1. sex·y  

   /ˈseksē/
   

   Adjective Sexually attractive or exciting. Sexually aroused.

Today whilst on the bus,  I heard a mother say to her little girl who appeared to be around two years of age 'Are you my sexy baby?' The little girl said 'Yes!' to which the mum replies 'No silly, you're my sexy little girl now!'

This isn't an isolated  case, both online and offline I have heard people referencing their babies and children as sexy much as one would use the terms cute, adorable, beautiful or gorgeous etc.  I'll admit to being absolutely aghast at this practise.  Why would anyone use a term that is defined as sexually attractive, sexually exciting or sexually arousing in connection with their child?  Is this not absolutely inappropriate and potentially damaging as it belittles and clouds the definition of the word and it's connotations?  Surely we should be alarmed at anyone referring to our children as sexy, so why on earth are parents themselves doing it?  It's not cute.  It's not funny. It's not cool.  To be frank, it positively disgusts me.  How is a child to recognise when someone is being verbally inappropriate to them when we blur the lines of what is acceptable?

Yet sexualisation is everywhere, granted to the very young it's almost subliminal as they have no knowledge of what certain things represent nor the connotations that are attached to them such as, just to name a few:

* BHS who were selling padded bras and knickers aimed at pre-teens with 'Little Miss Naughty' emblazoned across them.  In America Abercrombie & Fitch were selling push up bras for seven year old and, wait for it, thongs...again starting at age seven with the delightful slogans of 'eye candy' and 'wink wink' emblazoned across them.  After coming under fire they simply renamed the push-up bra to padded bra, because that's so much better right? and stated it would only be available for 12yrs+ yet the sizing started at age 10.  Asda at one point sold childrens knickers in black and pink lace.

* In 2008, Woolworths who once sold a childrens bed with the name 'Lolita' a name associated with the character Dolores, nicknamed Lolita from Nabokovs 1955 novel (where a step dad is utterly obsessed, sexually, with his 12 year old step daughter) which has since become synonymous with sexual precocity.

* In 2005 WHSmith were criticised for selling stationary to young people with the Playboy Bunny motif on them, a motif that is associated with a huge porn empire.  Likewise in  the past I've seen the pink Playboy bunny bedding advertised alongside children's bedding.

* In 2006 the supermarket giant Tesco were condemned for selling a pole dancing kit marketed in the toy department complete with garter and toy money to stuff inside with the packaging stating it can be used from age 11+ alongside the slogan 'unleash the sex kitten inside'

* Bratz brought out the vulgar 'Bratz Babyz Twins Phoebe & Roxxi' dolls.  If you click on the link and look at the picture, I think it speaks for itself really.  Dolls made to look like babies dressed up as skanky prostitutes.


Where does it end?  It's unnecessary.  Why is childhood, innocence and wholesomeness suddenly so incredibly out of fashion?  When I was a child many parents found 'crop tops' scandalously inappropriate attire so you can imagine The Mothers horror when she spied a vile thong in the children's underwear section.

How did it all go so wrong and come to this?

Give children back their right to be children and have a childhood.  Lets end this mini-me obsession.  Childhood is not sexy.

Workshy scroungers.

Prejudice is everywhere, all around us.  We do it all day and everyday often without realising and other times we simply don't want to admit we're doing it. Generally there are two main groups of those that are victim to this, one being those that are considered within society to be different be it homosexual, of an ethical minority, tattooed,  a young parent, an old parent etc it goes on and one and then there are those who rather than different are merely the unfortunate, victim to circumstance.  The different can fight back, the unfortunate are expected to lie down and take it.

When your so-called educated opinions are based on sensationalism and manipulation of perspective from the media, they become invalid.  You're merely regurgitating what they want you to think and believe.

Be it on teenage mothers or extended breastfeeders, the media will manipulate it into a televisual feast of sensationalism focusing on the extremes because the normality simply isn't as interesting, shocking or obscene.

Then there is the current tirade against benefit claimants, they're all scroungers and workshy. It must be true, the government and the media say so.  Obviously.  There's you working everyday to pay these layabouts for doing nothing.  Did you know that only 3% of the entire welfare budget it spent on Job Seekers Allowance? Oh and only 0.7% of the entire welfare budget is claimed fraudulantly.  Yes, really. Puts it into perspective a little more, no?

