What effect is size zero models having on the fashion industry and young girls in society?

I'm sure you've all heard by now of the sad news of Ana Carolina Reston who recently died of an infection due to being Anorexic. She started out as a "normal" size model and then through extreme diet/starvation got down to a size zero. The fact that Armani and other high name designers choose to encourage models to dwindle their bodies to such rail thin dimensions is despicable (not spelled correctly, I'm sure but I'm angry)! Apparently women should be dead in order to fit into their designs. The message is clear: if you want to be beautiful, sexy, and successful then you must be thin.... EXTREMELY thin.

Check out this link to see how far young girls are willing to go to be thin. http://mamavision.wordpress.com/2006/11/10/ana-mia...

American girls, younger and younger are becoming obsessed with being thin. They are engaging in dangerous antics to lose weight, such as weight loss supplements, starvation, excessive excercise, binging and purging and now their mothers have started to join in.

The sad thing is the industry preys on young women's self image and bullies them into believing the thinner they are, the more beautiful they are and the more successful they will be. All women (model and non-model) should come together and say enough is enough. Why are fashion designers dictating what a woman's body should be like? They are the ones who want us to buy their clothes, we should be telling them what's acceptable. The fashion industry may consider Ana's death an isolated case but there are tens of thousands of women out there trying desperately to be like Ana and they are starving themselve's too. Ana is not an isolated case she just happen to be in the limelight and that's why we know her story, but there are many others.

The madness needs to stop. (sorry for the rant)

MADRID, Spain - Organizers of Spain's top annual fashion show on Saturday rejected five models as being too thin to appear in this year's event.

The show, known as the Pasarela Cibeles, had decided earlier this month not to allow women below a predetermined body mass index to parade down the catwalk.

Doctors Susana Monereo of Spain's National Endocrinology Society and Basilio Moreno, an obesity consultant at Gregorio Maranon Hospital, were among the specialists called on to medically assess the models.

Five of the 68 models who showed up for appraisal failed the test, the doctors said. The models were over 5 feet 7 inches tall and weighed less than 121.25 pounds, Monereo said.

"They had a body mass index below, well below, that which is considered normal not just by the Spanish endocrinology society, whom we represent, but also by the limits set by the World Health Organization," Monereo said.

Having models being zero and subzero sized is having a HUGE impact on our teens! Opening up a magazine and seeing ultra unhealthy and thin women, more teens are apt to have an eating disorder.

media has a HUGE influence on the way a girl and even older women look at themselves. they thik to not be a size 0 is not pretty. Parents are totally against the whole thing because there are way too many teen girls suffering form this. it has become so serious that because one russian model fainted on the watwalk that some counteries have now banned models from being too skninny.

well not all size 0 models are anorexic or suffer from bulimia I am a size zero but I am very tall and slender but i work out and stay healthy

personally, i think its a bad thing. its harder for people to accept their natural body weight if they feel like they need to look like those modles.

a friend of mine has been ballemic since she was in 7th grade becuse all she wants to do is model... and its literally killing her. she's been hospitalozed sooo many times

poeple in countried where they dont have TV or movies, dont feel the need to be thin. they just live life and love it. i personally feel like i need to be thin to be accepted, and its not fun hating myself, because of those models i always feel like im not good enough.

hi i'm a model and im a size 0. i think i look very healthy! u can see some pics of me on my myspace page, do u think i look unhealthy???

http://www.myspace.com/lookinout4theogs

i don't really know, but my little sister won't eat anymore because she wants to look like the abercrombie girls

most of my friends r zero's and their body wieght is healthy...