Should I Delete That? - Have We Got the Right to Lose Weight?

Episode Date: May 1, 2024

In this week's Thursday ep, the girls discuss the resurgence of skinny culture. They dive into the responsibility of body confidence advocates, whether diet culture is being hidden under the guise of health and if Alex and Em have the right to lose weight and talk about it.Purchase tickets here for our first ever ✨LIVE TOUR!!✨Follow us on Instagram @shouldideletethatEmail us at [e-mail] by Daisy GrantMusic by Alex Andrew Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello, welcome back to To Delete That. I'm Alex Light. And I'm Mum Clarkson. How are you? I am good. I'm good. I can faintly hear a baby screaming in the distance, which makes me a little bit not good. But that's also just what we're doing at the moment. So I'm kind of getting used to it. No, no, he's just, yeah. We're trying this new thing where I just put in really far. away. Crying, can't hear that. No, he's just, he's in a phase, he's in a phase, he's crying a lot, but I don't know, it's apparently it's a four month thing, so yay for me. Baby's living

phases. It's how we roll. And I hate to say it because I would like to boycott Amazon. I really, really would. However, Amazon is my best friend right now. That's a bit hurtful for me to hear, but I'm happy for you. Sorry, it is my best friend. It trumps you a thousand percent because it's like, oh my god and literally someone only has to suggest something which might keep him entertained or keep him happy or make him laugh and I'm like it's ordered before you finish your sentence

I get that that's why babies bring so much crap with them anyway how are you? I'm good I feel like we've stuff to talk about this week we do have stuff to talk about this week that's good I need to talk about it yeah we can do that if you finished it because when I saw you on Sunday you're only four episodes in oh hang on Alex before we talk about baby reindeer

we need to talk about Sunday we need to talk about the family we went to Magic Mike Live oh my God you were like Sunday I was like what did we do on Sunday oh Sunday that's what we did on Sunday

Not for us No no no no Not for us Big day I got a big humping in the back From our podcast guest You got such a big humping It's such a shame that you didn't put that on Instagram

Because I feel like people would have wanted to see that Yeah that Yeah You got a proper hump I got a proper hump The problem The problem with that was it was early

I tell you what he did Al he roaredogged it because I didn't even I didn't even know it was Stop it didn't know I didn't even know it was him it was some man dressed as a sailor pulled my hair back

and like stroked my hair and then I was like this is all right and then it was like having a fucking Labrador on top of me just hump hump hump pump I was like well this is a baptism of fire and also there's something to be said for complete anonymity

in that situation. Knowing someone a little bit makes me way worse. I mean, we don't consider our setting to be a professional setting. But in comparison to the Magic Mike one, it's quite professional, right? Which is where we met Jake. So it was very strange to suddenly see him with no clothes, humping, grinding. Just odd. He was good.

He was very good. I mean, very, very good. Very good at dancing. Very good at his job. for resting um it was just the most nuts sunday afternoon of my life it was different it was different and i brought my friend who is not i don't know she's like self-professed like very very prudish and she was like oh my gosh what is going on here and the the code word was sorry the the safe word was unicorn it was really cool actually they there was like so much consent throughout the show wasn't there

Like, they came up to me a few times and were like, do you mind if we do this, if we do that? Like, do you mind if I pull, I can't remember what he did. Oh no, I got humped as well actually, by, not by Jake, but by someone else. And he was literally like, do you mind if I do this? And I was like, I don't think so.

And then someone came up to me before Jake took me for a dance. And I was like, do you mind if Jake comes up and takes you for a dance? And I was like, this is really nice. That is really nice. And there was like a safe word, unicorn. And you could say unicorn at any time. and they would stop and I don't know, I just thought that was really cool.

Yeah, it was a hoot. It was just nuts because, like, Sunday morning I went out for brunch with my kid and my dog. And it was like, wholesome. Family vibes. I was in a Gile and, like, yeah, like, didn't have any makeup on. And then Sunday afternoon, it was like, oh, he'll be out. Dave sent me a picture of Tommy on his little play mat and was like, how's your day going? And I just sent him back a picture of a man who was almost naked,

but in like a mesh thong with his bum out and I was like, we're having different afternoons, babe. Very different. Very different afternoons. Fashion news. Victoria Beckham's collaboration with Mango went live and it only went up to a size 12. Size 12, M! Size 12.

