Yesterday the cover of the latest Australian Women’s Weekly magazine popped up on my Instagram feed. I was immediately struck and impressed that Rosie Batty – Australian of the Year and courageous anti-violence advocate – was gracing the cover.
It’s not as bold as the magazine editor Helen McCabe’s decision to feature Turia Pitt on the magazine last year but it’s an inspired and welcome choice nonetheless.
The Australian Women’s Weekly is Australia’s most-read women’s publication, with a circulation of 451,000, and it’s not losing readership. The cover is prime real estate and Rosie Batty’s message is one that needs to be spread widely.
After processing that, however, my eyes were diverted to a headline on the cover. The PM’s wife: How Margie lost 20 kilos
Urgh. Really? The interview that the headline leads to is very interesting.
Margie Abbott has given very few personal interviews like this but she is frank about the challenges of being the PM’s wife. She talks about the leadership spill, Peta Credlin, her view of politics, holding down her own job whilst living in the spotlight and, yes, her own health.
It provides fascinating insight to Australia’s relatively unknown ‘first lady’ and the fact she has lost 20 kilograms is fringe. At best. In the context of Margie’s health and wellbeing it is interesting: for lots and lots of people losing weight is not simply a vanity exercise. It’s an important health measure so its inclusion is not without merit. But, as the cover line?
Notwithstanding the merits of maintaining a healthy body weight, the issue of women and weight loss and body image is fraught. It’s been acknowledged as important by the Australian Women’s Weekly many times and it’s worth noting that there isn’t another mainstream magazine here that features and celebrates cover stars that aren’t a size zero more than they do.
There is no simple solution to disentangling a woman’s worth from her appearance or her weight but de-emphasising weight as definitive helps.
The interview with Margie Abbott is worth reading but her weight loss isn’t what renders it so.