Since Thursday morning, Luzon (the northernmost major island of my country) has had a blackout due to heavy rains and strong winds brought by typhoon "Milenyo." Though some areas had their electric power restored on the same day, or a little over 24 hours after it went off, our part of Quezon City only saw light again tonight shortly before 9:00. That's about 84 hours with no electricity! It really is easier to appreciate something when you suddenly lose it. On the other hand, it was a refreshing change to try to make do without television, the pc, cold drinking water, electric fans -- even drive around Metro Manila sans traffic lights!
So back to blogging...
While this isn't fresh news, I still delight over the news about excessively thin models being banned from Madrid Fashion Week. I never thought I'd see the day, seeing how fashion models have acquired quasi-icon status over the decades, as if a skeletal frame is something to aspire for.
A few days after the ban on size-zero women was reported by Yahoo news, a related news article came out, this time with designer Giorgio Armani pinpointing stylists and the media as the culprit in propagating "ultra-thin chic."
Today's The New York Times editorial page contained a brief commentary on the same issue, and only here did I learn of the South American model who, after months of consuming only lettuce and diet soda, died of heart failure in August:
Yes, You Can Be Too Thin
If fashion models were purebred dogs instead of underfed women, there would be an outcry over the abusive standards for appearing in shows and photo shoots. The prize for women who aspire to the catwalk is a ridiculous size 0, though overachieving undereaters seem to be reaching for size 00, which invites further starvation, serious illness and worse.
If the industry needed a wake-up call, it got one last month, when Luisel Ramos, an Uruguayan model who had been advised to lose weight, died of heart failure after taking her turn on the catwalk. She reportedly had gone days without eating, and for months consumed only lettuce and diet soda.
Neverthless, organized of Madrid's Fashion Week caught designer and fashionista scorn for banning the unreasonably thin from their show. The Madrid standard: a minimum body mass index of at least 18 -- a measure of body fat based on weight and height. A reading of 18 is still underweight (18.5 to just under 25 is considered normal), but it is outsized among supermodels, many of whom hover between 14 and 16.
While the recently completed New York Fashion Week carried on as usual, Milan Fashion Week officials were considering applying their own healthy standard for models.
Ending the parade of starved and sickly seems like a fashion trend worth following.
I couldn't agree more, though I hope it's a trend that won't go away.
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