Monday, January 6, 2014

Fear of Fat Marketing

I am mad. 

The fitness marketing commercials have gone beyond selling to fears people have and have started creating fear where there should be none. 

The "T25" commercial came on with people talking about flattening their tummies and thinning their thighs and on and on. The next day my beautiful 6 year old girl told me she wanted to lose some fat. 

This is a girl who ran a 42:40 5K at age 5. This is a girl who at four years old biked 5 miles to Chaney's Dairy Barn for an ice cream treat. This is a girl who runs around all day, likes to row on the rowing machine at the gym, and likes to swing kettlebells. 

This one commercial and suddenly she thinks she needs to lose some fat. 

Why do they insist on selling fitness this way?

Probably because it works. We live in a society that is obsessed with image and appearance. The world around us tells us we are less than if we are not tall enough, muscular enough, skinny enough, tanned enough. . .

Commercials for jeans reduce women to nothing but their hips. Clothes aren't sold on how they function, but on how they make your butt look. 

The TV tells me I need a bigger chest and bigger biceps. It tells me I need fancier clothes, and that three months later those will no longer be fashionable enough. 

It will only stop if we stop buying what they are selling. 

Yes, fitness is important and you should be doing something to take care of the amazing human body you are in. Being strong and having good cardio is awesome, but I beg you, for your own sake and the sake of all our little girls, I beg you to be outraged at every ad and article that promises a sexy body, a perfect butt or a "beach body." Turn away from that style of marketing and focus your fitness on what your body can do and how your body feels instead of how some guy on TV tells you your body should look. 

I am disgusted. 

No comments:

Post a Comment