Look over here! A slightly feminist rant!

While this is technically considered old news, I can't help but be bothered every time it crosses my mind.

A few weeks ago, Kate Moss told Women's Wear Daily that one of her mottos was "nothing tastes as good as skinny feels." The moment the words came out of her mouth, everyone from fashion critics to eating disorder groups jumped at the chance to crucify her. Fashion critics went a little easier on her, stating that perhaps she should have a different motto, while spokespeople for eating disorder awareness organizations blamed her for causing young, happy girls to be anorexic.

What Kate Moss said sounds stupid, yes. Of course food tastes better than bones feel, and anyway, that is an illogical comparision. However, does she deserve this amount of ridicule? No. It is literally in Moss' job description to be skinny. Models routinely get fired for even the slightest physical change, which certainly includes weight gain. So, berating her for having a skinny-friendly motto would be akin to lambasting a sumo wrestler for saying "Everything tastes as good as fat feels."

I whole-heartedly admit to being a feminist that focuses on body issues. For me, the mind and body of a woman are what lie at the core of feminism, ya hear? So, naturally, I've taken this whole Kate Moss thing to that level. To me, it seems like underlying issue in the Moss-hatin' trend is this: women can't do anything right with their bodies in the eyes of our society. You've got anti-obesity crusaders who are raging against Beth Ditto's "fat acceptance" attitude, anti-eating disorder activists who can't stand how skinny Kate Moss is, and the media who can't stand the "average" woman and try to sell diet books and 3-minute cake mixes with equal aplomb to push her toward one extreme or the other.

Kate Moss isn't the picture of health for the following reasons: she drinks, she smokes, she's been known to use cocaine, and probably doesn't drink enough water or eat enough fruits and vegetables because she's busy. Oh, and she's too skinny. I get that young girls, old women, and men look at models and wonder why they can't look just like that, and I think that is horrendously sad. But yelling at Kate Moss for doing her job and being vocal about it is attacking the symptom rather than the problem. How about we try to be healthy by our own standards rather than yelling at people who don't live up to impossible ones? Hmm...that might actually be difficult in this world.

Obviously, my solution is to start some sort of body-lovin' society once everything crumbles in 2012 and all we're left with is John Cusak and a whole lot of time to figure out how our body images and expectations got so twisted.