I have heard that it was 12 to 14. It's not the, it's not, I don't understand. What did Mango go up to normally? I actually don't know, but I presume it's a 16 because that seems quite typical of... Quite standard. Yeah, quite standard of that kind of high street store. Oh, no, I totally take it back.

Mango actually go up to a size 26. Now that is the problem with this. Wow. They have got here, this striped dress with bare shoulders goes up to a size 26. Shit. I always got bare shoulders on the plus size stuff. Shit, that's crazy.

Why do they hate... Why do they hate... Why do they hate all the plus-sized women want to show? Do you know what? There's a brilliant TikTok. that does like in this week's edition of plus size clothing and it's always like a sequin butterfly and like a cool zigzag pattern and a and a cold shoulder always the fucking shoulders um yes that's mad i don't understand that i don't understand like you know what

if a brand like i don't know i'm trying to think of like if zara did it i'm like yeah well they own their shit you know what i mean like they make tiny clothes for tiny people they're unapologetic or brandy melville or like yeah one of these brands but it's like if you're making the effort to go up to a size 26 of your normal clothes. Why? Why? But then it feels out like I don't know if I'm like I don't know if I'm being really negative

with this but I just feel like Finn's just a hundred percent back like Browns aren't even trying yeah yeah I feel like there's been a real shift back to or like a shift away from body positivity and I feel like people

have ditched that and in favor of like, oh, being healthy, because actually, like, we had that phase, but really, like, let's look at what's actually healthy. And I've noticed so many plus size, not even plus size, but, like, previous body positivity influencers who are now on, like, weight loss journeys. Like, a lot of them seem to be doing the hard 75 or something 75. Okay, so, but I'm interested in your opinion on this because they have to be allowed to do that, right? if that's their journey.

But I keep seeing people because I actually don't know who we're talking about so I'm just going to keep being elusive because I haven't seen it. But like I don't know. Like what responsibility do we think these people have? If you've built an audience on body positivity,

now I think for the most part, most these women, or the women in the space of how I think of it, really celebrating themselves and anybody that was inspired to celebrate themselves as a result of seeing this one woman celebrate herself felt like a happy add on. Like I feel like that's the kind of,

maybe not body positivity because that's more political. But like body confidence, I kind of felt this like, for me at least, like, but not to really use myself. But like I feel like it's a journey and you're watching loads of women learn to love themselves and then that in turn inspires more women to love themselves. And you think that's really cool and that's how it should be. and it was less a business plan

and more like a woman's genuine like journey to love right? With that in mind if she then changes her mind changes her body what responsibility does she have to her followers? Because I don't think it's so cart and dry as to say she doesn't have a responsibility to them

but then she also can't have full responsibility for them so where do we land? I don't know if they have I don't know if they have I don't know if it's like responsibility I don't know if that's the right word maybe it is but I feel like it's more it's I don't know it's definitely a moral issue

I think because if you have built your following and a following off which you are profiting and if you've built that up off of body positivity or body confidence body image whatever if you've built it off of that then to pivot

on that and then to bombard your audience suddenly a vulnerable audience one might argue because they're people who are looking for help with their body in the first place and people who are probably likely trying to ditch diets trying to improve their body image and then suddenly

you're kind of doing this 180 on them and then losing weight but then on the flip side like they don't really owe their followers anything and it's then up to their followers to unfollow them if you know so it's tricky yeah you're right

it's tricky yeah because I keep thinking as well like if I think of if I think of weight you know, such a scale, we accept that we're going to change weight so many times in our lives, right? We'll go through periods where we're going to be smaller, smaller and bigger and whatever. And for a time, maybe it was profitable online if you were going to make that work for you. If, if, as the cynics amongst us would say, like, body positivity was just something that was cashed in on, like maybe it was done for financial gain, or maybe it was just,

