media and fat activism.

In my part of the Internet, my blog operates within a space called the “fat-o-sphere”. Over the last 10 years as fat activism and size representation adapted to new media a whole new sphere was created by people demanding that their bodies be seen and their voices heard. We started by creating discussion forums and then branched out to blogs, first testifying to our experiences living in fat bodies and then realising that we could participate in fashion, an industry where fatness isn’t just made invisible but made vulgar, by demanding that designers and retailers cater to us too. On blogs we posted outfit photos, in one blow to normative body ideals we were styling ourselves in the garments we could find (that are so limited!) and in a second blow representing ourselves. Craving validation, representation and normalisation hundreds of new “fatshion” blogs have been created over the past few years and testify to the sheer number of people who are rejecting normative beauty and bodily ideals.

Bodies of all types exist in the world but we rarely see them represented in the media, and if they are they are used as caricatures. Two examples come to my mind readily: fat bodies are shorthand for greed and laziness, and disabled bodies are pitied and used as “inspiration” for able-bodied people. Very rarely do we see neutral representation bodies that fall outside the normative ideal; instead mostly white, able bodied, thin and cisgendered bodies have been normalised. This hurts us in so many ways, manipulating us into spending a lot of time and money in the pursuit of being a totally narrow version of “beautiful”. I propose that we are not flawed. Instead this definition is flawed. We should replace that narrow definition of beautiful with “normalised”. Thin, white, able-bodied and cisgendered bodies are normalised through mainstream media and thus our culture, alienating a whole population of people.

I’m a fatshionista.

So part of what I do on the Internet is take advantage of the fact that we, the people, can create and publish content. This content can be completely personalised and free of commercial constraints because blogs and social media can be developed at a relatively low cost. I’m not a TV network and I don’t need to care about appeasing advertisers or manipulating people into buying into what I’m selling by spending money on products that won’t necessarily work anyway. So what I do is post photos of myself to the Internet and I write about my body as a way of seeking representation, and maybe even normalisation.

Reclaiming fashion.

I write about body image and fashion because I want people to know that there are other alternatives to self hate and feeling ostracised. For years I had no idea I could buy clothes on the Internet, and I was stuck with the frankly awful offerings in Australian brick and mortar stories; it was by coming into contact with fat activism online that I found other avenues to fashion, self love and a supportive community. Bodies like mine usually don’t get to dress up in designer clothes. Instead of “supporting local designers” or collecting pieces from super designers, most of us buy our clothes off the internet from the “high street” stores. The funny thing is, bodies like mine would absolutely consume designer fare if it were made in our size. But it’s not so fat people remain in a position where they’re portrayed as unfashionable and unattractive, when being fashionable and attractive is rewarded! It’s so frustrating and circular; I’m baffled when people fail to see this cycle.

Personal style can be a way to illustrate your moods and your politics. The two can’t really be separated for me, and because I am fat I don’t get to pick and choose exactly what I want so my clothes and my style can sometimes be shocking to some people, especially if they’ve got a concrete idea of what fat women are supposed to look like. The clothes available to me in Australia aren’t terribly fashionable, nor are they couture-like in quality. This excludes a whole bunch of people from participating in feeling fashionable, and for lots it’s a point of shame and drives them to body minimising behaviours. For me though? It makes me feel political. I am angry that our capitalist society doesn’t want me to love my body or feel fashionable and I am angry that people are hurt and excluded by this mechanism.

It’s transformative!

Blogging, while more accessible than traditional mainstream media, isn’t perfect. There are still barriers to access for lots of people because literacy, technical proficiency, access to the Internet and a camera are required. Even then, setting up a blog can be a daunting prospect because it requires social networking with other bloggers to gain readers and although we are taught that success equals a large audience, I’d like to think that overcoming the multiple hurdles to even start blogging is success in itself. Having the guts to represent yourself and your body, publish your writing or post your photos publicly is pretty significant.