Households with out of work claiming parents just breed more people that will never be in work and live off the state.  The government told us this so it must be true, in-fact the Daily Mail probably said it too an they never lie. Generations after generations of unemployed people.

"Reality: The academics Paul Gregg and Lindsay MacMillan looked at the Labour Force Survey, the large-scale survey of households from which we get most of our statistics about who’s in work. In households with two or more generations of working age, there were only 0.3 per cent where neither generation had ever worked. In a third of these, the member of the younger generation had been out of work for less than a year. 

When they looked at longer-term data, they found that only 1 per cent of sons in the families they tracked had never worked by the time they were 29. What’s more, while sons whose fathers had experienced unemployment were more likely to be unemployed, this only applied where there were few jobs in the local labour market. So ‘inter-generational worklessness’ is much more likely to be explained by a lack of jobs than a lack of a ‘work ethic’. " - (http://www.redpepper.org.uk/mythbuster-welfare-reform/)

There's plenty of jobs out there if you really want one.  You're just not looking hard enough because they don't really want one.  Beggers can't be choosers, get off your lardy arses and get a minimum wage job and pay your own way.  Really? when was the last time you were long term unemployed?  Once upon a time you could walk into your local pub, shop or factory with a 'give us a job?' and they would.  You could walk onto any building site and get work starting the next day.  In case you haven't realised, we're in a recession, scrap that, we're in a depression.  We're talking about several hundred people all applying for the same minimum wage factory job or cleaning job.  Many of which got laid off this year or last year thus trumping the people who have been out of work longer.  Jobseekers apply for reams and reams of jobs every day of every week becoming further devoured by hopelessness at the bleak outlook as companies don't even bother to send out 'sorry but no' letters any more.  You're just left, hanging.  The simple truth out there is, there is not enough jobs.  Is it really so hard to grasp that concept? Add to this the abhorrent workfare and zero hours contracts, companies no longer need pay people to work when they can get a stream of workfare candidates there instead for free and on top of that receive a bunch of money from the government for doing this.  Generally there are no jobs given to these people (these people who have to participate or face sanctions, doing the same work other people get at least minimum wage for to keep their £74 a week job seekers allowance which works out at working for £2 an hour, with no paid job at the end of it. It's absolute exploitation. A disgusting affair.

Yet living on benefits is easy, there's no incentive to get off them.  You get money for doing nothing.  You work full time whilst they sit around watching Jezza Kyle on their flat screen plasma tv's paid for by you, or the 0.00000whatever% of your actual taxes that actually do go towards JSA as you raise an eyebrow at their can of Stella an pack of fags because they're supposed to be desperate and surely i they can afford to smoke they're obviously getting too much benefit money.  Oh and how very dare they buy their kids Christmas presents when they have no job! Never mind that the TV is actually on tick and they'll be paying quadruple it's worth in interest until they're ninety years old and Christmas is most likely paid for by a doorstep loan shark that again they'll be repaying double or quadruple the amount they borrowed just in interest.  Is it any wonder they have a fag or a drink? really?  Do you really begrudge them that?  It's not to exploit the fact they're on benefits, it's to try and help cope with the fact they're surviving..barely.  They're existing not living.  When you're at the bottom you have no choices.  When you've cut back on nearly everything you possibly can, there's nothing else to cut back.  It's hard, it's dark, it's bleak and you cope with this by attempting to numb yourself with the odd drink.

Your clothes are second hand,  Ditto with the majority of your furniture, which by the way is falling apart.  Your bed is so knackered you wake up in pain and your oven door has no handle.  You haven't had a holiday in years.  You can't afford one car let alone downsize just to one. You're obviously doing everything wrong because you don't have a plasma screen tv, yours is third hand and old style....so old that half the graphics on adverts etc aren't seen on the screen.  You weigh up what's more important, turning the heating on to keep your kids warm or buying value bananas and apples to try and keep them healthy.  You've sold everything of any worth you've ever owned including new clothes just so you can buy food and pay for school trips. You can't move to a less desirable area and less fancy house to save money because you're already on a council estate where you want to barricade the doors and windows every night.

