Amy Schumer Called Out A Magazine For Including Her In Their "Plus Size" Issue As A Size 6, And 18 Other Times Celebs Called Out The Media For Screwing With Their Body Image
It's no secret that the media produced and peddled by Hollywood has had a negative impact on lots of people's body image — including the celebrities who create and star in those movies, music videos, and magazine covers.
Vogue / Via giphy.com
A lot of them haven't held back when it comes to calling out how their careers affected the way they feel about their own bodies.
Identity / Via giphy.com
Here are 19 times celebs called out Hollywood and the media for the negative way they impacted their body image:
Some entries mention eating disorders and body dysmorphia.
1.Rebel Wilson drew attention to the fact that her 2020 weight loss garnered more media attention than the four films she starred in during 2019 did.
She told the Australian Daily Telegraph, “In 2019, I had, like, four movies come out, two which I produced and one, Jojo Rabbit, which got nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture. Yet I get more press the following year when I do nothing except lose weight."
2.Kumail Nanjiani told Vulture that, after undergoing a physical transformation for Eternals, he began to experience body dysmorphia, and when a paparazzi picture of him outside his gym went viral, "To hear a bunch of people reaffirming my own darkest thoughts about myself was very difficult."
He said, "It’s very easy to get obsessed with that number on the scale. It’s a tough thing. It's deceiving. You become obsessed with it. I certainly have, and for me, it’s not great to weigh myself every day. I could tell you what I weigh today."
3.When Beyoncé was 19, she began to feel insecure because of comments people were making about her body, but she "woke up one day and refused to feel sorry for [herself]" and then wrote the iconic Destiny's Child song "Bootylicious."
She told Harper's Bazaar, "It was the beginning of me using whatever life handed me and turning it into something empowering to other women and men who were struggling with the same thing."
4.During an Instagram Live, Miley Cyrus said that after people online mocked her 2013 VMAs performance and compared her body to turkey, she "basically went through two or three years where [she] wouldn't wear shorts" and "stopped wearing skirts onstage."
She said, "I was just starting to understand myself as an independent person, and it was just really, really hurtful to be so body-shamed like that. It really affected me in my personal life."
5.Speaking about her post-weight-loss Instagram pictures that went viral despite the fact that she didn't mention her body in the post, Adele clarified to Vogue, "My body’s been objectified my entire career. It’s not just now."
She continued, "I understand why it’s a shock. I understand why some women especially were hurt. Visually, I represented a lot of women. But I’m still the same person. The most brutal conversations were being had by other women about my body. I was very fucking disappointed with that. That hurt my feelings."
6.Lizzo told Apple Music's Zane Lowe that, as a plus-size woman in music, one of the most difficult parts of her career is "accepting that [she] was a part of a new movement or a wave" when she was only being herself.
She continued, "This is the biggest insecurity. It's like, 'How dare a pop star be fat?' I had to own that."
7.Amy Schumer put Glamour on blast for including her in their "plus-size only" issue "without asking or letting [her] know," which she said on Instagram didn't feel right to her because "plus-size is considered size 16 in America. I go between a size 6 and an 8...young girls seeing my body type thinking that is plus-size?"
She also said, "I think there's nothing wrong with being plus-size. Beautiful healthy women...[My thoughts] are not cool [G]lamour not glamorous."
8.Mindy Kaling told Good Morning America that one day in The Office writers room, a coworker suggested that their character should tell hers that she could lose 15 pounds as a "joke."
She said, "I had a reckoning where I'm like, 'People are scrutinizing [me], and not only are they scrutinizing [me], they're verbalizing their displeasure with how I look because I don't look a certain way... That kind of dissonance has really affected so much of what I write about [and] the kind of characters I play. Almost all of those kinds of things [in my work] come from something really real."
9.Megan Fox told British GQ that, after being heavily sexualized early in her career, she reached a "breaking point" following Jennifer's Body and has "body dysmorphia...[and] a lot of deep insecurities."
She said, "We may look at somebody and think, 'That person’s so beautiful. Their life must be so easy.' They most likely don’t feel that way about themselves."
10.Sharing a screenshot of a Daily Mail article about him going shirtless at the beach, Jonah Hill said he didn't take his shirt off at the pool until he reached his 30s, and it "probably would have happened sooner if [his] childhood insecurities weren’t exacerbated by years of public mockery about [his] body by press and interviewers."
He continued, "So the idea that the media tries to play me by stalking me while surfing and printing photos like this and it can’t phase me anymore is dope...I'm 37 and finally love and accept myself."
