The National Organization for Women has named Oct. 15 as National Love Your Body Day. The day was created to bring attention to the negative and harmful pressure women and young girls are under to be ultra-thin and ultra-beautiful.

"On Oct. 15, NOW chapters and campus and community activists across the country are celebrating Love Your Body Day with actions and events... Some communities are holding mentoring workshops promoting self-esteem among women and girls, while several campuses are organizing 'Girls Night In' events to discuss safety on and off campus."

Though many of the events took place on college campuses, women everywhere were encouraged to participate simply by getting together and encouraging one another to love the bodies they're in, rather than idolize the unrealistic bodies portrayed by the media and fashion industry. Source: National Organization for Women

Labels: awareness, pressures, society

Manon Slome is the curator of the Chelsea Art Museum in New York. She's recently put together a multi-media collection titled Dangerous Beauty which consists of video, photographs, paintings, sculptures and a bathroom scale.

"Curator Manon Slome says the purpose of the exhibit was to create a little anxiety for the audience. 'People are scared to be weighed in public and that's why I want to have this at the beginning of the show to create a sense of anxiety which I feel is the result of the beauty industry.'"

The exhibit includes a straitjacket covered in artificial nails, and a series of photographs that document a women's forehead implant surgery. Curator Slome hopes the exhibit will change people's perceptions by showing the high cost of paid by those who to adhere to society's strict definition of "beauty".

Read more at VOANews.com.

Labels: art, awareness, society