If life on benefits is so easy, do it.  I double dare you.  Stop complaining about how easy they have it and join them.  Jack in your job and sign on.  I'm not talking about a quaint little experiment here with the promise of your own real life back afterwards, I mean long term.  It's not a case of tightening your belt, here you have no belt because that would be a luxury.

Fear, hopelessness, worthlessness, depression, anxiety and £74 JSA a week to live on.

But these people have never worked a day in their life! Bollocks.  Are you really so naive to believe that? Many people worked full time straight from school and well into adulthood before finding themselves unemployed due to recession or health.  Whilst you were at University (by the way even if Mum & Dad paid tuition fee's what they pay is only a fraction of what it costs, the rest is actually subsidised by the government) many of these cretinous scroungers were working full time thus helping to fund you with their taxes.  Not to mention that just like you the unemployed pay taxes on everything they buy, so are putting back into the pot.  The same pot they're entitled to also withdraw from should they need it.

Do you get child benefit?  The key is in the name...benefit.  I.e you're technically a benefit claimant too.

Many claimants of council tax benefit and housing benefit, are actually in work.

It must be incredibly comfortable up there, judging those below.  You think you have it hard?

The majority of people on JSA want to work just like the majority of young mums are good mums and the majority of extended breasteeders aren't weirdos.

The root of it all.

Like the majority of woman, I'm not happy with my body.  I know it's terribly cliche but I need to lose weight.  My belly is too large and saggy, my boobs are dusting my toes, I'm too tall (yes, really.  Rather absurd the notions we have regarding our own bodies)

I'm not thinnist nor am I fattist, truth be told i'm only ever me-ist.  Naturally I feel a pang of envy at those naturally thin woman yet equally so at the naturally curvier woman who look good, feel good and have accepted how beautiful they are.  The truth is we're all different and not only are we all different, we're all made to be different.  I've known many naturally slim people, you know the kind, they neither diet nor adhere to some punishing exercise routine yet they just are slim.  Likewise you get some naturally plus size woman who you simply can't imagine them being any other way without looking ill.  It's not the old excuse of heavy bones yet rather bone structure, some people are simply made to be the way they are.  The naturally thin can gain a few pounds and genuinely look like they've gained stones, it alters the way they look, the way they feel and not in a positive way.  Likewise those more curvier who don't accept themselves and embark on a tiring cycle throughout life of dieting only to regain the weight, yet rather than look more attractive or confident when they lose pounds or even stones they simply lose their look of Joie de vivre and look withered, older and awkward and lets be honest, bloody miserable.

So where did it all start?  Where did this negative image obsession start from?  When did you first become body image aware?

You may want to read an interesting blog post that proved quite thought provoking.  Don't worry i'm not going to spiral into an emo-fest where everything wrong in life is all down to Mummy and Daddy yet, as an adult and a mother there comes a point when we have to accept responsibility for our role in shaping our childrens societal tolerance and self acceptance.

Children are not born to hate, they are born of love and to love.  Take racism for example, this is a learned hatred. A child will notice  difference in skin colour just as they would in eye colour and hair colour, how they then decode this difference is generally down to the parent.  Both my elder children, upon starting school, asked me why some people had brown faces to which I simply replied along the lines of that everyone is different just like hair colour, eye colour, height etc.  They accepted this.  Why wouldn't they? It's the truth.  Homophobia is another learned hatred, upon asking why, on a Mr and Mrs gameshow, one couple were both boys I simply explained that love is love, some girls love boys, some girls love girls, some boys love girls and some boys love boys but it's all love.  Again, they accepted this.  The key is explanation not judgement.

