It’s become clear over the decade that people come in all shapes and sizes. The outline set out by social media, the one with the hourglass figure, has become redundant as the movement to have people love themselves continues to change social standards. This movement, seen in changes like the one taking the Barbie Empire by storm, has its obstacles that sprout up of course. The latest setback has taken form in what is known as the A4 challenge and is nothing short of ridiculous.
Just in case someone out there doesn’t know about the challenge taking over social media platforms, I’ll explain it. The A4 challenge is a trend in which women hold an 8.3 by 11.7 inch paper vertically in front of them to take a selfie. If their waist is hidden by the paper in the picture, they’ve won the #A4waistchallenge. This trend first became a thing among Chinese women on foreign platforms like Weibo, Wexin, and Wechat, and has become point of debate among those who support the challenge and those that do not.
Those Against It
Surprisingly, (or not surprising at all) the backlash against the challenge is led by contesters from Western culture through twitter and Instagram, using their own photos to condemn the practice. From women and some men using poster sized papers to using their college degrees, people are using title #PaperlessAndBeautiful to counteract the trend. With the challenge even being called a fitness challenge by some, even the Asian American community has spoken out against it.
The “A4 Waist Challenge” is being shared and described as a fitness challenge, which ignores the fact that waist size doesn’t directly translate to health,” writes Reappropriate, a leading blog in the Asian American community.
We readily accept that thin people can be healthy and un-thin people can be unhealthy, but we forget that people with large waists can also be physically active and highly fit while people with small waists can have exceptionally low physical fitness.
Those For It
With so much backlash hitting the trend and its participants, many women who favor the practice have begun to fight back. The women defend the A4 challenge by saying that within the Chinese culture, junk food is not something eaten often which has led to thinner people in the country. A woman who received negative comments on her Instagram feed explained to BBC when asked,
"Growing up, I think this is normal, I think this is what people are supposed to be like," she told BBC. "My mum is 50 years of age and she's a mother of two. She probably won't fit into that piece of paper, but she's exactly the same weight as me.
When asked about her diet, she had this to say:
"The nature of our diet is very different. We don't eat as much pizza or fast food. I don't see the harm in it."
This isn’t the only challenge of its kind that has sprouted up either. Before the A4 challenge, there was the belly button challenge, where people would take selfies as they wrapped their arm around their waists to reach their belly button in order to show just how thin they were. There was also the collarbone challenge, where people would balance stacks of coins on their collarbones.
Why We Should Be Concerned
Even though this began on the other side of the world for some of us, we should still be concerned. Every picture taken is placed on the internet, and every photo on the internet can be seen wherever there is wifi, which means that every photo can be seen by someone willing to copy these extreme measures.
I’ve got a fourteen-year-old sister at home, who stays glued to her phone constantly. She has everything, from a facebook and Tumblr to an Instagram. She and her friends keep up with the latest gadgets and the latest trends, even the latest challenges. It is challenges like the A4 that she’s trying out, that are training her to believe that she’s only worth the size of her waist. I think I can say for all big sisters out there that this isn’t what we want little sisters believing. I only hope that things like paper thin waists can one day make enough room for my sister to love her own skin, instead of crushing the beauty within her.