Poking your tongue out at normative ideals is a major thing and comes highly recommended by me. I’ve met hundreds of new people, learnt about so many things and come to a new place in peace with myself. In fact I feel so passionately about blogging, fatshion/ fashion and self representation that my husband and I provide at-cost hosting for new fat activism and fatshion blogs because we are fortunate enough to have the skills to be able to help people. (If you want to start a fatshion or fat activism blog and need help, please get in touch!) It’s a powerful thing to be a part of; I want more and more people to access this form of activism and investigate the hurtful ways in which our culture disenfranchises people who literally don’t fit in.

Here are some links to things I’m involved in:
definatalie.com  My personal blog.
@definatalie  My Twitter account.
Axis of Fat  A group blog about (mostly) Australian fat activism, writing and fashion.
Deathfatties  A user submitted Tumblr dedicated to showcasing fatshion.

Body Love Revolution

2011-03-27T18:24:25+11:00

There’s something scary happening in Hollywood. One by one, the women on our magazine covers and TV screens are becoming oddly alike. Their faces are strangely smooth and their expressions are unsettlingly frozen. Botox injections are as regular as manicures, bizarre procedures (like butt implants!) are increasingly common and boob jobs are basic requirements. Some famous women in their 50s look startlingly similar to their 20-year-old counterparts and one particular young starlet is well-known for undergoing a staggering 10 cosmetic procedures in a single day.

Worryingly, a twenty-something woman with face full of botox, lips full of collagen and breasts full of silicone is no longer considered particularly strange. On the contrary, it’s more likely she’ll be dubbed an “it” girl, given a place in the “100 hottest women in the world” lists and turned into a role model for impressionable tweens. On the red carpet, unnaturally perfect, primped, plastic women have simply become the norm.

What’s really concerning is that cosmetic surgery procedures, hair extensions, bizarre exercise regimes and coconut water diets are no longer exclusively the domain of the rich and famous. “Plastic fantastic” culture has spilled over into the lives of regular women. Mamas are getting tummy tucks with their c-sections and teenagers are rocking up to class with fake hair, fake tans and fake nails.

So why has looking like a cookie-cutter clone of a thousand other surgically, cosmetically and digitally enhanced women become something to aspire to? Why are so many smart girls buying into this madness? And why are there so many beautiful women with shattered self esteem and zero body confidence?

Well, at least in part, the answer is quite simple: Because every day the media inundates us with destructive messages. You only need to cast your eyes over the magazine titles at the checkout for a hint as to why negative body image is so rampant. Girls of today are repeatedly told that they are not enough. Natural is not acceptable. Unique is not desirable. If you don’t fit the mould, you don’t matter. And if you’re not in, you’re out. That’s what drilled into little girls when they pick up a copy of Total Girl magazine with a photoshopped picture of Miley Cyrus on the cover. That’s what teenagers are led to believe when they watch Heidi Montage strutting her surgically-enhanced stuff on The Hills. And that’s what mothers are told when they read a Women’s Day article featuring a celebrity mother wearing a bikini and declaring “I lost my baby weight in just 3 weeks!”

An examination of magazines from the 70s and 80s really highlights how much things have changed (for the worse) in the last few decades. Though super models and movie stars have always been enviably beautiful, in the past they were more naturally so. Plastic surgery was not so common and much of the technology now used to digitally “correct” images simply didn’t exist. Today the images presented and perpetuated by the media are so far removed from reality that if it wasn’t so dangerous, it’d be laughable. Furthermore, through technologies such as social media and reality TV, the line between “the girl next door” and “celebrity” has become increasingly blurred, creating even more pressure for women to live up to Hollywood standards.

The expectations currently placed on women are ridiculously high and mostly unattainable. When a girl’s relationship with her body is already such a fragile thing, these unrealistic depictions of beauty are terribly destructive. Body-hate mentality is insidious.

If we are ever going to escape the body-hate cycle, things obviously need to change. The media certainly need to be more conscious of their impact and make serious reforms, but for as long as they are making a profit while pushing their toxic messages, that shift is unlikely to occur.

While as individuals we have little power over the media, as a group we women are a force to be reckoned with. We can speak with our money by not buying the products that perpetuate dangerous beauty ideals and we can speak with our numbers by letting the government know, this is not ok.

It’s time to speak up. It’s time to be heard. It’s time to start a body love revolution.

