Here is the thing: I\u2019m not unhappy with the way I look. Sure, there are things I\u2019d like to change, but noth\u00ading I want badly enough to, like, WORK, on it. Plus, I kind of hate working out. I mean, I have no objection to daily physical activity \u2013 riding my bike to class, etc.<\/p>\n
But I have never been much for doing repetitive motions on a sticky mat while surrounded by lots of other, fitter people. Beyond that, I\u2019m a busy person; it\u2019s not like I\u2019ve got a lot of free time I want to spend on the non-chased variety of running. Given all that, you might think I would be one of the last people you would find in a gym. But you\u2019d be wrong. And oddly enough, it\u2019s because of my wedding to the man who loves me no matter what I look like.<\/p>\n
To clarify, this actually has very little to do with my fianc\u00e9. He is 100% consistent in affirming that he loves me no matter how I look (which, if you\u2019ve seen me when I\u2019m sick, you know is a good thing). Like I said before, it isn\u2019t really about me, either. Until I started planning my wed\u00adding, I thought about my weight approximately never.<\/p>\n
What it IS about is the fact that, once I was en\u00adgaged, I found out that the already-ubiquitous \u201conly-skin\u00adny-is-pretty\u201d message is thrown at brides-to-be even harder than it is at women in general. In the bridal and wedding planning magazines, on websites, in stores and especially in the ads targeted toward me, the message is the same: \u201cIt\u2019s your big day, and you want to look your best. Bet\u00adter start shedding those pounds!\u201d And while I would have thought I\u2019d be the last person in the world to be affected by that message, it has had a surprising and negative effect on my self-esteem.<\/p>\n
For better or worse, weddings are an industry. Hon\u00adestly, that\u2019s part of what makes them fun: buying the dress, the invitations, figuring out all the little specifics, and de\u00adciding how to tweak all the details to make it an awesome celebration. But obviously, the industry has a negative side as well. A lot of people are highly invested in getting future brides and grooms to spend money, and a good way to do that is to convince said brides and grooms that they need what is being sold.<\/p>\n
This is nothing new \u2013 creating markets is how cap\u00aditalism continues to function, and products to make you \u201clook better\u201d (whatever that means) comprise a pretty lu\u00adcrative market. For some reason though (na\u00efvet\u00e9?), I wasn\u2019t expecting such a bombardment on the wedding front. A lot of the advertising is really easy to turn down; I feel con\u00adfident about getting through my wedding day without the aid of a monogrammed plastic cake slicer or confetti that spells \u201cCongratulations!\u201d<\/p>\n
However, some of it is a little harder to ignore. It was really surprising to me how much I found myself being drawn in by the ads trying to convince me that I need to lose weight, especially because most of the weight-loss ads really are stu\u00adpid. On the scale of legitimacy from \u201cconfetti\u201d to \u201ca well-made dress,\u201d the weight loss ads tend to fall way down on the confetti side.<\/p>\n
If I\u2019m going to lose weight, it\u2019s not going to be with \u201cStrip That Fat,\u201d \u201cBridal Bootcamp\u201d or \u201cAcaiSlim\u201d (I didn\u2019t see a single one suggesting the old \u201cmoderate diet and exercise\u201d regime). In fact, I\u2019m pretty sure that there\u2019s a rule book for writing weight-loss ads, because they all follow pretty much the same formula.<\/p>\n
They start by featuring a sad, pathetic \u201cbefore\u201d photo of the \u201cfat\u201d person who is \u201cmiserable\u201d because of her (and it\u2019s almost always her) weight. Then come the outlandish promises about fantastic success with no effort, and the talk about all the health ben\u00adefits of weight loss in general and the product in particular. Next, they an\u00adnounce what a fabulous, money-sav\u00ading, one-time-only deal the product is. Finally, there is the prominently displayed \u201cafter\u201d photo of the made-over, better photographed, airbrushed \u201cskinny person\u201d who is so much hap\u00adpier, thanks to this wonderful product!<\/p>\n
The particularly devious as\u00adpect of these ads isn\u2019t that they are so convincing; it\u2019s that they are ev\u00aderywhere. As you might expect, I first noticed these ads on Facebook, after the all-important switching-of-the-relationship-status to \u201cengaged.\u201d<\/p>\n
I didn\u2019t notice right away, probably because I was responding to the thousands of \u201cCongrats!\u201d wall posts, but at some point, I realized that all the ads that used to encour\u00adage me to see a movie or become an egg donor (a whole new can of weird, weird worms) were now making help\u00adful suggestions about losing \u201call that weight\u201d before the wedding. I\u2019m talk\u00ading about 95% of all the ads Facebook shows me. While I get the occasional advertisement for a photographer or wedding planner, the overwhelming majority are about weight loss. And since they only appeared once I was \u201cengaged,\u201d it\u2019s clear that they\u2019re tar\u00adgeted towards the wedding crowd.<\/p>\n