a genuine celebration of where you were in that moment, in which case surely we should be able to celebrate these people as they come out of that moment and into the next. And that's where I kind of feel this like, I don't know, this like contradictory confusion because I think I don't know, if somebody was loving themselves

when they were bigger, that's a really great message that they sent. But just because they're now wanting to be smaller, does it mean that they never loved themselves and they were bigger? No. I don't know. Like, it just, it feels like so much pressure to put on one person. It does. And I guess it's, I guess, I mean, whenever an influencer loses, okay, so if an influencer lose, I think there's two separate issues here. Like, if an influencer loses weight, I think absolutely her right to do so, it's her right to share

it as well, but her right to do so and she can look however she wants and it's actually nobody's business to comment on that or she doesn't owe anyone anything. She doesn't owe her followers anything but it's the the documenting and the pivoting of like from body positivity to weight loss essentially back to diet culture even though it's kind of wrapped up in it tends to be wrapped up now in like I'm doing it for my health or I'm doing it to get back to a place where I feel comfortable or I feel like this is like something like really common as well I like to feel less sluggish you know which is always like coach well yeah wouldn't we don't don't don't don't even start but that tends to be code for like I want to I want to lose weight like I want to

look better so I do I want to be more of a worm yeah so I think it's the sharing it I think it's the sharing it that it's that it feels really icky for me it feels off but in terms of responsibility I think that's like up for debate I really do yeah I don't I don't know where I actually like fully land on that I can't because I keep I keep fucking it's not morally right though to me it doesn't feel right morally. Okay, so this is really interesting. I got a DM just on this now because now I feel that we've like picked a thing.

Like, so I've lost weight the last year because I had a baby, then I have got further away from the time that had a baby. So I've lost weight, right? Yeah. And I've had like a couple of comments about it. And it's like, I don't know.

I mean, like, I don't know. I don't know what responsibility. Because we do talk about this where like, and obviously I haven't. done 75 hard or whatever but I have trained for marathon and I know for me that that's mindset but it's someone else's perception that I may have done it for you know like it's fitness and you know I had a big fitness goal and with fitness comes hand in hand often with weight loss and whatever but like I get comments I get comments sometimes about the fact that my body's changed

and I find that really interesting because it's like how much are we projecting onto other people and then I don't know I just I like I don't know it's like we want to freeze people

in time and then but it's so much more it is so much I can't get my head around it but for you I want to say you never had

at least you never stated that you had a specific intention to lose weight no exactly so that was never I didn't yeah so it's completely yeah it's completely different

but then yeah but then but then would Would that have been a bad intention? Because, like, there are people who are making very deliberate efforts. Like, look at Oprah or, I don't know, anyone. Like, anyone on Zemphic or whatever. All these people who are making really deliberate efforts

and have deliberate intentions. And it's kind of they're right. But they just can't work out. It's difficult, isn't it? Because then, like, Oprah, like, she has been the face of weight loss for so long. She's been she is weight loss Like she's tried so many different things She's been the face of Weight Watchers

She's done this, she's done that She is the face of Weight Watchers She is still yeah Now that they've partnered with her ZemPEC And basically admitted that Weight Watchers is Just Just not very good So it's

Different But then like Yes even if you said I am going to lose weight This is how I'm going to do it I don't think you, I don't, yeah, I think you have every right to do that. I just don't, and that's the thing, you have every right to do it and you don't owe anyone, anything, I just feel like it would be, I feel like people wouldn't be mad, they'd just be

disappointed. No, I just feel, I just feel like it's a moral, I don't know, I can't like put my finger on it. It's like an ethical thing. I know, but then there's something to be said for right, at least they're fucking own it. At least, you know, someone who's lost loads of weight and everyone's staring at them going, how do they do it? How do they do it? At least, you know, if someone comes forward and said, it owns epic, it's like, okay, well, that's that. But then you're in shit for saying how you did it.

So, okay, so you don't want to endorse this toxic way of losing weight. But then if you're quiet about it, then you're gatekeeping. And then you might be falsely leading people to believe that you've done it through natural means and then, you know, more and more people are going to be. themselves up for the fact they can't look like this unobtainable body that you now have. So what level of transparency do you owe people? But that feels like people have to manage their own things in that instance. Do you know what I mean?