Several months later, he made another Instagram post kindly asking his followers to stop making comments about his body because "good or bad...it's not helpful and doesn't feel good."
11.After their Saturday Night Live performance, Halsey addressed comments about their postpartum body on Instagram, writing, "The body behind all those compliments the other night was wearing a custom tailored outfit and lighted perfectly after much testing, so I could feel good and do my job. I do not want to feed the Illusion that you’re meant to feel and look 'great' immediately postpartum."
They said, "[My body] is still changing and I am letting it. I have no interest in working out right now. I’m too tired and too busy playing with my darling son."
12.Jessie Cave told the Independent that she gained weight after filming Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, and when she returned for The Deathly Hallows, she "was treated like a different species."
She continued, "I definitely felt invisible when I gained a little bit of weight. And since then, it’s made me have weird issues with weight and work — and it’s so fucked up, but it’s just how it is. Women have to deal with that all the time.”
13.Sharing a shirtless picture on Instagram, Sam Smith said, "In the past if I have ever done a photo shoot with so much as a t-shirt on, I have starved myself for weeks in advance and then picked and prodded at every picture and then normally taken the picture down... Yesterday I decided to fight the fuck back."
They continued, "[I decided to] reclaim my body and stop trying to change this chest and these hips and these curves that my mum and dad made and love so unconditionally... Some may take this as narcissistic and showing off, but if you knew how much courage it took to do this and the body trauma I have experienced as a kid, you wouldn’t think those things.”
14.In her documentary Miss Americana, Taylor Swift said that seeing magazine covers insinuating that she'd gained weight or might be pregnant "would just trigger [her] to just…starve a little bit."
She continued, "I would’ve defended it to anyone who said, ‘I’m concerned about you.' I was like, ‘What are you talking about? Of course I eat. It’s perfectly normal. I just exercise a lot.’ And I did exercise a lot. But I wasn’t eating.”
However, she eventually realized that “if you eat food, have energy, get stronger, you can do all these shows and not feel it...which is a really good revelation."
She said, "Because I’m a lot happier with who I am and...I don’t care as much if somebody points out that I have gained weight. It’s just something that makes my life better.”
15.Jessica Simpson told Today that, after photos of her performing in mom jeans went viral in 2009, she felt "taken down by the world," and "it ruined the stage for [her]," which had previously felt like home.
She continued, "I'm so happy that times are changing now and more women are accepted for who they are. People are flaunting themselves at every size, because that's how it absolutely should be."
16.On The Ellen Show, Demi Lovato said that they struggled with an eating disorder in part because of the extreme measures their previous team took to control their life, such as removing the phone from their hotel rooms to prevent them from calling room service and taking away fruit because there was sugar in it.
They also said that they were only allowed to eat fruit once a year — a melon covered in fat-free whipped cream in lieu of a birthday cake. However, after signing with a new manager, they were finally able to eat a real birthday cake.
They said, "I just remember crying because I was finally eating cake with a manager that didn't need anything from me and that loved me for who I am and supported my journey."
17.After a bikini picture of Khloé Kardashian that was posted without her approval went viral, she shared unedited videos of herself on Instagram and said, "The photo that was posted this week is beautiful... But as someone who has struggled with body image her whole life, when someone takes a photo of you that isn't flattering in bad lighting or doesn't capture your body the way it is after working so hard to get it to this point — and then shares it to the world — you should have every right to ask for it to not be shared."
She continued, "In truth, the pressure, constant ridicule and judgment my entire life to be perfect and meet [others'] standards of how I should look has been too much to bear."
18.On No Filter With Naomi, Ashley Graham said that, after she was on the cover of Sports Illustrated, another model got upset and said that Ashley "was very large, and that women [Ashley's] size should not be on the cover.”
When Naomi Campbell asked who the model was, Ashley said, "It was before your generation... It starts with a C... It was interesting because it brought a whole perspective to the industry... Of course you're going to get negativity; you're always going to get negativity. It brought up a great conversation of, 'What is health? What is beauty? What is sexy?'"
19.And finally, on Instagram, Jameela Jamil highlighted the fact that money "is the reason most people don't look as thin and young as celebrities" and gives celebs access to certain privileges, such personal trainers, organic food, surgeons, and makeup artists.
She continued, "And then ON TOP of that, they are airbrushed without telling you they are... You are being set up for a fall within this comparison porn culture. Swerve the lies and just do you."
