"I may be fat, but I beat my eating disorder"

[Exian]

I think what we're witnessing (it's probably obvious, and goes without saying) is some push back towards the use of fit, tan, athletic women to sell products. Now, can you fault businesses for doing what makes them the most money? Is there even a fault? You have a majority of men liking a certain body type- that body type helps sell a product- we end up with a public saturated with the image of a certain female body type. Meanwhile, women who don't have that body type feel bad about their bodies.

So, when they do push back, they aren't arguing that their bodies should be used to sell products; they aren't saying "You should think this is sexy, too."; and they don't seem to be aiming their message towards men at all. The point seems to be to form a support group of like-bodied people, in order to raise their own opinions of their bodies out from the negative end of the pool, and into the positive. In other words, they aren't telling us they're sexy, they're telling theirselves that.

This becomes a moral issue, doesn't it? Should these businesses market their product this way, when one reaction to those ads is an increase in sales, while another simultaneous reaction is a drop in self-esteem for large groups of women?

Again, I understand their health is the thing being brought into question, and that I've largely ignored this, but mental health is just as important. And it seems to be at least a start, right?