Hello Sparkles!

Well, I've been watching the news today, and preliminary reports say that the world has not ended. Coincidentally, I just found an interesting, thought-provoking article from February of this year. You may have already read it and others may have blogged about it, but it was new to me. So, I thought I'd share it here.

The article is entitled, "What if Botticelli had Photoshop?" ....You guessed it, well known images of feminine beauty (from a certain age) apparently have gone under the knife! --Well, the air brush, anyway. Having been subjected to our current societal expectations, their bodies have trimmed down substantially. Details about whether said women underwent virtual liposuction, or if they may have subjected themselves to retroactive starvation diets, were not released. The medical records for Venus were unavailable, although she looks to be within a healthy weight range in her before photos, er, I mean paintings. It is doubtful that she would have had diabetes, heart disease or that her blood pressure, triglycerides or LDL would have been too high.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/n
ews/article-2098355/What-B
otticelli-Photoshop-Artist
-imagines-classic-images-g
oddess-love-Venus-size-zer
o-treatment.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

In related modern era stories, teen girls have recently protested and petitioned Teen Vogue and Seventeen Magazine, requesting that these publications show images of "Real Girls". They want the depictions to be displayed sans tampering. This seemed like a reasonable request. They held a peaceful protest. No training bras were burned. The girls raised just enough rabble to get the attention of the media, in a most grown up and appropriate way. They even started an organization to support their cause. (It has the word "Spark" in its name, too!) Victory was theirs. But really, they only kinda got any agreement from these glossy rags. Mostly, they were just told to go away. Humph. But wait; they're young yet. They just might change the world.

http://www.nydailynews.com/n
ew-york/real-girls-teen-vo
gue-protest-willowy-air-br
ushed-models-article-1.1112531

What do you think about the images of women, as portrayed throughout the ages? --Guys, please weigh in, too! Are the images the media feeds us too extreme? Is being just a little curvy really... the end of the world?

Have a Sparky Day! (It could be the last one, ever.)
: )