Because if they're projecting onto you like onto someone like, oh, but they might have done it through natural means and I haven't and that's making them feel bad. Like that's, this sounds harsh, but like that's kind of their own thing. Whereas if someone is saying to you, I am doing the hard 75 and I'm not eating this day and I don't know what the hard 75 is I keep like scrolling past because I can't be asked but like if someone's saying

I'm losing weight through this I'm like I can't handle her hard 75 days and then I think what would I want on a hard 75 days when I could have an easy 75 days? I actually don't oh actually yeah I think 75 does stand for days that's just clicked anyway whatever

but you see the difference in my head it's like you're not talking about it you're not you're not you're not I hate the word like promoting it With that in mind, if people are taking On Zepic, for example, do you think they have a responsibility to tell people that they are or not? No. Do you think they should tell people that they are or they're not? I think they should do whatever they want to do.

But if they were to say that they were, that would be a bad thing. Would it be good for that they're being honest or would it be bad that they're promoting something dangerous? No, I think they should be able to say it as well. And I don't think that would necessarily be a bad thing. But if this person has been revered as a plus-sized person and has built a following of people who perhaps follow them because they're empowered by this person's body and then this person changes their body,

it's because then the further down this we go, I just think, oh, fuck it, do it be bloody wall. I agree. I guess the further down on this we go, the more like stipulations that are coming into my head. Okay. But it's like, if I'm saying I'm taking Ozempic, like I've lost loads of weight,

it's because I've taken OZNPick is different to, I'm taking OZemPic. I started off at £200 and now I'm down to 180 after three weeks and like this is what I looked like before and then this is my

after, I don't know. I'm actually, I've lost myself now. Al, what would you say if I said to you I'm going on on Zephyk just for a bit and I'm going to share the journey online Is that my right? Of course it is, but I would be like, fuck.

No, don't. Our brand. Don't do it. Yeah. You'll ruin us. No, I don't know. This is really hard. This is...

It's really hard. It's new territory because, yeah, oh, I don't know. I don't know. But I just keep thinking, like, I mean, it isn't really because this is like, you know, women have been, or female celebrities have been doing, like the sort of weight loss DVD forever. But then I'm also like, listen to how long we've just talked about women's bodies.

Yeah. This is such a problem. We don't talk about men like this. It's so annoying. And it's like, I don't know, we're just, it's so much of like calling each other out, catching, tripping each other up, policing what we're doing, policing what each other are doing. And I've actually, oh, I tell you what I've seen recently that's been a bit nuts I want to talk about.

Did you see that a photo that, um, Kim Kardashian put up to Courtney's birthday? Yes. Yes. People went off. the comments. People weren't awfulness, right? And I am quite interested because, okay, obviously the Kardashians have played a huge role in

creating the beauty standard. They're problematic as how, right? I get that. But I think the standard people are holding them to now, they are upholding, we are upholding what they created much more intensely

than they are, in my opinion. Like when they, when Kim put up that photo of herself, Chloe and Courtney. Courtney's just had a baby a few months ago. I mean,

she still looks ridiculously good. But she's got like, like ridiculously good. But she's got like a bit more curve than the others.

Because she's like just had her like fourth kid and she's like 45 and she just looks unreal. Anyway, all the comments are like, Kim, like why do you hate Courtney?

Courtney's going to fucking hate this. Like why? you've done her so dirty, blah, blah, blah. And then Courtney comes out, and she says, I love the way I look. Like, this body created my babies. And we're like, oh, my God, unexpected bingo card of the year,

Courtney Kardashian, our positive. I don't know. And then I saw another photo of her yesterday. Again, still looks ridiculously good. But all the comments are like, girl, you got soft. Are you pregnant again? Look at that belly, blah, blah, blah.

And it's like, oh, my God, what's happened? What has happened? What's, though? What's happened? Yeah, I mean, that picture of the three of them and then people were like, tell me you're feuding with Courtney without telling me you're feuding with Courtney. And I was like, guys, she looks great.

