Can We Ban the Skinny Beauty Standard?

It's not skinny that's bad--it's the anorexia, bulimia and obsession with size that's bad. The fashion industry makes billions a year on products to make us thinner or appear thinner. Such measures won't ban skinny, just raise awareness, which is a great thing. In America we should focus our efforts on obesity.

No, but the public can disregard this fatal obsession with being skinny ... the supreme desire to be a zero size. You have an eternity to look like a skeleton after your dead and buried.

Banning skinny in France? The country where men pride themselves of their petite wives, little dogs and little houses? I mean really, isn't it part of their heritage? Coming now with a bit of European perspective, and after talking with French friends, I doubt this bill will make it through the upper house. If it does, can you image Milan, Japan and other cities suddenly following suite and changing their run-way standards? I don't think they will--even it sends a good message to women.

Banning skinny is different from banning public incitement to extreme thinness. I agree with the bill. I also think that such incitement can be fairly obvious and easy to demonstrate if the French government and people sincerely desire change. That's the question.

I don't think we can ban skinny as an immediate fix to body image and health problems, but I do think that measures like those France has taken will eventually make a difference.