Kelly Clarkson

FOX News' coverage of Adele and Kelly Clarkson's performances at the Grammy's took a bizarre turn when the channel brought on a nutritionist to discuss the "critics who are taking to Twitter saying they need to slim down." Why random people calling famous women fat on Twitter is valued as a "criticism" that requires discussion remains a mystery. But the results were appalling. In their conversation, the anchor and nutritionist Keren Gilbert articulated that stringent body image standards can be harmful for young women—and then turned around and critiqued Adele and Clarkson's bodies for not being "normal." The anchor even took a pot shot at the nutritionist's body for being too thin. 

Apparently, Fox News has gone meta. They're now wrapping a conversation of unrealistic female body standards within a conversation exemplifying exactly that problem. 

Check out the whole hot mess, or there's a transcript below the video. 

 

If there’s one pop star who can make me nearly swerve off the road while driving, due to wild one-armed dancing action paired with a silent weep, it’s my good friend Kelly Clarkson. Here is my confession: I am a big blubbery emotional softie smoosh. Like, the emotional equivalent of Dairy Queen. Many things set me off, but nothing moreso than a good impassioned pop tune. I like to play such hits on my banjo, but I often have to take breaks for my voice to crack when I start to sob ever so slightly at the chorus or bridge. And “Stronger (What Doesn’t Kill You)” by Kelly Clarkson is one of those that brings a tear to my eye almost every time.

The world’s biggest flirt has triumphed over a social revolutionary on the pop charts: Carly Rae Jepsen and her flouncy seven-week chart topper “Call Me Maybe” finally unseated Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way” as the longest-running number one single for a female singer with the Interscope label.

Flirty summer fun winning out over social comment, according to the dollars we are paying for the music they are making, means something. And yet, since this ideological overthrow was executed in the arena of pop music, the philosophical shift our iTunes purchases are fueling is not being discussed in the same way it might be if we were talking instead about domestic themes culled from the latest Jennifer Egan book or other pieces of more “worthy” art.

So what if we worthified the Top 40 by considering it alongside thoughts and arguments from great women writers of the past? What if we made explicit connections between the music of Kelly Clarkson and the oeuvre of Charlotte Bronte? What if we could talk about the contrasts between Adele and Emily Dickinson?

Welcome to my new guest blog, RetroPop, where the messages from today's biggest female-created pop tunes are played right next to those of rockin' and respected female artists from the past—and where dancing while blogging is highly encouraged.

In response to a Gold's Gym marketing campaign that declared July "Cankles Awareness Month" (WTF, douchebags?!) Imagine Today deemed August Self-Esteem Awareness Month. To celebrate, I've put together a few songs about standing up for yourself, being yourself, celebrating that self and flaunting it. And for the record, I think your calves and ankles look fantastic.