Body Scrutiny Quotes

When I was first pregnant, which was, let's see, in nineteen-eighty-three - I remember wearing a regular bathing suit to my in-laws' pool. It was just like a spandex one-piece, completely modest, and yet people were looking at me like it was obscene.

When I was a model, everybody was scrutinising me and I felt I had to go to the gym because my figure had to be fantastic. Now that I'm a singer, I've got a different kind of body - it's more athletic.

What I do for a living means that people look at me. As an actress, you are scrutinized. You are not just dealing with your looks privately, you are on display. I have never been 100 percent comfortable in my own skin. I go through different phases. But I don't feel beautiful all the time, no.

When you model, there's no way you can't notice yourself. Do you know what I mean? Because you're constantly surrounded by people saying, 'Oh, she's too short, she's too skinny, she's this, she's whatever.' And you're right there. They're talking about you, and you're right there.

I go to a restaurant with a group of women and pray that we can order lunch without falling into the semi-covert business of collective monitoring, in which levels of intake and restraint are aired, compared, noticed: 'What are you getting? Is that all you're having? A salad? Oh, please.'

It was great about the sizes of the audiences we were getting in America, but sometimes you feel like telling some of the men that you're not on stage to have your body looked at.

One afternoon a girl walked by in a bikini and my cousin Janet scoffed, “Look at the hips on her.” I panicked. What about the hips? Were they too big? Too small? What were my hips? I didn’t know hips could be a problem. I thought there was just fat or skinny. This was how I found out that there are an infinite number of things that can be “incorrect” on a woman’s body.

As a model, I'm used to having my body scrutinized, and I have a tough skin so I can shake it off. I know I'm the only person that gets to decide how my body should look.

I only photograph myself at poignant moments in my life as a check of where I am and how large my thighs are.

I walk into a health club locker room and feel an immediate impulse toward scrutiny, the kneejerk measuring of self against other: 'That one has great thighs, this one's gained weight, who's thin, who's fat, how do I compare?'

I had a reporter ask me how much I weigh. I said to him, 'You go first: How much do you weigh?' People always ask me what I eat. Other artists don't get asked these questions.

It's a normal part of the culture of ballet to go to a nutritionist in your first few weeks. They write down everything you eat and use a little roller that pinches you to measure the fat all over your body. Then, every semester, you get a letter saying either you're too thin, or you're OK, or you're overweight.

I think that's just part of what people do and part of being a female in the media. One day it's, 'Doesn't she look thin,' then the next day, 'She's put on weight.'

The way my body is viewed in the world is different than a male body. People are going to write about the performance, but they're probably also going to be writing about what I was wearing or my hair, which just doesn't happen to men.

There's nothing wrong with looking at a woman's kneecaps.