The Anorexic Anatomy Of ‘America’s Next Top Model’

To celebrate last week’s series finale of ‘America’s Next Top Model,’ star, judge, and Executive Producer Tyra Banks, sat down with Entertainment Weekly to laud the show’s supposedly groundbreaking body positivity, and to paint herself as some sort of fairy godmother of self esteem for young girls of all shapes, sizes, and hues.

Tyra gushed, explaining ANTM was “way ahead of the curve” by choosing a plus-size winner in the tenth season. “What I’m really proud of is the show extending the definition of beauty,” the supermodel showrunner crowed, “because I really wanted to show girls that beauty is not cookie-cutter. So when I’m talking to that girl that’s standing in front of me . . . yes, I’m talking to her but I’m really talking to the millions of girls that look like her that are at home watching.”

I have no doubt that Tyra sincerely wants to expand beauty standards — it’s too bad, then, that her reality show’s imagery and narratives reinforced eating disorders and body dysmorphia in service to the ideology of corporate fashion and beauty advertisers. In actuality, ANTP did a dangerous disservice to those millions of girls watching at home. The following excerpt from Reality Bites Back: The Troubling Truth About Guilty Pleasure TV, “Get Comfortable with My Flaw Finder: Women’s Bodies as Women’s Worth,” elaborates: