Missing In Action & Plee For Help

As many of you may have noticed I've vanished off of the radar a bit. Things have been pretty hectic my end! Lets see... GCSE Mocks, not pretty I'm telling you, lots of magazine work and magazine photo shoots, oh and the incredible amount of accidents I've managed to have in the past two weeks since I received from being sick... I have a bruised nose and upper lip from being hit in the face with a Lacrosse stick while playing Lacrosse (now I know why we have to wear gum shields - I would have lost some of my front teeth!), bruised and swollen wrist from very same Lacrosse session, and a big bruise on my forehead from opening a car door into my face (I know... I'm a klutz!). It didn't bruise at the time but coming back from a photo shoot I hit my head with the camera so NOW its bruised!

So in short I've been being a bit of an idiot. Then I had History coursework: 'Why is the Battle of the Somme regarded as such a great military tragedy' and 'Is there sufficient evidence in Sources A to G to support the Modern Military Historian John Keegans’s view that Haig was an ‘efficient and highly skilled soldier who did much to lead Britain to victory in the First World War’?'

I think you get the picture.

Now onto campaign ish stuff...

I'm stuck. I'm trying to think of a stunt. I;m trying to think of stuff to do... I'm out of ideas!

So if anyone has ANY send them in... I'm DESPERATE!!!

Rachel

xoxo

Why DO Celebrities have to be thin?

Ok so I’m expanding my campaign to not only encompass models but celebrities too. I like reading blogs and stuff, my favorite three being one on mainstream alternative music news, one on fashion and one (I’m ashamed to admit it) on celebrity gossip. (Though I do skim over the pointless articles to things slightly more important to me such as who’s being cast in the next Twilight film for example!)

One news article I have been following this week is the story of Jessica Simpson’s weight gain. Apparently even President Obama had something to say about it.

I personally can’t see what the fuss is about - she looks fine, if not better than ever! And the fact that people are starting to suggest that she’s having a personal break down just because she’s gained weight - ridiculous!

http://tinyurl.com/djps4b

But this got me thinking... why DO celebrities supposedly have to be thin?!? Your ideas?

Celebrity Fitness Videos

This afternoon, because apparently you can’t play Lacrosse on frozen over pitches covered in snow turned solid ice my team and I were sent to a classroom during sport. On the Lacrosse notice board it said to come in our sports kit and trainers. When my team mates and I arrived we discovered we were going to be doing one of my least favorite activities. A celebrity fitness video. I’d done this particular one once before and I seem to remember hating it and being totally useless to boot.

I was right. As a joke I moaned to my friend never to me, Helen whom some of you would have seen in the documentary (she was the make-up artist), that I really shouldn't be doing this as its against my ethos. I only said it because I like to complain about being made to do things I don’t want to. But a few minutes later while I was jumping up and down I was like, wait a sec! This really is against my beliefs.


Why do celebrities make fitness videos? -----> Celebrities make fitness videos because they make lost of money by doing so as people buy them.

Why do people buy celebrity fitness videos? -----> Because people want to look ‘nice’ and thin like said celebrity.

Is wanting to look like someone in a magazine who is totally different to your beautiful self useful? Helpful? Constructive? A positive thing to do? -----> NO!


Unfortunately after this revelation I kept my mouth shut figuring that my coach wouldn’t be best impressed if I refused to do the same exercise as everyone else based on the grounds of my personal ethics and my not wanting to look like a hypocrite so I had to finish up. But the afternoon got me thinking so at least it achieved something.


What do you think about Celebrity fitness videos?

Help Me Get Well!

Just because I'm ill, and bored, I decided to google my Battlefront campaign and I found the teaching notes for my Battlefront episode on the Channel 4 education website and a list of activities for PSHE, PVE and Citizenship teachers to get their classes to do after spending 1/2 an hour of being tortured by my presence on the big screen of their classroom... 

Some of these questions I think are really good, but predictable, but some of them I really wanna know what peoples answers to them are! So it would be really fantastic if you guys could answer them for me, either in a comment to the blog, or a Bebo page comment or a Battlefront comment or an email... you know the drill! 

And I really wanna read your answers! You'd all be contributing to me getting better quicker!!! 

1. What is Rachel's opinion of images of models and celebrities in the media? (Ok, I know what MY opinion is, but I wanna know if I got my message across right!) 