Like, she looks so good. But also, like, do you really think that Kim would have posted that without, like, it's going out to billions of people? Like, they are not going to be allowed to post pictures of the others without permission. Fuck no. Fuck no way.

Although I wish I had that stipulation with my sister. You should see photoship, to me. But yeah, it is, people aren't used to seeing, especially in that context, in the context of a Kardashian, on a Kardashian's Instagram, people aren't used to seeing like bodies that don't look like the typical Kardashian's bodies, like the standard of beauty, right? They're just not you see. And this is even crazy to say because Courtney's body is like mini, miniscule, tiny.

it's just that they are so contoured the other two I don't know I can't think of another word for it than contoured because that's what it feels like they are through yeah through through whatever means I don't know that's up for debate but like she looks different compared to them but still just like she still fits the standard of beauty this is the thing she does but this is what I find quite interesting is it's just like as we talk about them right and how problematic they are which they are you know and whatever but

But if they wanted to move away from that and to create a more positive legacy, we're not going to allow them to do that. Because it's just like, you know, Courtney's taking very, like, very little steps here to, like, slightly normalising a postpartum body. And it's not my normal, but it's a normal and, like, good for you. But the minute she does that, we make such a big deal out of it. It's more, it's a worse situation than if she hadn't done it in the first. first place. Like the standard now that we're holding them to is much higher than the one that

they've created for themselves. And that feels difficult. Like that feels frustrating. Yeah, that twists my mind a little bit, but I see what you mean. Because it's just like we're not going to allow them to do better. We won't allow any, we wouldn't allow it to change now because we've accepted them as they are. Did you see Chloe put up a post that was a picture where she was like, this is motivation. Yeah, this is my inspiration. But I actually, I miss read it. I totally is read it, I'm an idiot. I miss, I saw that and thought she was saying, I look big here. I'm going to serve as my like before picture. I'm using this as inspiration. Oh, that's what I thought it said. Apparently, it meant that that's an old picture of her where she thinks she looks really good and she's like using

that as her after picture to be like, that's where I'm going to get to. Like, I'm using it for Thinspiration, like motivation. See, Thinspiration's back, isn't it? It's just bad. It's because of OZempic, I swear. It's because of OZempic and it's a backlash. It's a backlash to body positivity because the pendulum always swings like too far in the other direction. And I feel like that's what people have perceived that it's done with body positivity. It went too far. We got too comfortable with bigger bodies, bodies that aren't healthy. It went too far and now we've got to bring it back.

And it's like swung the other bloody way and people are losing weight left, right and center. I swear, like the world probably collectively will. be thinner now than it has been for quite a long time. Actually, I don't know that. Probably not. But you know what I mean? So many people have lost weight. Like everyone's losing weight. Celebrities left right and centre are like coming onto the red carpet looking thin, like thinner than they have been. And so yeah, I think we're having a, we're going back to like thin is back. And then what? What do you think then? See, I thought we were going to sort of land in the middle with this. Like the pension was going to like stop and slow and like we're going to

land in the middle. But I don't know. Honestly, I don't know. But then I feel like we would, we've become, through the body positivity movement, we're too conscious now of the fact of, but I think anyway, we're too conscious of diet culture and beauty standards and how damaging they are and how arbitrary they are. I think we're too conscious of that to let it completely rest with like thin is good and we've got to be thin. But having said that, who fucking knows? I'm in a bubble man honestly I'm in such a bubble this is bleak isn't it sorry I feel bad it's bleak well yeah

and I also we've made no conclusions we've made no conclusions but I just I don't know I feel like the like overwhelming thing that I feel is anger that it's just more noise around women's bodies

and like our like because ultimately if women want to lose weight fair fox if you want a game weight fair fucks like yeah how you show up should be you know fine

whatever but I think like the thing we have to unpick and like work out within like ourselves and I need to work this out before I like try and educate my daughter but it's like what what like responsibility

