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As I was standing in a supermarket line last night, I was assaulted by the Australian tabloid women’s magazines at the checkout. Juxtaposed on the covers were headlines screaming “Kirstie Blows Out” and “Brad Fears For Fading Angelina”.

Poor, tragic, Kirstie (Alley) recently lost umpteen kilos after starving herself for months on a diet of cardboard-like Jenny Craig dinners and wasn’t the tabloid sisterhood proud? After years of lampooning the star of Fat Actress over her weight and alleged hamburger-addiction, she was hailed a heroine for trimming down. “Good for her!” I thought at the time, knowing from personal experience how humiliating it can be to witness other people’s reactions to your weight gain. But, at the same time, I predicted she’d re-gain the kilos (as most Jenny Craig ‘losers’ do) and suffer even more stinging public ridicule via these so-called ‘women’s magazines’ for ‘falling off the diet wagon’. I was right. She’s ‘ballooning’ again and every kilo is being tracked by the paparazzi and salivated over by culpable editors.

Angelina Jolie, meanwhile, was being criticised by the same magazines for her diminishing frame and accused of suffering from an eating disorder. Talk about irony!

These mags are to the Australian print media what A Current Affair and Today Tonight are to TV journalism - a destructive, anti-intellectual assault on the senses and the mind. But what makes them worse offenders in my book is that, unlike the male-dominated world of tabloid TV, it’s women who run these magazines and women who buy them. And, it’s women who are almost exclusively their victims.

I have particular empathy for the ‘Fat Actress’ after being compared to her by a female colleague in the week after embarrassing photos of her (with hamburger being stuffed guiltily into her mouth) were published world-wide. I’ve always thought of Kirstie Alley as a beautiful woman – thin or fat – so I should have been flattered by the comparison. Instead I was stung. I knew where this woman was going when, in the next breath, she asked me “Aren’t you hot in all that polyester?” Suffice it to say she’s young, gorgeous, privileged and thin - and we’re not close.

What is it with women? Why are we so prone to bitchiness and the destruction of each others’ self-confidence? How can we be proud of our sex when we delight so much in other women’s misfortune and public humiliation? Don’t we have enough to contend with in a society where sexism and domestic violence are rampant and the glass ceiling still stifles our careers? How liberated are we, really, when our identities are apparently still so deeply connected to our body image?

I’ve been pondering these questions at length lately because I’ve realised just how guilty I’ve been of assigning large chunks of my own self-worth in accordance with what society deems physical beauty to be (which is a very narrow definition in itself!). And, in subconsciously adopting this measuring stick, I’ve devalued men as well as myself. What I mean is this: it’s not physical beauty in a man (and, being heterosexual, it’s blokes who draw me in) which makes me swoon. Take, for example, George Clooney: there's no doubt he's extraordinarily physically attractive, but it’s his wit, charisma, talent and political activism that move me from admiring him, as one would admire a Rembrandt, to a state of semi-swooning. And, beyond Hollywood - in the real world - it’s intelligence, humour, soulfulness, creativity, passion, and courage tempered by tenderness, that ‘do it’ for me. So, if my attraction to men is so multi-dimensional, why do I sell them short by assuming they won’t find me attractive because of my ample ‘curves’?

It took a man – a virtual stranger - to wake me up to this double standard. When he told me he found me attractive, I was floored. Who, me? In my mind, while I'd attracted plenty of male attention when I was thin, I’d pretty much come to assume that I was, as a ‘larger lass’, physically repugnant to men. So, I’d assumed this amazing, swoon-worthy guy in a handsome wrapper wouldn’t find me attractive. What shallow thinking! Not only was I guilty of assigning unfairly narrow definitions of sexual desire to this man (and, by extrapolation, all men) I was underselling myself, damn it! I'd apparently forgotten I have a brain and a heart and a funny-bone - all of which I find attractive in a man, but hadn’t valued highly enough in myself.

In writing this, I realise I’m still not convinced he found me physically attractive (clearly, I have some residual ‘baggage’ to work through!)…but that’s immaterial because I know he found other, less transient, elements of me desirable and that was a real gift. He woke me up to my enduring beauty (beauty that’s more than skin-deep) and my self-confidence has grown by the bucket-load as a result. I feel like I’ve been 'turned back on' and I now count my ‘virtual stranger’ as a friend.

It’s not that my long-term partner was oblivious to my deeper desirabilty, but he fell in love with me when I was thin and I guess I’d somehow (unfairly... irrationally, perhaps) reached the conclusion that he didn’t find me physically attractive anymore either. Pretty narrow-minded of me, huh? I blame anorexic models, Hollywood, those horrid mags and a whole lot of negative socialisation experiences for this mindset. And, yes, some men can share the blame. They are the ones who rank physical beauty above all other attributes and those who reduce women to plastic boobs. (Although I really can't fathom the appeal of breasts that don't move and look likely to explode upon touch!). There are also the abusive ones... .Then, there are those men for whom size really does matter. I once knew a ridiculous man who threatened to leave his wife if she got fat after having children because she would "no longer be the woman (he) married". But, I realised long ago that such men simply aren't worthy of women's attention. And, I’ve decided it’s high time I took responsibility for my own thinking, so I’ve changed the track.

Yes, I acknowledge the need to avoid obesity for health reasons, but I’m finally shaking off decades of negative mental conditioning and I'm looking nakedly at myself in the mirror and (almost) liking what I see. Damn, self confidence is sexy!

I encourage you to join me on this journey of self-discovery. You can start by boycotting those bloody horrible tabloid ‘women’s’ mags that keep you addicted by preying on your own lack of self-confidence and your misplaced desire to feel better about yourself by laughing at other women's failure and humiliation. Do it for Kirstie, do it for me and, most importantly, do it for you!

(PS For those of you wondering what I actually look like - refer to the stylised image above; shrink her from head to toe; enlarge her waist and derriere (significantly!); normalise her facial features and lengthen her hair)

Post Script - The lyrics to India Arie's 'Video' offer food for thought on this theme:

Sometimes I shave my legs and sometimes I don't
Sometimes I comb my hair and sometimes I won't
Dependin' on how the wind blows I might even paint my toes
It really just depends on whatever feels good in my soul

(CHORUS) I'm not the average girl from your video
and I ain't built like a supermodel
But, I learned to love myself unconditionally
Because I am a queen
I'm not the average girl from your video
My worth is not determined by the price of my clothes
No matter what I'm wearing I will always be India Arie

When I look in the mirror and the only one there is me
Every freckle on my face is where it's supposed to be
And I know our creator didn't make no mistakes on me
My feet, my thighs, my lips, my eyes; I'm lovin' what I see

CHORUS

Am I less of a lady if I don't wear pantyhose?
My mama said a lady ain't what she wears but, what she knows
But, I've drawn a conclusion, it's all an illusion, confusion's the name of the
game
A misconception, a vast deception
Something's gotta change
But,don't be offended this is all my opinion
ain't nothing that I'm sayin law
This is a true confession of a life learned lesson I was sent here to share with
y'all

So get in where you fit in go on and shine
Clear your mind, now's the time
Put your salt on the shelf
Go on and love yourself
'Cos everything's gonna be all right

CHORUS

Keep your fancy drinks and your expensive minks
I don't need that to have a good time
Keep your expensive car and your caviar
All I need is my guitar
Keep your Kristal and your pistol
I'd rather have a pretty piece of crystal
Don't need your silicone I prefer my own
What God gave me is just fine

CHORUS

So get in where you fit in go on and shine
Free your mind, now's the time
Put your salt on the shelf
Go on and love yourself
Cos everything's gonna be all right

CHORUS    [read more]