If you know Zendaya, 19, you know that she is the perfect role model, not only for our younger generation but for us younger adults as well. Last year she ran into a huge confrontation with television star Giuliana Rancic, 47, during the Oscar 2015 Awards Show. Zendaya rocked a natural hairstyle that consisted of glorious, jeweled locks and an elegant white dress. Giuliana blatantly said, "Like I feel like she smells like patchouli oil. Or weed.”
Seriously? Zendaya responded ever-so-professionally on her Instagram to Giuliana's disrespectful comment, saying:
With that being said, I think we can all assume that Zendaya is not to be messed with. You will receive a response that will gracefully assign you a seat in a stadium full of people who tried it. It doesn't stop there though! This weekend at the 2016 Kids' Choice Awards, Zendaya received the Favorite Female TV Star award for her lead role in "KC Undercover."
Spoiling the celebration, comedian Julie Klausner, 37, decided to attack Zendaya via Twitter, saying, "And a thinspo model for your impressionable tweens" -- complete with a picture of Zendaya accepting her award underneath. She goes as far to say that "Zendaya's ultimate retort to Giuliana Rancic is starving herself down to the size of one of her elbowz." Oh, it doesn't stop there, my friends. She then said, "I will never stop criticizing celebs who perpetuate dangerous beauty standards for a generation of girls who grow up thinking they're fat."
Clearly there is a problem here. Klausner must have completely forgotten that there are people who are criticized for being thin! She herself is one of those people who is criticizing someone for their size. It doesn't matter if someone is smaller or bigger than you -- they're still a person of equal value and it is wrong to judge or verbally attack anyone for their body shape.
There is such a thing as a metabolism, Klausner. Some are faster than others. From my own personal experience, growing up with immature, hypercritical, insolent and uneducated kids, I got made fun of for my somewhat heavy weight. It wasn't a fun time, but I can also tell you that it wasn't just people who were smaller than me who picked on me.
In my time slightly obsessing over Zendaya, I have never once heard or read anything that showed Zendaya degrading a group of people, nor claiming that they have health issues by simply looking at them. If anything, she uplifts everyone of all shapes, sizes and colors. She empowers those who choose the natural hairstyle movement. Those who don't, she encourages you to beat your face to the gods (doing your makeup so well that Aphrodite herself is put to shame), but also to wear your natural glow when you need to. There is literally no wrong in this girl. She has a great head on her shoulders.
My main question to you Julie is this: Why knock down someone who fights just as hard to support the same causes you do? You claim that your personal attack against Zendaya was only a joke, but you hurt people in the process of making it, and then proceeded to post it on one of the most popular social media websites.
Those same people who grow up thinking they're fat think that way because of people like you, who think everything is a joke. Those same people who developed eating disorders and anorexia were most likely told that they were fat or had an unfavorable body type. Those same people who gained weight because they were too skinny are now being made fun of because they have fallen into the never-ending cycle of what females should look like and what is "healthy" and what is not.
You say all women are beautiful, but you criticize those who you think are too skinny or unhealthy. You created your own twisted beauty standards, isolating and degrading those of a thinner body size. Julie Klausner, I need you to know that what you said is wrong. If you plan on helping those girls who want to escape these impossible beauty standards, start by lifting up those of all beautiful body types, as well as the ones you brushed to the side.
Body-shaming is a two-way street, my friend, and you are stuck in the middle. This goes for everyone out there with the urge to comment or attack people for their body shape. According to our country's beauty standards, you can't win. This is why we have plus-size models breaking the "model stereotype". This is also why we have thinner models embracing their skin and their body structure in magazines and on television. There is beauty in everybody, and I think it is time that we stop looking at women through a "perfect" telescope. In that process, we are isolating those that bring comfort and change to a world full of impractical beauty standards and creating our own form of body-shaming. It needs to end now, because the world of beauty is changing. So get in with the new or get out with the old. Seriously, leave.