Yet when did we first become aware of how we should look? As a child I certainly didn't read tabloids and other media outlets and nor did I for one second believe Barbie was based on real people. What I do clearly remember however, is being put on the Rosemary Connellys hip and thigh diet as a young child, as in 6-7 years old, by my mum.  I was porky, it's evident in plenty of old pictures. It's quite baffling really, we're told puppy fat is a myth yet we walked everywhere, my mother was incredibly strict on treats, I did tap, ballet, modern and troupe dancing and later disco.  I did ju jit su.  Yet, I was porky.  My mother decided I was too big which thus told me I was too big and so started the internal programming of 'must be slim.  I'm fat' that fat is wrong and unattractive and yes, bad.  Thus, being fat I must therefore be wrong, unattractive and bad.  Don't get me wrong, I wasn't brainwashed and nor was my mother cruel, she was simply imprinting her own thinking onto us.  She's always been somewhat obsessed with her own weight and body image.

Fast forward to high school, I clearly remember a girl in my class calling me a 'Fat cow' .  In hindsight I wasn't fat, without the bloody dieting my puppy fat naturally dispersed anyway and I was neither fat nor slim.  Yet, it flipped a switch.  I became obsessed with calories and would feel euphoric if I managed to chuck my packed lunch in the bin and likewise would descend down dark paths of depression, binge eat on 'bad forbidden' foods and then spend evenings alone in my room, slashing at my stomach with scissors and inducing vomiting.  At age 15 I was about a size 6-8 and I was convinced with ever fibre of my body that I was fat, and ugly.  Meanwhile one of my brothers who was always slim, started on his road to obesity, gouging on chocolate bars en masse and stuffing the evidence down the back of the sink.  He's now morbidly obese.

By college, i'd live on Haribos mainly skipping breakfast, often skipping lunch and picking at my tea before rushing out to the pub.  I'd dance upon euphoric mania like some sugar fairy on acid then sink under the tsunami of self hatred and depression, hacking at my wrists with blades and swallowing painkillers like they were candy.

I still thought I was fat.  I look back at pictures of that time now and would sell several limbs and organs to look like that again.

Yet getting older, becoming settled in life comes a complacency and before I knew it the weight piled on, slowly at first and then, bam, one day I was technically obese (BMI 31) Google told me that was wrong, society told me that was wrong, my mother told me it was wrong. Back to the yoyo again then.

Last year I managed to get down to an impressive size 12, I felt like I was finally becoming who and what I was supposed to be.  I would be pretty.  I would be acceptable.  I would be normal. I would be god damn fucking super woman. I would be happy. Yet here I am a year later back up to a 14-16, again.

Life is too short to deprive ourselves.  I don't enjoy rigorous exercise and also feel that if a grueling regime of gym bunnying and eating salad is what it takes to be a normal weight, then how could that possibly ever be a normal weight?  Surely a persons normal weight should be whatever they are when they live day to day life keeping under the so-called calorie allowance and just well, living?

So we have society and media telling us we're too fat yet it goes back further then that.  I don't blame my mother, we each have our own neurosis, yet it did start in childhood which is why as a Mother, i'm trying to learn from my own experience.

We don't have forbidden foods in our house, anything in moderation.  We try to normalise chocolate, sweets and cake so they're not seen as contraband and are thus enjoyed and not craved.  We are relaxed and open   , you have to be with five people and one bathroom.  We don't hide our bodies, the children will see the reality of real people and not be beguiled with the myth.

I want my daughter to live her life realising that size is just another common denominator in life and it will not define who she is. That she is amazing, powerful, strong and beautiful.  That she doesn't have to change, for anyone.

I started this entry saying I need to lose weight, yet why?  Say's who? doctors who've never met me yet have reduced me to lines on a chart?  Magazines that I don't read?  Society that don't know me?

My husband thinks i'm fine the way I am.  My children occasionally joke about me being fat but hey, that's my own doing whilst being careful not to label others, I clumsily forget not to label myself. Yes, i'm pudgy.  I'm overweight.  I'm no longer obese though.

We all need to accept who and what we are and realise, it's okay.  We're beautiful.  We're amazing.

It's not the size of a person that makes them attractive, it's how they feel about themselves and in a smile.

That is what we need our children to believe.  That is how we need to teach our children to live.  Self love and acceptance starts in childhood.  We need to be careful what we say to our children, not just about them but about ourselves and others.  Teach them to see the positives and uniqueness in themselves and others.