The Battle Within

2011-03-27T18:23:40+11:00

A young English girl who calls herself ‘Mememolly’ started a phenomenon on YouTube when she posted ‘something of an apologetic love letter’ to her body in 2007. She listed parts of her body – her feet, arms, ears, eyes – and talked about why she appreciated them. A flood of people responded by posting their own video responses in which they told the world how they feel about their bodies.

Inspired by them, on the morning that I turned 38, I sat down and wrote my own letter of thanks to my body:

Dear body,
I am really happy with the way we are growing old together.

Thanks, feet, for being so pretty. I love the way your nails look when they are painted. I haven’t always treated you so well, though. I have stopped wearing killer heels quite so often, but hey, we both know the damage is done.

Thanks, legs. You are fabulous; you’re so long and you rarely change shape, even when I eat loads of junky foods. You have made me feel glamorous on many occasions.

Belly – what can I say? You are a podgy, bloated little thing, aren’t you? I have tried exercising you, sucking you in and constraining you in special ‘Bridget Jones’ style bloomers – but you just will not be denied.

Breasts – you will not be denied, either, but you are lovely. You make me feel so feminine. And you fed both my children; that was truly amazing. I will be forever grateful.

Arms. My special body parts. Lefty – you are a bit of a non-event really, aren’t you? I don’t write with you and you are quite nondescript. But righty – yes, you have tales to tell. I love your burn scars now. Really. I do. You make me strong, unique and show the world I am a girl with a history of bravery. I am sorry that I hid you for so many years when I was young, but I just hadn’t learnt how to deal with something so large. We both had to grow into the tight, twisted and melted flesh.

Face – you are just fine. Elegantly shaped eyebrows, a few wrinkles that show I have lived, laughed and worried.

Hair – I am sorry I bleach you. You do well to hang in there – but I do treat you to great shampoos and head rubs from my girlfriends.

Thanks, body, for getting me this far. You are so resilient and so strong. You rarely get sick and you can withstand great pain. You are an Amazon’s body.

Happy Birthday. xxxx

Scarred and scared

When I was two years old, I was badly burnt. I received third-degree burns all down my right arm and neck. As is often the case with burn victims, I also suffered two major secondary infections, German measles and the potentially life-threatening golden staph.

My great-grandmother burnt me; she poured hot cooking oil down on me as I sat watching breakfast being prepared. As a small girl, I was always told this was an accident, yet I questioned why no one ever spoke of this woman again, let alone saw her. Why hadn’t we forgiven her? I wondered. After all, accidents do happen. It was only when I was older that the truth emerged. Great Grandma had been unstable and had shown signs of violence towards my beloved grandmother when she was a small girl, too. Everyone felt instinctively that she had burnt me deliberately.

I don’t remember whether it was done to me deliberately; and ultimately, as it cannot be undone, I have chosen not to focus on that question. It happened.

What do I remember? I remember my grandmother’s face as she came through the doorway in response to my screams. I recall thinking I must be very badly hurt as she looked stricken. I remember my doctor, too. As I was hospitalised for almost six months, he became a central figure in my life. He was kind, gentle and doting. I was his special girl. Heaven help any nurse who dared keep me waiting! I remember gifts, in particular books. Perhaps this was the start of my love affair with words. I loved being read to. I escaped pain and boredom through tales of princesses with power and adventures of other little girls who faced great dangers and emerged triumphant.

I soothed myself with words, too. I could not yet read, of course, but I would talk to myself when frightened, repeating over and over the mantra ‘You’ll be okay, you’ll be all right.’ It was my secret spell and I would cast it to give me strength.

How fortunate that these are my memories: of being loved, spoilt, protected and strong.

For my family, other, darker memories remain as well. Memories of me writhing in pain as my dressings were changed, of being told that my arm would need to be amputated, of being advised that I would need yet another skin graft, of being told time and time again that I would not live.

But live I did. And I kept my arm. With its red, raised, twisted flesh, it looked different to the arms of my friends. There was a flap of skin near my elbow that was taut when my arm was stretched out and hung loose when my arm was bent. Yet as a small child these differences did not concern me – I was so much more than my body!

