On Going On Diet

My piece for the Pub:

Aside from fashion and cosmetic products, one way to enhance feminine beauty for women is perhaps going on diet. In this skinny era, far too many women depart from the classical ideals of feminine beauty and often find themselves complaining that their waists are too wide, legs too short, and sometimes even breasts too small. Unlike ancient times, chubbiness is no longer an indicator of physical virtue, but rather, an offensive deviation from an ideal proportion that runs contrary to the Golden Ratio.

How much determination they need to resist the temptation to salivate towards a box of Belgian chocolate; how much courage they may have to show to devour a piece of strawberry cake regardless what a scientific formula about sugar and fats may have to reveal. To fill their stomach with the tiniest amount of sugary product is to lay down the very foundation of obesity. It's almost as if a piece of candy may easily lead women to avoid the verdict of a full-length mirror and possibly deny them of the opportunity to appear on a Vogue magazine.

Yet this aesthetic assault which women have so rigorously practised is hardly the sole evidence of masochism. Humans are both independent and dependent creatures. If women are willing to suffer from this assault, it might be because men tend to be seduced by this concept of slimness as well. According to most men, physical beauty of women can be measured according to an objective standard, a view that is so influential on women that it has become their own. In order for a woman to be beautiful, the contour and the shape of a woman have to be symmetrically balanced, waists narrow, breasts not flat, bottoms slightly larger, and legs thinner so as to make them seem longer. This view seems to suggest that there is a mathematical basis of beauty, hence the faces that successfully appear on the front cover of magazines are necessarily rather than subjectively pleasing.

What's more is that the rigours of going on diet may bear a certain wisdom that comes from ancient Greek philosophy. In ancient Greece, self-control was of the utmost importance. Inscribed on thousands of vases and ceramics was the guidance on how people should maintain their diet. Socrates once said to one of his companions Epigenes, "You've got the body of someone who just isn't engaged in public matters." He then suggests, "You should care for your body no less than an Olympic athlete." Apparently, physical training was part of the duty of a Greek citizen. The ancient Greeks believed that physical self-control could eventually lead to self-control of the mind which was a necessity if one were to participate politics. Hence modern women may be said to draw wisdom from the ancient Greek philosophy not in order to participate in politics, but instead to nurture their reasoning abilities. How easily a masochistic practice may be mistaken to be self-indulgent.

However, ruminating over the schism between aesthetic perfection of femininity and culinary delight, is it really impossible to reconcile these two ideals? Are women to rely on bases, mascaras, eye liners and such which could chisel a dent from their bank accounts to meet the criterion of absolute beauty? Do they have to be committed to a self-inflicting diet in order to wear bikini and lingerie?

The fact that most women spend a great deal of fortune on cosmetic products, fashion, and diet programmes has risked inspiring an unfair neglect of their habits of eating and a misguided enthusiasm towards artificial inventions. If their appreciation of dessert and junk food is liable to rupture their physical beauty, it is not because these things are inherently harmful, but because women have never quite got the ability to savour what they eat rather than taking in too-big quantities, given the fact that we are living in a society that encourages us to get several things done within a day. The stomach needs time to register fullness, and through taking our time while eating, we may slowly reduce our overall consumption which will prevent obesity. Slower eating not only helps us to productively realise how much food we really need, but also enjoy life while we are eating. We should not forget that the best kind of food is to be enjoyed through our manner of absorption instead of the extent of our consumption.

Those who have known me long enough should testify that I'm not very far from being a skeleton. So eating slowly must work. Therefore, women should eat all they want. Only through eating what they like and enjoying it, they can become slimmer.

W