Introduction

Body shaming is the act of criticising someone based on the shape, size, or appearance of their body. Anyone can be the target of body shaming.

As wellness and beauty are increasingly commercialized, body image is often misused in marketing. For example, a Thai café gave discounts to thin customers, exposing the ethical issues in rewarding body size. Such tactics may seem harmless but raise serious concerns about dignity, fairness, and mental health—especially in a diverse society like India.

Socio-Cultural Factors Driving Body Image Shaming 

• Unrealistic Beauty Standards: Popular culture, including Bollywood films and fairness cream ads, promotes narrow beauty ideals like fair skin and slim bodies. 
  • It is well-documented that idealized body norms can lead to body image disturbance and unhealthy behaviors, including dieting and clinically disordered eating.
• Media & Social Media Pressure: Platforms like Instagram and YouTube often promote unrealistic beauty through filters and edited images, making people feel they need to look perfect. 
  • For example, an 18-year-old girl from Kerala, tragically died after extreme water fasting influenced by online weight loss advice.
• Cultural and Family Bias: Women are often valued for their appearance, while men face pressure to be muscular or tall.
  • In many Indian households, girls are pressured to lose weight or become fairer for better marriage prospects. Dark skin or being overweight is wrongly associated with laziness.
• Peer and Social Conditioning: From school bullying to college jokes, appearance-based teasing starts early and normalizes judgment based on looks.
  • There's a lack of body-positive education.

Ethical Frameworks and Violations

• Kantian Ethics: Judging people by appearance for profit or ideals violates human dignity, treating them as tools rather than individuals with intrinsic worth.
• Utilitarianism: Though such practices may offer short-term gains, they cause long-term harm through mental health issues, stereotypes, and discrimination—making them ethically unjustifiable.
• Virtue Ethics: A good society should promote compassion and inclusivity. Rewarding appearance encourages vanity and exclusion, which are moral flaws.
• Justice as Fairness (Rawls): These practices fail the fairness test, as no one would accept a system that discriminates by body type if unaware of their own. It undermines equality and justice.

Key stakeholders involved

Way Ahead

• Stronger Regulations: Enforce laws to ban ads that promote body-based discrimination. Include body diversity education in schools and public health campaigns.
• Media Awareness: Help people recognize and question unrealistic beauty standards. Support campaigns that celebrate real, diverse bodies
  • Example: Dove's "Campaign for Real Beauty" broke stereotypes by featuring women of all ages, shapes, and sizes, redefining what beauty means.
• Ethical Marketing: Businesses should focus on inclusivity and avoid content that shames bodies. Hold influencers and brands accountable for harmful messaging.
• Mental Health & Dialogue: Offer psychological support for those affected by body shaming.
• Role of Parents: They should promote body positivity, avoid judging appearances, praise inner qualities, teach respect for all bodies, support emotional expression, and not set unrealistic beauty standards.
• Role of Schools: They can offer body image education and promote well-being over weight loss to build lasting confidence.

Conclusion

Ending body shaming requires collective effort—from media, institutions, and individuals—to shift focus from appearance to acceptance. True progress lies in valuing people for their character, not their looks, and creating a culture where everybody is treated with respect and dignity.