I was a busy, bossy little girl. I had a younger sister to organise, lollies to eat, Barbies to collect and, once school started, more books to devour. In childhood, my body was merely an instrument to carry me from one adventure to the next. When I wanted to join my friends at the beach, I just had Mum cut the toes out of one of my father’s socks and popped that on to protect my arm from the sun. Problem solved!

Around the time I turned ten, things definitely changed. I started noticing boys. And I started noticing the girls the boys noticed. At school, the boys preferred the alpha girls: popular, pretty, often good at sport. I was a pretty enough girl and had a few close friends, but as I was more interested in reading than netball, I was definitely not alpha material. It wasn’t just at school that I received messages about what defined beauty and sexual attractiveness. My Barbies, Charlie’s Angels, ABBA – all of them taught me that to be a desired woman, I would need to be thin, beautiful and immaculately groomed. No scars allowed.

I entered adolescence and, like most girls, began a new internal conversation. I was no longer casting spells to heal myself. Instead, I was engaging in darker, self-destructive thoughts and telling myself that I was not enough. Not pretty enough, not thin enough, not popular enough. My feelings of inadequacy due to my scarring became quite overwhelming; I was still bright and ambitious but my main preoccupation was how best I could hide my scars from the world.

I hid. I hid my arm. I wore skivvies underneath my summer uniform, wore jumpers all year round. I avoided pools and beaches. My arm no longer seemed small; it seemed enormous. A huge, horrible, disfigured limb I would be forced to drag through what had been my oh-so-promising life.

Yes, teenage girls are good at drama.

I vividly recall my daydreams at age 15 about what my life would be like if I had not been burnt. I was tall and had very long legs, so I fancied that I could have been a bikini model if it had not been for my arm. How telling: as an adolescent, my dream job was to be a bikini model! For many adolescents it is not the actual job of being a model that appeals; it is the kudos, the knowledge that one’s body has been declared special. Worthy of attention. ‘If I looked that way, then they would love me . . .’

At school, I hid my scars not only with the sleeves of my jumper but also by seeming self-assured. I knew that if I appeared vulnerable, I would be targeted. So I spent my free time joining in with my peers rating one another. I went to an all-girls school and at lunchtime it was as if the magazines we read, which told us what clothes were in and whether a celebrity was hot or not, had sprung to life. We may not have been able to control many elements of our lives, but we could definitely control one another through ridicule. The ratings we gave one another might not have been held up like scores in a talent show, but they were branded on our psyches.

The rules in girls’ rating games, then and now, are not difficult to follow. Be considered hot by your peers, in particular by boys, and you score points. Getting a highly desired boyfriend means an instant advance to the top of the club. I was lucky enough to land the school ‘spunk’ from the boys’ school next door and was elevated from classroom ‘brainiac’ to the girl everyone wanted to know, almost overnight. He dumped me a year later for a girl considered hotter. At just 14, she was a fashion model appearing in women’s magazines and parading in labels sold only to rich 30-somethings. My dream run at the top of the charts was over. I had all my deepest fears confirmed. The prettiest girl did win. In my mind, the breakup was all about me not being beautiful enough. It seemed all the more tragic because I had elevated him to godlike status for loving me despite my scars.

Looking back, I see how ridiculous this all was. I was funny, bright, passionately in love with him. He was not doing me any favours by being with me! It seems strange to me now that at no stage did I stop and think that perhaps my relationship with this boy had broken down for reasons other than my appearance. Possibly it had been the pressure of us getting too serious too soon (the reason my boyfriend gave me at the time), or maybe we were just growing apart. He may have just been a jerk. And the truth is, while the new girl certainly was beautiful, she may have been so much more than just her looks, too.

It was only in my adult years, as a teacher, that I finally explored ways in which I might come to terms with my burns. If I could not accept myself, how could I possibly ask my students to accept themselves?

I searched once again for soothing words, and found them in the writing of women such as Naomi Wolf, who wrote in The Beauty Myth: ‘We don’t need to change our bodies, we need to change the rules.’ In women such as Sofia Loren: ‘Nothing makes a woman more beautiful than the belief that she is beautiful.’ And in the words of the young women I now taught: ‘I love how you wear your scars, Miss, you don’t let them wear you.’ Words healed me. And my self-talk once more became focused on my strengths rather than my perceived weaknesses. I was okay. It would be all right.

