“Oh my God,she’s so skinny!” “He looks so fat.” “She is flat chested.” Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? We often come across such statements in our day-to-day life without even realising that these are ways of body shaming.
Body shaming is being judged for your body type. We may not realise it, but it hugely impacts a person’s self esteem; and even celebrity kids are not spared.
In her recent column in DNA, Amitabh Bachchan’s daughter Shweta Bachchan Nanda talks about how her daughter Navya who was body-shamed in the UK where she is currently studying. She says that as parents you raise kids with so much love and care and then one day, all of a sudden ‘someone callously brings it all crashing down and their only authority is that they are your child’s peer.’
Bachchan Nanda recalls her youth and how she was awkward as a teenager. In her own words, she always felt like the ‘ungainly, flappy Big Bird’. Cut to present day, she says that her daughter is nothing like she was. According to the proud mother, ‘Navya has beautiful long hair, delicate nose, long lashes and artistic hands and a heart that is soft and brave.’ Her only advice to her daughter is that ‘you must not let the world define who you are.’
By way of this column, Bachchan Nanda has addressed an important issue that children often face. Body shaming is a reality you cannot escape. It happens in schools, colleges, workplaces and unfortunately, sometimes, even in our own homes.
However what we can do and must do, is make our children realise that it is not your body type that defines you, but your character. We must teach them to embrace themselves and everybody else as they are and not get fixated on how they look.
