Weight gain in the 1940's

[Guest Gainertrainer]

Here's an interesting advert i saw...

[RotundAdmirer]

I remember we used to have a 'vintage weight gain advertisements thread'. Let's bring it back!

[Heart and Mind]

Interesting...

[moby_jones]

Do any of these companies still take orders  ;D

[WJones]

Ahh...the 40s, good times, good times...except for WWII. That wasn't too good.

Regardless, great pics!

[kirsch]

I guess that the explosion of television may have had something with the "ideal physique" becoming skinny toward the 1960s. Marilyn Monroe was pretty curvacious in the fifties and early sixties, but I guess that ideal must've died along with her.

It should be noted that this shifting in ideals from curvy to bony has been predominantly a white woman shift, as non-white cultures have generally persisted in idealizing the fuller figure for women. The emergence of music videos and hip hop in the last two decades has actually encouraged the dominant culture (i.e. white women) to look more positively at the fuller figure.

[kirsch]

And, I guess that in economies/societies such as Western society after World War II, where high-calorie food is so plentiful that it's easier to be fat than skinny, it has become a "status symbol" for women to have slimmer figures.

[RotundAdmirer]

I guess that the explosion of television may have had something with the "ideal physique" becoming skinny toward the 1960s. Marilyn Monroe was pretty curvacious in the fifties and early sixties, but I guess that ideal must've died along with her.

It should be noted that this shifting in ideals from curvy to bony has been predominantly a white woman shift, as non-white cultures have generally persisted in idealizing the fuller figure for women. The emergence of music videos and hip hop in the last two decades has actually encouraged the dominant culture (i.e. white women) to look more positively at the fuller figure.

Blame Twiggy. Her emergence into the modeling world caused many women to reconsider their fuller figures. But, I'm glad that there has been a resurgence of interest in curvier women, and this forum is proof. 

[moby_jones]

I believe it was a combination of both increased wealth and a counter-reaction to the classical curvy look of women. It's no surprise that counter-culture, increased wages and the dieting industry all debuted during the sixties.

[nhoj]

Yeah. It's about money. Before, only rich people could afford enough food to not be thin. Now, poor people have to eat cheap and fast food that make them fat; while rich people can afford gym, quality food, nutritionist and, sometimes, even a regular balanced diet cooked by someone else.

[Gary1627]

The striving for a slim figure is a mixture of many reasons, but certainly seen as a status symbol and a pious attitude. I am better than you because I can afford a fitness trainer; I am better than you because I can control my weight; I am better than you because I did something about my weight; I am better than you because I am not a slob. The list goes on and generally is a very unpleasant form of prejudice, reinforced by generally unpleasant people.

[RotundAdmirer]

Aside from the discussion of why women want to slim rather than curvy, I just noticed the words "You sure are popular since you put on that curvy weight" in the second picture I posted. I never noticed that before but that, in turn, reminded me of: http://www.southparkstudios.com/clips/104268/bebe-got-boobs 

[moby_jones]

i hate twiggy. well not her personally, but i hate her figure, and the idea that she set out. as someone who's suffered anorexia in the past, thin is not beautiful. it's painful and can kill you. while people moan about the obesity "epidemic", noone ever seems to stop and think about which is worse- and believe me, being that thin is much more dangerous. being fat- generally it only harms in the long-term, and there are steps you can take to prevent it doing as much damage as it can. but being thin- (my own personal experience) your hair falls out, you don't get regular periods, my teeth are ruined from making myself sick, i feel weak and tired easily, my metabolism is much slower than it should be, the hourglass fat distribution i used to have has now been replaced by a pear shape, i may be infertile in the future, i lost a lot of bone and muscle mass, i'm at a high risk for osteoporosis at only 18 years old, my memory has been affected, my brain chemistry changed, my heart muscle is severely weakened, my eyesight is terrible and won't get much better, my lungs are weakened... the list goes on. It's a terrible, terrible illness. At least being overweight you can have all of your normal bodily functions. I can't. Some of this still applies 6 months after recovering from anorexia. Despite my bmi being 19, my periods won't come back until I'm around 21-22 on the scale. Above anything else the mental effects are the most disturbing. I can still look in the mirror now and criticise every part of my body, coming away feeling like the most disgusting whale ever. And the fact that I want to be big, as i find it more attractive, only makes it more complex. I don't understand how I starved myself on 100 calories a day. I don't understand why I spent two years wanting to kill myself rather than be fat, despite finding it attractive. I don't understand how I did it all, knowing that it was upsetting my friends and family to see me wasting away, and still being paranoid they thought I was fat.

I'm now going on to study psychology at university, and hopefully, will make steps towards a cure in anorexia and bulimia. But my main argument here is this- look at all the problems models like twiggy cause. Then look at all the problems "plus-size" models cause. What's that you say? They DON'T cause this type of problem?... case settled.

A lot of people are underestimating the dangers of being underweight, even though it's way and way more dangerous being 50 pounds underweight than being the equal amount overweight. Society's abnormal obsession with fat is not only killing people physically, but screwing people up mentally.

An excuse for the consistent pressure people face over their weight is that it's meant to be helping them slim down to a  healtier weight. But clearly it isn't working as obesity is still growing everyday. It's only effect is making insecure people more insecure!

[Achernar]

Ok, let's dial something back here.

You see those girls after they've put on weight?  Are you not noticing that they're what some people might call curvy and are absolutely not fat?  Are you not noticing that there's really not much in the way of extra pudge on anything that isn't tits or ass?

This concept that, somehow, fat was beautiful until the 70's isn't just wrong, it's stupidly wrong because to disprove it, all you have to do is look at these adverts.

At that point in time, "skinny" was more or less code language for "flat with no tits and no ass", one would need to put on weight to get the necessary tits and ass for society to say you were attractive.  Being fat was still bad, it was still considered ugly, and society still shamed women for it.  That's just how it was (and still is).

Marilyn Monroe?  Yeah, she was a size 14 or whatever hilarious bullshit thing, but that's not because she was chunky, it's because she was at most a size 6 by the standards of today's clothing and dress sizes have grown with women.  At no point in the twentieth century was actually being fat considered the feminine ideal anywhere in mainstream western society.  In fact, I'd go so far to say the same holds true for the nineteenth and at least most of the eighteenth century.

[Guest 35bentley]

Came across this in the September 1939 Issue of the now defunct Picture Play magazine.

It's amazing how our society has flipped the definition of beauty over the years. Also it's amazing how far we've come in understanding how things work

Sorry if this is the wrong category.... it was a tough thing to categorize.

[Bojangles biscuits n' gravy]

Awesome!!

[Hirsch von Bork]

I am sure those tablets were as useless as the weight-lose pills that you can buy nowadays.

[nomagicfish]

I am sure those tablets were as useless as the weight-lose pills that you can buy nowadays.

Unless they contained growth-hormones taken from livestock factory farming,

which i would not rule out given the time-period this add is from 

[wilan]

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