And everything was okay. And it was more than just all right. Life without self-doubt was magnificent. I loved and I was loved. As a confident 20-something, I shone. I have a picture of me taken back then, when I went to the Amazon, in South America, for my honeymoon. It captures the authentic me. I look strong, fit. I am wearing a singlet top and grinning from ear to ear. I had been trekking in the jungle with my new husband and we had stumbled upon a village. When the local children saw my burn scars they ran and hid from me. Our guide explained that they feared I would die soon as they were not used to seeing large scars. In the Amazon, as there is no running water or electricity, if you get a major injury you will most likely die from infection. I assured our guide that he should tell the children I was fine. And one by one, they came across and touched my arm, played with my hair, and started telling me in the local language that I was a strong, brave girl. A warrior girl.

Yes. I am an Amazon warrior. I am more than my body. It is such a small part of the entire Dannielle Miller story that it has again been relegated to a co-starring role. I have managed to move from hating my body to not just accepting it but loving it, scars and all. I don’t think it is perfect, but I am okay with that. This is me.

When I choose to indulge in the trappings of conventional beauty – heels and hair dye – I do so knowing that these things may be fun, and they may make me feel pampered or be just what my outfit calls for on a special occasion, but they do not make me worth more or ensure I will be loved. I feel equally as valuable when I’m at home wearing my ugg boots and track pants, with my hair pulled back in an unbrushed mop. And though I may get occasionally frustrated with my tummy, I cannot bring myself to hate it for a moment. It is part of me. My body is like a dear friend: not perfect, yet lovable and comforting, quirks and all. Despite the advertising rhetoric, diets, surgery and cosmetics do not have some mystical power that will bring us eternal happiness. I know this.

How liberating! And, unfortunately, how rare. Many girls will not grow to be women who love their bodies. They will believe that if they just had the right-shaped breasts, or a flatter tummy, or a smaller nose, their life would be complete. They will bare scars of their own for many years – it’s just that their scars may not be quite as obvious as mine.

At war with the body

Many girls are enslaved to their bodies. Their supposed imperfections – be they scars, weight or bust size – take on monstrous proportions. This deprives them of finding that Amazon power within. Statistics tell the story bluntly: 94 per cent of teenage girls wish, some of the time, that they were more beautiful. A quarter of teenage girls want to change everything physically about themselves.

The problem with statistics is that it is easy for us to be emotionally detached and for the numbers to become somewhat meaningless. But each number is a real girl. A girl who wakes up hungry and chooses to stay that way all day. A girl who is deeply sad. A girl who feels that she is unloved and unlovable. A girl who limps through her days hiding, through actual physical withdrawal, or by assuming an ‘I am sooo fine’ facade, or by ridiculing others to deflect attention away from herself. Living with a sense of inadequacy hurts; occasionally this girl will take the ache from within her own chest and throw it at other girls, allowing herself just that little bit of breathing space. This teen girl might tease and belittle others, because it deflects attention away from her own perceived flaws.

I have cried for, and with, many of the girls I have worked with, as they shared with me the pain of being at war with their own bodies.

I have struggled since I was six with weight and body image . . . I haven’t eaten for a week in an attempt to be beautiful.
Katia, 15

My whole life, I have been called just ‘that fat kid’.
Lucy, 14

I think I am not as pretty as other girls. I hate the way I look, as it means I can’t make friends.
Samantha, 12

I don’t like to look in mirrors or get my photo taken, ’cause I am not beautiful. None of the girls I see in magazines look like me, because my skin is really dark. I wish I could make it whiter.
Stephanie, 13

Often, I do not cry out of sadness. My workshops are incredibly joyful. I cry tears of joy and gratitude, too. I try to help heal and soothe and show girls that there is another way. Girls can silence their inner critic and begin a new conversation within, a conversation that is affirming rather than destroying.

For this to happen, girls need new, positive messages, delivered with authenticity and passion. Girls need to see women who realise that they are so much more than just their bodies.

