FSU NEWS
Speaker discusses body image and self acceptance with students
FSU Women's Center hosts lecture for 'Love Your Body' Week
Guest Speaker Ophira Edut lectured
to students last Wednesday evening, as she was invited by the
Florida State University Women's Center to speak about body
image as a multicultural health issue to students in honor
of the annual "Love
Your Body" Week at FSU.
A published author and writer for Teen People magazine, Edut
shared her own stories of struggling with body image and self
acceptance throughout her life and told how her own experiences
prompted her to write her book Body Outlaws and share her point
with others.
"We were just kind of born into this world," Edut
commented. "We inherited the culture and all of the connotations
about our bodies and how to look and what the right way is."
Edut travels to universities nationwide to spread her message.
"My mission is really for people to just find their own
expression and their own self acceptance," said Edut.
Edut has also been featured in Ms. Magazine, The New York Times,
and on MTV's Total Request Live.
Edut's lecture addressed a wide range of modern societal body
image pressures ranging from how to handle the problem of 'pesky
body hair' to one woman's battle with her 'junk in the trunk.'
According to Edut, 60 percent of all American women wear a size
14 or higher yet are made to feel uneasy with their bodies.
"What's wrong with this society we live in that somebody
who is statistically normal can't comfortably show a little skin?" Edut
asked.
The lecture was not only geared toward
females, as many males were in attendance in the audience.
She read an excerpt from her book written by a male author
about his feelings about societal pressure to have "washboard abs and perfect pecs." She
added that males account for 10 percent of all eating disorders.
Much of Edut's lecture focused on how the media conditions society
to have a poor body image. According to Edut, the average American
sees between 400-600 advertisements per day. She said that poor
body image is an epidemic, eating disorders are on the rise,
and more people every year are getting plastic surgery at a younger
age.
"It's a world where there is one right way to be, and you
have got to fit in with that or in so many subtle or not-so-subtle
ways you're made to feel that there is something wrong with you," said
Edut.
In addition to her lecture, Edut also read excerpts from her
book, conducted an audience questionnaire, led students in 'body
image fairy tale mad libs' and allowed for a question and answer
session.
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