Christina Aguilera Reflects On Media’s Fixation With Her Weight

All through her profession, Christina Aguilera confronted intense media scrutiny and criticism concerning her weight.

Within the mid-2000s, as she gained weight, she was incessantly focused by tabloids and public commentary, which was reflective of broader societal points with physique picture and superstar tradition.

Over time, Aguilera has spoken out concerning the challenges she confronted with physique picture and media strain and has emphasised the significance of self-acceptance and physique positivity.

In a brand new interview reflecting on the twenty fifth anniversary of “Genie in a Bottle,” she mentioned how the media’s fixation on her weight affected her vanity and psychological well being.

When Christina Aguilera dropped her 2002 album “Stripped,” her image and weight became a media frenzy. The album marked her transfer to a extra unbiased and edgy persona, showcasing a curvier determine in comparison with her earlier, slimmer look.

Particularly, her hit track “Dirrty” led to a now iconic music video, which confirmed Aguilera sporting a gritty look with greasy hair, black streaks, and kohl-rimmed eyes, carrying a–less chaps.

It blew everybody away, turned the discuss of the city, and continues to be a sizzling subject. The truth is, one critic known as her the “world’s skeeziest reptile lady.”

The pop star determined to make use of the second to redefine her artistry in a manner that was each daring and unprecedented.

Whereas “Dirrty” was an ideal mixture of aggression and defiance, Xtina’s subsequent single, “Stunning,” is what actually pushed boundaries.

On the floor, it’s a robust ballad about self-acceptance, however the music video, that includes scenes of two males kissing and a transgender lady dressing, was a radical assertion throughout the conservative Bush period. Aguilera devoted “Stunning” to the LGBTQ+ group, incomes her a particular recognition on the 2003 GLAAD Media Awards.

“The truth that the ‘Stunning’ video confirmed same-sex relationships and Christina’s personal presentation was going towards sure magnificence requirements of that interval had a big influence on endearing individuals to her long-term,” DJ Louie XIV mentioned on the podcast “Pop Pantheon,” per Glamour. “She realized there have been individuals feeling bothered by how ‘promenade king and queen’ pop had change into at that second.” ​​​​

As anticipated, it got here with criticism, however Aguilera ignored the jabs about “Stripped.” Nonetheless, different issues aren’t as straightforward to shake off.

Like Aguilera, many feminine celebrities and their our bodies had been the only focus of tabloids and the media. The notoriously ruthless ’00s tabloid tradition and its hyper-fixation on younger ladies affected many, together with the “Genie in a Bottle” artist.

Jessica Simpson, for instance, was globally criticized for carrying mother denims as a dimension 27. Each inch of Nicole Richie’s and Lindsay Lohan’s our bodies had been proven in tabloids, and Aguilera inevitably fell victim to the body-policing critics. The noise was so loud that she mentioned she stopped watching late-night exhibits for some time due to the jokes geared toward her and others.

“If you’re a teen, you will have a really totally different physique than if you’re in your 20s,” she instructed Glamour. “I began to fill out, after which that was unacceptable as a result of it was like, ‘Oh, she’s getting thicker.’ Then I had business individuals: ‘They favored your physique and the way you had been as a thin teenager.’”

“I’ve a maturity now the place I simply don’t give a fuck about your opinion. I’m not going to take it on,” she instructed the journal. “It should be your accountability to take up your house. Different individuals’s opinions of me should not my enterprise.”

The artist goals to instill this mindset in her youngsters. She shares a daughter, Summer season Rain, with fiancé Matt Rutler, and has a son, Max, from a earlier marriage. “Your youngsters set off issues in you that you just don’t need them to undergo,” she mentioned. “And it’s virtually such as you’re reliving this entire factor once more.”

“I really like my son and my daughter a lot, and also you do wish to defend and defend them from the world,” she mentioned as she acquired emotional. “However they must study their very own classes.”