After Tara Watson called out the film Bridget Jones's Diary for giving women "trust issues", many others shared how the media of the early 2000s negatively affected them
Let me first start by saying that I acknowledge that the media today is nowhere near perfect. Body standards are still unattainable, women are still expected to never age, and diet culture is still running rampant, especially online. But some things have improved. It takes a long time to correct systemic issues, and when sexism is ingrained into many cultures, it takes quite a bit of effort to eradicate it. But one reason why I know things have improved, at least a little, is because when I watch many of these films or shows today, I know they haven’t aged well. They leave a bad taste in my mouth, and I’m confident that these storylines would not be successful with today’s audiences.
For example, I recently watched Friends for the first time, and wow, was I appalled by the “transformation” they give Monica to play a younger version of herself. Dawning a fat suit for comedic effect would not fly today, or at least I hope it wouldn’t. The joke is a cheap trick and in horrible taste. Of course, fatphobia still exists today, but I am confident that a plotline such as that on a popular sitcom today would face a mountain of backlash.
Even many of the films that were extremely popular in the early 2000s would never receive the same response with a modern audience. All of the jokes about Bridget Jones’ weight, along with remarks about weight in Mean Girls, The Devil Wears Prada, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, Bride Wars, and countless other films and shows would definitely be critiqued today. I’m not saying that all of those movies are awful; there are redeeming moments in some. But due to all of the discussions that have taken place in mainstream media about mental health, body positivity, eating disorder awareness and sexism over the years, I am optimistic that these storylines would not be received the same way today.
Unfortunately, that does not negate the impact that these plots had on young, impressionable viewers at the time. Countless women on Twitter shared their own struggles with disordered eating or body dysmorphia, fueled by the atrocious media at the time. And these struggles don’t vanish overnight, they can become permanent issues that take years in therapy or excruciating personal growth to overcome. Let’s look at eating disorders, for example. According to the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders, “10,200 deaths each year are the direct result of an eating disorder—that’s one death every 52 minutes.” Unfortunately, the media is very powerful when it comes to how impressionable audiences view themselves, so it’s extremely irresponsible to spread messaging that promotes disordered eating.
To learn more about what inspired this conversation on Twitter in the first place, we reached out to Tara Watson, the editor of Punkee. She shared with Bored Panda that she started rewatching Bridget Jones’s Diary at Christmas time because she loved the movies growing up. “Last year, I was watching it with my mum, and we were both shocked to see how thin Renee Zellweger was in the first movie. While she is often seen wearing frumpy and oversized clothing in the movies, there's several scenes where she's not wearing much at all and there's no denying that is a thin woman!”
“Despite this, Bridget calls herself ‘fat’ throughout, and the characters around her reinforce this skewed view,” Tara pointed out. “I didn't even recognise how odd this was while growing up in the 00s, as seeing extremely thin women represented everywhere was the norm. I was left baffled that these movies had skewed my idea of women's body shapes for so long.”
We were also curious how Tara thinks this media affected her while growing up. “To see a woman who is about a size 10 represented as ‘fat’ definitely affects how young women see themselves,” she shared. “It sets unrealistic beauty standards and stigmatizes any body shapes that aren't a size 6. Women's bodies come in all shapes and sizes, and no good can come from deeming one size as superior to another.”
But Tara is optimistic that the media is moving in a healthier direction. “The body positivity movement has seen small strides made, which has translated to TV shows like ‘Shrill’, ‘Insecure', and ‘Orange is the New Black’,” she told Bored Panda. “But there's still so much more work to be done in normalizing seeing an entire spectrum of body shapes on screen -- not just thin and mostly white bodies. That being said, thankfully I can't imagine some of the dialogue in Bridget Jones would fly today.”
Finally, Tara wanted to thank all of the women who contributed to her thread. “Bridget Jones is just one example of the countless harmful depictions of women in pop culture which set unrealistic beauty standards. I had so many responses from women sharing their struggles with body confidence growing up, so thank you for sharing your stories.”
We also reached out to Mel B. and Jackie D., the hosts of the Read, Watch or DNF podcast, as they joined in on the conversation on Twitter as well. Last year, during April, they covered some of Jackie’s favorites from when she was younger to celebrate her birthday month. And one of these favorites just happened to be Bridget Jones’s Diary. “Watching Bridget Jones’s Diary 20 years later was surprising for sure,” they told Bored Panda. “Jackie says she believes as a 20-something young woman without much life experience, she found this story to be cute, funny, and relatable.”
“Now, we both agree that the level of cringe in both the book and movie are unforgivable,” the hosts shared. “Like honestly, what were we actually thinking back in 2001? The work chat exchanges between Bridget and her BOSS are so inappropriate - especially considering there was no prior relationship between these two. So she’s wearing not-so work appropriate clothing, and that’s an invitation to bring up her breasts!?”
“Looking back to 2001; we accepted that 134lbs was overweight because every magazine had features of candid celebrity photos highlighting cellulite, belly jiggles, double chins (and let’s be real, none of them actually had any of that),” Mel and Jackie shared. “So being in our teens and early 20s in the early 2000s– media made sure to remind us every day that we weren’t good enough, so when we go to see Bridget Jones’s Diary, we happily agree with all of her griping and cheer her on has she goes through fad diets, and empathize when she stress binges. Then to top it all off, we welcome the sexual harassment from the cute boss because we obviously don’t deserve the attention.”
And as far as the media today, Mel and Jackie say we still have a long way to go. “We wish we could say that [it’s gotten] better, but unfortunately we just featured an adaptation of a more recently published book, that is supposed to be an ode to female survival and empowerment, but in reality, it’s just glorified Stockholm syndrome. It parades a young neglected and traumatized girl as a survivor (which she definitely is), but we’re guided to swoon over a love interest that displays all the tendencies of a predator. But hey, he’s cute and called her sweet names. And, oh yeah, saved her…?”
Mel and Jackie then provided a few examples of media that they believe are doing things right. “Authors like Sarah J Maas write female characters who can take care of themselves, but maybe choose to take on the grumpy sexy love interest, but they don’t need them,” the hosts told Bored Panda. “Platforms such as Twitter, Twitch, and YouTube provide spaces for young women to feel comfortable expressing themselves- though not entirely flawless, but we find support and strength in numbers there.”
“We are grown women now with teenage daughters, so we hope that we are guiding them well enough where they’ll feel empowered to get out there in the world. But we’re not sure who on the outside is helping with that,” Mel and Jackie shared. “One of them really doesn’t like romance in shows and movies - which highlighted a reality that a production can’t seem to not include some sort of love/lust/sex subplot, even when it provides nothing to the story. But sex sells, right?”
If you’d like to listen to hear more from Mel and Jackie, be sure to check out their podcast Read, Watch or DNF right here!
We also reached out to blogger and content creator Magali Vaz, who contributed to Tara’s thread on Twitter as well. When it comes to how the media of the early 2000s affected her, she told Bored Panda, “I do think movies like Bridget Jones’s Diary were part of a larger culture that promoted extreme fatphobia. We were shown absolutely normal, average bodies and told that this is what an overweight person looks like, and that being fat or overweight was one of the most unattractive things, and that we should all aspire to be skinny. I think the media is one of the main reasons that most millennials have body image issues!”