This blog post is an extract from Dannielle’s book The Butterfly Effect, Random House, 2009

The Skinny Jeans Obsession

2011-03-27T18:25:51+11:00

What do your ‘skinny jeans’ look like? You know, your magic jeans? The jeans that have outlasted most of your significant relationships, the jeans that at joyful moments throughout your adulthood actually fit you? The jeans that you keep as your ultimate yard stick of body measurement?

My skinny jeans are dark denim, straight leg Jags that I’ve had since my early 20s. They fit me… most of the time. Occasionally though, in the five odd years that I’ve owned them they reach varying levels of unwearable. Either far too baggy… or far too tight.

The last time my miracle jeans were in the unwearable state of baggy I was stressed and sick. I had terrible gastro that lasted for a full eight days, I was acting in a demanding and grueling play, I was moving house, I was bridesmaid in a wedding and I was about to leave the city I was raised in and my boyfriend and my family weren’t coming with me. I was miserable, living on a steady theatre diet of gummy bears, toast, red wine and insomnia. I was a wreck. I looked and felt, like shit.

Then, after I moved to my new city and sampled a few too many of its famous wine bars my skinny jeans once again became unwearable. On the other end of the spectrum. My new city was cold and cruel so I found comfort in stodgy food and cheap wine. I soon found that my recently baggy jeans were cutting off my circulation… to my calves. Physically and mentally it was the same as when the skinny jeans hung loose around my hips. I looked and felt like shit.

This got me thinking about my relationship with these jeans. I certainly didn’t look like shit when I bought them. I was in the throes of a new relationship, I was fit, healthy and incredibly happy. They fit me perfectly. It made me realise something important, something crucial about these jeans. These jeans aren’t my skinny jeans… they are my happy jeans. It’s no accident that when they fit me perfectly I’ve been sleeping well, exercising and eating good and nourishing food. They only fit me properly when I’m being good to myself.

I now use these jeans to gauge my happiness. If I try them on and they are a little snug I wonder why I’m feeling the need to overindulge. If I try them on, and they sit comfortably over my hips and button up without a sharp inhale of breath I know that I’m doing something right. If they don’t look like tracksuit pants I can be fairly certain that my mental state is on track. I’ll be honest though, it’s always a little exciting for them to be baggy but I refuse to forfeit my health to make it happen.

Over to you. Do you think that your skinny jeans might really be your happy jeans? And that the perfect fit might well be the right one?

Getting airplay to fight negative Body Image

2011-03-27T18:21:19+11:00

Yesterday, I was interviewed by Alex Sloan on 666 ABC Canberra Radio to talk about our exciting campaign and the launch!

Missed out on the interview? Listen to it now:

Meet our bloggers

2011-03-27T18:26:30+11:00

I’m excited to introduce to you, the four lovely ladies that will share with us their thoughts on Body Image. Join them in the conversation over the next four weeks, which will start straight after our launch!

The bloggers are:
Carly, the fashion blogger from Smaggle
Dannielle, the CEO and co-founder of Enlighten Education and from The Butterfly Effect
Cakie, a professional writer and dreamer from Cakie Belle
Natalie, who is passionate about activism through blogging from definatalie.com

Blogger Profiles

Carly Jacobs

Carly Jacobs is a fashion blogger, freelance writer, jeweller, designer, actor and general preacher of positivity. She’s been a regular contributor at Australian Cleo magazine and she’s also been featured in Cosmopolitan and Bust magazines. As editor of Smaggle and shopping writer at Lustable she spends her days writing, procrastinating on Facebook, drinking black coffee and trying to find people to play with.

Dannielle Miller

Dannielle Miller is a major innovator and expert in the field of education and student welfare. Dannielle is the CEO and co-founder of Enlighten Education, which provides girls with training and support to stand up to limiting media and social messages.

In 2009, as part of its Next 100 series, The Weekend Australian newspaper named Dannielle as Australia’s no 1 Emerging Leader in Learning. She works with thousands of girls across Australia each year and makes regular media appearances to advise on teen issues. Author of teen parenting book The Butterfly Effect (Random House Australia, September 2009), she is also an avid blogger. She is featured in education journals, her articles have appeared in The Sydney Morning Herald, and she is a popular speaker at youth and education conferences and forums.

See Dannielle’s latest interview on the Kerri-Anne Show: Should You Tell Your Daughter She Is Fat?