what power are we giving celebrity because it's actually nuts like all this is showing is like how incredibly powerful celebrity is like perhaps more than ever but like a whole load of celebs took a diabetic medication and like all of a sudden everyone wants to be thin again and it's just like that is actually like the the status that we give it is wild isn't it and like that seems like the biggest problem I mean and yeah I mean beauty standards have always always come from celebrities like even back to like the the the

the 40s like it was like I can't remember her name but like a film star and then it was Marilyn Monroe and we've always taken beauty standards from celebrities but yeah it's just it's it's brutal when it's like to now fit those standards that are setting you a have to earn a lot of money because those MPC is really fucking expensive and B you have to be prepared to inject yourself sacrifice your your pancreas and see you've got to really not care about your pancreas. I like it's quite a strict

stipulation. Put up with some pretty shit side effects like people are vomiting diarrhea, nausea, headaches, like there's all sorts I don't think this is like

this is not for the faint-hearted. But this is boutique. We've just been here. Like I swear like we've just got out of here. Like we just got out of our influences selling laxatives. And now we're disinjecting them and everyone's like, ooh, cool.

It's not cool. It's not cool. Like, there's nothing about shitting yourself that's cool. Like, it's, but it's so nuts how we can just repackage something literally 10 years later and everyone's just for them. I'm actually like, I don't, I'm hesitant to say this because I don't want to encourage people to do it, but it's extremely easy to get your hands on it. And I know this because I was going to feature in a documentary about it, which didn't end up happening. But we tried to see if we could get hold of it, easy. Was it? It was so easy. So easy. There was, there was hardly. any boundaries or at least boundaries that aren't going to be like that are very easy to overcome if you're a vulnerable person who's desperate basically so yeah anyway bad and we doesn't make any conclusion this all came from vb's vb's mango collection next week please you're gonna do it next week okay well you haven't yeah you haven't finished the episode yeah yeah anyway um I guess we need to ask for people's opinions on this do you know what we should actually said nothing important or educational or helpful and we've probably just made everyone

a bit depressed. It would be, it would, it would be so good to do this as like a live conversation with like loads of other women, like loads of our listeners because they would have some really good opinions on this. So it would be really cool actually if you would put your opinions on paper. Let us know what you think about this. Write into us. Email. Should I delete that pod at gmail.com. If you're on Instagram or at should I delete that. Tell us what you think. And it would be nice to just, it would be interesting to talk about this, I think, and like, help us out, please. Help us come to some kind of conclusion. Yeah, what level of responsibility? Like, what, to what extent does anybody have a responsibility to stay at a weight that they're not happy with? No, because I don't even think it's that. Because when you say it like that, I'm like, oh my God, no, they can do, they can, of course they can lose way.

Okay, put it like this. So if, if I turned around, if I turned around now and said on my Instagram, so after all the work I've done on body image, right, if I turn it. turned around now and said, guys, I'm losing weight. I'm taking a Zempic and I'm going to do. Here's my before picture because you are a before picture and I'm going to document the journey online. Tell us what you think about that. Like, would I have, have you got the right to do that? Have I got the right to do that? Have you got the right to, to, to, to, to, to build your, like, to build what you want. Yeah. If that's what you want. Yeah. Are we in the right? right to stand in your way.

Oh, you're standing in my way, I bet it's fuck. I'll tell you what you've done, Al. You've made a rod for your own back. I have, haven't I? No one's epic for you. No shitting yourself for you. You are destined to a healthy cancus

for the rest of your life. I'm lucky. A little ozempic account on the side, you know, a little finster. Please write in. I'm actually so interested to hear what people have to say about this because I feel like they'll, I don't know,

they'll just like sum it up far more eloquently than we've tried but um i feel like we've wasted everybody's time but we love you we love you regardless and we can't wait to hear from you um and yeah next week i'm excited of course we love them regardless we it's whether or not they love us regardless yeah could you let us know at the end of the email whether you do still love us or not who'd like it in writing please and if you don't don't write that um okay okay well that's interesting more more more We're on this next week. All right, guys.

Well, we love you loads. We will see you on Monday. We'll see you on Monday, guys. Bye. Bye. Thank you so much for listening. Should I delete that is part of the ACAS creative network.