2. How much impact do you think Rachel's online magazine will have?

3. Who helps out Rachel the most and why? (Again, I know who helped me the most but I'm curious to your ideas on this...) 

4. How would you promote the use of healthy-weight models in fashion photographs? 

And finally, I may be digging my own grave here... but after seeing the question I just had to ask...

5. Rachel is a healthy size - how does she look? 

For a full list of the questions check out the page I got them from here:

http://www.channel4learning.net/support/programmenotes/micro/battlefront/prog4-activities.html

And I can't wait to hear your answers!!!

Rachel

xoxo

Sorry...

As I have just said to all my magazine staff - sorry for being M.I.A recently! I've had exams (grrr....) and I'm just waiting on the marks... :S...

Anyways... I have a little announcement for you all, something, considering as it directly affects them I hope my magazine staff won't kill me for telling you guys all first!

Lipstick Royalty Magazine are launching a mini mag which is going to be part of the magazine each month. I had the idea for it when doing some campaign research! Its called Diamond Duchess Magazine (I know... what's this with me and the crazy names!) and its going to be headed up by Who Wants To Be A Size Zero campaign team member and Lipstick Royalty fashion editor Amy.

Diamond Duchess is going to be a woman's magazine like Cosmopolitan and Glamour and Company.. but with out what i call all the nasty bits, like diet pages! Its going to be a real magazine for real women who WANT to feel good in their own skin!

We're hoping to launch it in March on the Lipstick Royalty page but we can't do that until we get a creative Director, so if you know someone who has graphic design skills they'd like to lend to creating our layouts each month give us a buzz!

Just one last think, completely unrelated to the campaign but really really important to me! My writing group (which Amy and LR Arts Editor Lauren are also a member of) launched an Anthology of short stories last year, selling it in aid of the Laura Crane trust for teenage cancer. My short story 'Family' is published in there as well as some other pretty fantastic pieces of writing and I really recommend it as a great read! You can either download it as a PDF or buy it as a paperback here:

http://www.lulu.com/content/2619890

All proceeds go to charity! We've sold 51 copies so far and we'd love to sell lots more to be able to present a great big fat check to the charity!


Enjoy your weekend,

Rachel

Did you know?

In 1970 the average age of a girl who started dieting was 14; by 1990 the average dieting age fell to 8.

After viewing images of female fashion models, seven out of ten women felt more depressed and angry than prior to viewing the images.

Young girls are more afraid of becoming fat than they are of nuclear war, cancer, or losing their parents.

30% of women choose an ideal body shape that is 20% underweight with an additional 44% choosing an ideal body shape that is 10% underweight.

Twenty years ago the average fashion model weighed 8% less than the average woman. Today she weighs 23% less.

Kate Moss is 5’7” tall and weighs 95 pounds; 30% below ideal body weight. Her fellow supermodels Niki Taylor and Elle Macpherson both meet the physical criteria for Anorexia.

In 1999 Gisele Bundchen was Vogue’s model of the year; the magazine stated that this was because she strayed from the rail-thin image. At the time Gisele was 5’11” and weighed only 115lbs, that’s 25% below her ideal body weight.

The average woman in the UK is 5’4” tall and weighs 140lbs. The average supermodel is 5’10” tall and weighs only 112lbs.

Special thanks to campaign team member Kee for finding these stats out!

Happy holidays!

Well… first I want to wish you all a very Merry Christmas, Hanukkah and general holiday merriment to everyone!

What a year it’s been, and I just wanted to thank all of you for everything. Both I, and the campaign have achieved so much over this last year and most of it is down to you guys; the people who have supported the campaign since the start, everyone who send in messages of support after watching the campaign on Channel 4, everyone who both read the campaign issue of my magazine and gave me such wonderful feedback, as well as everyone who has read the other magazine issues this year. Also my fantastic all new campaign team; Larnie, Greg + Amy and all the ideas they have come up with so far (some great stuff planned for 2009!), all the magazine staff who were patient with me while I was trying to get the campaign issue with all the campaign pictures just right! (sorry about all that guys!). And even a big thank you to everyone who has sent in negative messages to the campaign; its allowed me to change the campaign for the better by playing devils advocate!

Thanks again, and don’t worry about how many mince pies you’re eating!

Rachel

xoxo