Cakie Belle

Cakie Belle is a professional writer, dreamer, cake fanatic, body image advocate and self love crusader, on a mission to promote healthy self esteem, body confidence and true beauty.

Cakie passionately believes in the the magic of being unique and actively rejects the superficial, narrow-minded and unrealistic definition of beauty presented by the modern media. Cakie hopes to remind women that beauty comes in all shapes, sizes, ethnicities and ages, and inspire, educate and encourage girls to love their bodies for the gorgeous miracles they are.

Natalie Perkins

Natalie Perkins writes for her personal blog, definatalie.com, about being fat, wearing clothes, making art and being human in Brisbane, Australia. Natalie is passionate about activism through blogging and has helped a number of fat activists establish blogs. In 2009 she created Axis of Fat and Deathfatties as web spaces for fat activism and fatshion powered by the community.

Refusing to play well with the Australian fashion industry and bloggerati’s erasure of bodies that don’t conform to the accepted ideal, she turns up visibly fat to events and doesn’t read fashion magazines. Her personal style leans towards the sublimely overdressed while maintaining nostalgia for ’90s riot grrrl sensibilities.

Find her tweeting as @definatalie.

Last chance to join us for our launch!

2011-03-27T18:25:04+11:00

Join us for the official launch of Sharing Young Women’s Stories hosted by Cassie Gillis,
co-owner of Dynamic Studies. We have two wonderful speakers lined up for you, Charlie Hunter, Health & Fitness Director and Carly Jacobs, fashion blogger and our first guest blogpost (to be released next week). Throughout the evening enjoy the music of the Sienna Aguilar Trio as you have some nibbles and be one of the first to send our Avant Card postcard to Minister Garrett!

date: Wednesday 9th February
time: 6:15pm
place: The Front Gallery & Cafe- Wattle St, Lyneham, ACT
Light refreshments provided & places are limited
RSVP close today!

We look forward to seeing you there!

Profiles

Cassie Gillis

Cassie is a popular dance teacher in the Canberra Community and co-owner of Dynamic Studios. Cassie works along side her business partner Nicole, on ways of promoting positive body image to her students. Cassie is also focused on Health and nutrition. Through her own Primary School based dance program – dancecore, Cassie has been able to infiltrate Canberra schools with a message of positive body image, self worth, confidence and good health.

Charlie Hunter

Charlie is the Health & Fitness Director of GetMyBodyBack Health & Fitness studio in Queanbeyan. She has been coaching people for over 10 years helping them find the confidence to use their inner voice. Charlie is a strong believer that a healthy body starts with the mind and she focuses on changing people’s stop start dieting habits into long term healthy eating for life.

 Carly Jacobs

Carly is a fashion blogger, freelance writer, jeweller, designer, actor and general weirdo (her words not ours!) She’s been a regular contributor at Australian Cleo magazine and has been featured in Cosmopolitan and Bust magazines. As editor of Smaggle and being a shopping writer at Lustable, Carly spends her days writing, procrastinating on Facebook, drinking black coffee and trying to find people to play with her.

Sienna Aguilar Trio

The Sienna Aguilar Trio consists of local musicians, all of whom are former students of the ANU School of Music. With a wide repertoire of jazz standards and modern pieces, they perform a range of styles including Latin, swing and popular music with a jazz flavour. Their distinctive sound complements various settings, from relaxed bars and cafes to more formal occasions including corporate functions and weddings.

At an Avant Card stand near you

2011-03-27T18:28:17+11:00

The postcards are now available for you to pick up, send, share and stick up on your wall! You can find them on Avant Card stands at your local High School and at a bunch of cafes and restaurants in the capital cities. If you see one on the stand, take a photo and post it on facebook.

Do you want to help us spread the word? Download your own copy or if you don’t have access to an Avant Card stand, send us a message and we’ll send you some copies for distribution to your networks. Please include who you are, your organisation, and with whom you plan to share them.

Share your Story

2011-04-06T21:02:49+10:00

Who inspires you?
Is there a woman that has inspired you?
Your mother, grandmother, daughter? Best friend, neighbour or a public figure?

Share your story and tell us how you have been inspired by adding a comment below