Bravo! The “You Are Beautiful” campaign is just what women and young girls these days really need to see – women, as they are, no photoshopping, just in their own skin…and owning it proudly. I know I don’t even need to address how frustrating it is to feel confident in a body our photoshopping society tells us is flawed. It’s not that it’s flawed either, it’s just who we are. There are really no flaws, only uniqueness.
That’s my only qualm about campaigns or groups that try to counteract this shallow culture we live in with finding beauty in our flaws. I haven’t found a person yet that has a flaw of any kind and I’m just being honest. We aren’t meant to look the same and we don’t all take care of our bodies the same way. There is no reason to live in shame because someone else has determined what we use as the benchmark for perfection. It’s all subjective. The only relevant aspect is this: Do you love yourself?
This campaign is very positive and uplifting. Those who left comments had a mixed bag of emotions regarding this campaign, however. Some were very glad to see a positive spin on one’s body acceptance, some felt it only depicted mothers and questioned whether the message was not including women who decided to not have children, and some felt it put too much emphasis on accepting physical appearance.
I truly do feel that some people just really do not care about their appearance, and that’s fine too. For the women who have lived feeling ashamed of their bodies because of this celebrity-worshipping culture, this is a good message. I don’t believe they were intentionally leaving out women who decided not to have children; it just looks like celebrating a mother’s body is more her focus than women who haven’t had children. I wouldn’t doubt another campaign will come forward featuring women who did not have children.
In the air of positivity and acceptance, I would hope that a positive message remain a positive message – that we are ALL worth self love and acceptance, whether it be physical or otherwise. Just remember, you are beautiful just the way you are.
More Protests
Violent clashes at Brazil teachers’ protest in Curitiba, BBC NEWS
There is more civil protesting going on in the world this week. This week, the protests are taking us to Brazil where many teachers are protesting a new fund that will house their pensions. The teachers feel that this new fund source will not be as secure and they are worried their pensions will be compromised by this fund movement and have decided to strike and protest to speak for their state pensions.
Over 200 teachers have been injured when police officers fired rubber bullets and stun grenades at the demonstrators.
Despite the protesting, the state assembly approved the changes on Wednesday.
The article stops there. Well that’s news right? These teachers who banded together to protest someone else deciding where their money was going to go just should have not said anything at all. It would have saved 200 injuries, right? Seems no matter what they would have decided to do, the vote would have done what it did.
I feel that is the message this is trying to send. I, however, don’t want to believe that’s really how it is. I can understand governments and media sources who are in bed with governments reporting on this one. Two hundred plus teachers (not gangsters, not ISIS, not criminals….TEACHERS) were injured in what appeared to be a “war zone”. These injuries were for naught. Nothing happened to stop the funding vote they disagreed with.
In the future, stay home, shut up, and do what you are told. Is this like our American Government who claims to not negotiate with terrorists, I wonder. If you disagree with the status quo, you are not to be “negotiated” with? Your voice means nothing, even if your voice is speaking out for something that affects you? I don’t know, but it doesn’t seem like this is a good way to have handled this at all.
Why didn’t they just let these teachers protest? I have to ask myself, if the demonstrators were trying to get into somewhere and that’s what caused this unnecessary violence, where were they trying to go? Maybe they were trying to vote? Maybe they were trying to let the state assembly hear their plea? Why would teachers just up and decide to create this havoc? This war zone? It doesn’t add up.
For the length of this article and the amount of questions that I am raising, something tells me 1 and 1 does not equal 2. We are missing a HUGE portion of this story.
No matter what we are told, no matter the source, we should always question and find our internal lie detector; our own discernment. We should not just sit down and shut up because it will cause problems if we do. A real leader, a real government, even a real democracy would WANT questions. Would want collaboration. What is this? It just doesn’t jive.
We are far greater beings than we have been told, far greater beings than most of us realize.
In Light and Love,
Lindsey