My fianc\u00e9, by the way, has gotten no similar ads on his Facebook. Not only has he not seen any ads about losing weight, he hasn\u2019t seen a single one about anything to do with his ap\u00adpearance. Mostly, his ads are about movies, with the occasional photogra\u00adpher or honeymoon suggestion thrown in. He does get those emails adver\u00adtising various \u201cmale enhancement\u201d products, but that\u2019s a whole different kettle of proverbial fish.<\/p>\n
Of course, wedding weight-loss ads are not limited to Facebook. Wedding magazines and wedding plan\u00adning websites are only two of the other most obvious examples. Inter\u00adestingly, I haven\u2019t seen any ads for weight-loss in or near any wedding dress stores. I would guess this is be\u00adcause these stores are already trying to sell me something, and they don\u2019t want to encourage me to spend money on anything else.<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t worry, though: these stores make up for the lack of ads with a surfeit of size zero models, gleefully prancing around in the dresses I\u2019m about to try on. There are very few advertisements featuring \u201cplus size\u201d women, or any women above a size zero, and, of those, none of them ap\u00adpear in ads with the same degree of polish and couture that the \u201cregular\u201d women receive.<\/p>\n
Granted, this is true of any clothing advertisements, but wedding dresses receive special scrutiny. \u201cThe most important dress you\u2019ll ever buy\u201d is just one of the terrifying titles a wedding dress gets, and dress adver\u00adtisers do their best to reinforce that message. In other words, wedding dress shopping hardly provides any re\u00adlief from the self-esteem barrage.<\/p>\n
Clearly I\u2019m aware that the presence of these ads doesn\u2019t mean that I, personally, need to lose weight. I should pretty much be able to say, \u201cGive me a break\u201d and move on. But for some reason, since I\u2019ve been en\u00adgaged, my self-esteem has taken a dis\u00adtinct downturn.<\/p>\n
And despite my long-standing dislike of gyms and having the busi\u00adest semester since I came to college, I have started going to the gym twice a week with my fianc\u00e9. I know that exercise is good for me \u2013 it gives me more energy, keeps me healthy, all that good stuff. But knowing all that has never made it worth my while be\u00adfore. The fact is that common roman\u00adticisms about the \u201cbeautiful bride\u201d can seem like a lot of pressure when they\u2019re turned on you. And some\u00adtimes, all the knowledge about unhealthy gender expectations in the world doesn\u2019t make you feel any better when you look in the mirror.<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s take a moment to revel in the irony here. Isn\u2019t the point of getting married that you\u2019ve found someone who loves you uncon\u00additionally, at your best and your worst? I mean, I\u2019m all for looking one\u2019s best in any situation, and, ok, let\u2019s be clear: I\u2019m certainly planning on looking my best for my wedding. But I don\u2019t think \u201clooking my best\u201d should require the sacrifice of my peace of mind.<\/p>\n
A wedding should be about celebrating the fact that two people have decided to commit themselves to each other. It isn\u2019t about proving to my future spouse, or anyone else, that I\u2019m pretty enough to marry him. If I\u2019m supposed to spend my time preparing for it by making myself as beautiful as I can be, a wedding sounds like a pretty shallow celebration of love.<\/p>\n
As much as I can, I try not to let the pressure get me down. I know I should be too self-confident to lose weight just because a wedding maga\u00adzine tells me to. Still, on my bad days, something about the experience of be\u00ading targeted by weight-loss ads makes me feel like maybe I\u2019m just not quite good enough. Overall, the \u201cbe skin\u00adnier\u201d message is only one message among many other positive ones, and the bad days are pretty rare. Still, I think it\u2019s worth noting that it is a mes\u00adsage at all. In the midst all the joy a wedding entails, this is one message I haven\u2019t quite been able to tune out.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Senior Claire Richmond describes her battle against wedding weight-loss advertisements that have been targeting her ever since she became engaged.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":43,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[33,233],"tags":[132,131,78,130,133],"class_list":["post-115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-perspective","category-vol-2-issue-1","tag-advertisements","tag-claire-richmond","tag-engagement","tag-marriage","tag-weight-loss"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/43"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}