Keep this One Rule...

Alison Skirtboston

Skirt! Boston editor

Skirt! is evidence that the universe is paying attention: I spent the last six years at mach speed, whether finishing college (Emerson) while writing full time for Boston Globe West (2001-2004) or editing the Boston Parents’ Paper during the day while holding down the steady gig writing for Globe ...

Keep this One Rule...

Alison, editor

Wednesday, August, 20, 2008

Sorry, I couldn’t help myself. We’ve been working on the Rules Issue (September) for skirt! and I saw this internet ad on the thesaurus.com web site:

1 Rule of a Flat Stomach:
Cut down 37 lbs of stomach fat in 3 months by keeping this 1 old rule
Wu-YiSource.com

I tried to avoid it, I really did... then I clicked. Now I have clicker’s remorse. Of course they were trying to sell a weight loss product, in this case tea.

I already drink gallons of tea, and have only gained weight as age and gravitational forces conspire against me. I’ve also spent at least a decade (or three by now?) – like so many other women who don’t resemble supermodels – wishing I could lose 10 stubborn pounds, and I know drinking any additional volume of tea isn’t going to do a darn thing.

Then there was this article on the New York Times.com: Better to be Fit and Fat than Skinny and Unfit.

It wasn’t the first time I’ve read exactly that article, but do you think I can get the “lose weight” message out of my head, even briefly? Wouldn’t it be great if we could bombard young girls with a different message throughout their lives, something that could be ingrained as thoroughly as “be thin!” is with our generation?

If we could reverse the damage, what sort of message should we replace “be thin” with? Hmmm...