“You can’t encourage people to take care of their body by telling them to hate it.”
– Laci Green
Body shaming is the act of mocking or humiliating a person based on their physical appearance. Regardless of which form it takes place in, body shaming is hurtful and embarrassing to continue further, which can trigger various forms of anxiety, depression and mental health problems. People with a history of trauma or those facing a mental health problem are even prone to hurt themselves. Self-harm is the worst thing one can be persuaded into resulting from body shaming. Nobody deserves to feel this way.
Body-shaming makes us think about our bodies in a rather negative way. These thoughts and feelings pertaining to our bodies can impact us throughout our lives, affecting how we feel about ourselves, our mental health and our well-being. Research suggests that higher body dissatisfaction is associated with a poorer quality of life, psychological distress, and the risk of unhealthy eating disorders. Therefore, concerns about a person’s weight should be raised sensibly instead of assuming they need to be working on themselves. Also, if our body has kept us alive during a deadly global pandemic, it clearly states that our health is more important than our appearance.
Brands often do not engage models with darker complexion as well.
A few years ago, #Garnier drew flak for replying to a vlogger who had reached out for collaboration by saying, “We don’t work with your skin types.”#colorism #fairnesscreams #racism
— Youth Ki Awaaz (@YouthKiAwaaz) September 1, 2021
This is a problem that is growing at a very high rate. A living example of body shaming is none other than myself, but I was on the opposite side; I was the one being the bully and passing rude comments on my friends and colleagues about their appearance. I often used to poke one of my friends over his body and he started suffering from mild depression. He stopped talking to everyone, never used to come and eat his lunch with us, always sat in a corner- paranoid and perplexed about the happenings around him. I later tried approaching him, but he won’t talk to me. Then I tried asking his close friends and even talked to his parents regarding my concern towards him, and they told me something I never expected; somehow it was me.
Those comments about his appearance triggered a fear inside him; he stopped talking to anyone and started questioning how miserable his life was. He was a very bright student, but that year he barely passed. So, after hearing what body shaming can do to someone, I started researching about it and came to know how far reaching consequences it can have. There are cases when people have taken their lives just because they feel they don’t fit in. ‘How fat they are,’ ‘how thin they are,’ ‘how weird they look,’ but appearance doesn’t matter when you are a good person. I want to tell them that beauty lies within us. Death is inevitable, exterior beauty is not permanent but our inner beauty, our thoughts and perceptions is what edifices us. We need to take a step and create a difference in the world and in people’s lives—a change and step towards well-being.