Big bouncy rolls. Stripes of stretchies. Dark and hairy pits. These are the imperfections and flaws imprisoning the human body.
Body shaming is one reason most people feel upset after lingering in front of the mirror, staring at themselves for a long time. Although men and non-binary individuals also experience this issue, women are predominately the victims of body shaming. Surprisingly, it takes many forms that sometimes people body-shamed did not notice and were unaware of it. Subtle or direct, the results are parallel – a false narrative of a perfect body, a narrative that should be long gone.
The Philippine Commission on Women defined body shaming as acts that “promote the culture of misogyny that justifies and normalizes abuses against women.” For instance, backhanded compliments, such as “you'll be prettier when you're slimmer,” are only some of the many derogating comments women are handed with.
These torturous words hiding in the guise of compliments push women to be conventionally attractive. Small praises are always nice, but it becomes too much when an ulterior motive is hiding.
Introduced below are some college kids who shared their body issues, how they shut down negative thinking, and started owning their bodies.
Sickness of Filipinos
Does body shaming really run in the blood of Filipinos, or is it an innate sickness of them? Sure, the Philippines is not the only country where many utter a bunch of body-insulting remarks towards others.
However, it is troubling enough that even young girls are already handed upsetting comments at their innocent age. Just imagine bumping into a real-life Regina George in your elementary years. That's both sad and crazy!
Tin Eclevia, a medical technology student in De La Salle Medical and Health Sciences Institute, admitted that when running around with her schoolmates during her primary years, uncomfortable thoughts were also spinning in her head.
“I was body-shamed in school, mostly during my grade school years, and it was masked in a humorous way. Nevertheless, it was still body shaming,” Tin said.
Tin firmly asserted that women are pieces of all the places they have been and the people they have loved. “They are stitched together by their strength, character, and experiences, and women decide and build whoever they want to become,” she added.
It is as if everyone was freely handed a wooden gavel waiting to hit a sound block after seeing a person who did not pass the scales and standards. All are entitled to define the acceptable from not. The only thing different is that even minors are not free of trials.
Mirrored by the media
Media successfully painted a picture of what an “ideal” woman is. Fair complexion, chiseled jaws, and everything Eurocentric. It is as if when women fail to achieve these beauty standards, their entire womanhood is set to failure.
Second-year psychology student at Far Eastern University, Lyka Carriedo, shared that people who always picked on her being oversized made her so insecure.
“Aside from the negative opinions of other people about my body, I believe that the media has contributed in shaping this mindset as well,” Lyka added.
Dismayed by the media's fostering of women's unrealistic image, Lyka upholds that this image does not represent the entire women population.
“It fails to represent actual human beings with realistic features such as cellulite, body hairs, and discolorations which are all normal. Therefore, people think of these as imperfections.” she said.
Not even celebrities enjoy a free pass card. Recently, Rhian Ramos was slammed by netizens for her super skinny body. Rhian had to reveal the messy breakup she had to go through when in the first place, she had no obligation to explain.
Obviously, social media became an active ground for spiteful online threads and posts. However, it is progress that, little by little, the media displays a diversity of women. In a time when beauty queens and models are the charmers of catwalks, it is a win for all women that the ideal norm is persistently abolished as they can now rock the aisle with all-out confidence.
Mental health matters
In a journal co-authored by the Food and Nutrition Research Institute and the Department of Science and Technology, six out of 10 women were not satisfied with their body image.
What’s more disturbing about body shaming is that it does not only affect the appearance of those who suffer it but their mental wellness as well. Telling other people what to be is a big no!
Innabuyog Gabriela Youth (IGY) – UP Baguio Chairperson Janice Militar shared how she defies body issues and offensive remarks.
“I think it really requires a very strong will and mind to keep your insecurities and ill thoughts about yourself grounded.” Janice was sure that this could only be achieved after a “long and tedious process of learning to love the body you have.”
Women affected by body shaming develop unhealthy lifestyle habits to the point they torture themselves with knives of social anxiety, body dissatisfaction, and depression. \
Slamming it down
What's the pill these young ladies swallowed to resist body shamers and their audacious language? Body positivity!
Body positivity looks forward to smashing down the notion of feminine beauty ideals. It challenges the beauty standards that continuously rein and imprison women, especially in the Philippines, where imperialist beauty standards still rule.
And to all young girls out there, IGY member Kevyn Brondial wanted to remind you that you are not alone in your fight of loving yourself. Thanking her Leo personality, she is assured that it’s not a woman’s job to feel accepted. For her, time would come when everybody will learn to love themselves and will be able to help others who need them.
The very same reason convinced the other girls.
Tin, who grew tired of dealing with her body issues and learned just to brush them off, wanted to raise the consciousness that everyone is built differently. Being different doesn't make anyone less valuable, especially with our younger generation who are prone to “bubbles of false body images which will lead to comparing themselves and complying with these standards.”
Janice wanted to remind everybody that amidst a pandemic that forces everyone stuck inside their homes with only their body and thoughts, now more than ever, is the perfect time to promote body positivity to boost confidence.
For Lyka, beauty is subjective, and women have the power to create their own meaning of it. She hopes that this would reflect the person they see in the mirror. Exhausting yourself by conforming to these unrealistic standards is a waste of time.
Thus, having morena skin, acne scars, curly hair, flat ass, cellulite, dark groins, moles and freckles, body hair, layers of creases, crooked and gap teeth is all normal. This list goes forever, a list generally made to devalue women.
But when will people start viewing these as part of being a normal woman and not an imperfection or flaw? When will they see stretch marks engraved on a mother's skin as a mark of bravery? Or textured skin as a keepsake of what someone had to bear?
Women do not deserve to be labeled as “stained” or “damaged” just for having these normal features because they cannot be compared to products that did not pass quality control.
These same women spend a lot of money to look conventionally appealing, but it literally costs none to be kind to them. Flaws are on those arrogant ones who think they are granted the right to decide what other people what to be.
May everyone remember that the perfect body and the perfect face are nonexistent – made-up fantasies to suffice the wants of a patriarchal society. The “ideal woman” is a social construct designed to depreciate and neglect what is more of the essence – not the façade but what's within. What is more important is what lies beyond the surface – women's intervention to achieve a more democratic society.
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