1. Is it a matter of record that she has an eating disorder?

2. Saying that someone who you consider to be too thin "should eat a sandwich" is just as insulting as telling someone you consider too fat to stop eating.

3. Discussing eating disorders is fine. They're a real problem, among actors and non-actors alike.

But if it's not known that she actually has an eating disorder, saying that she "really needs to eat a sandwich" is body policing, saying that her body does not conform to an external standard of acceptable appearance. And her body is nobody's business but hers.

She went vegan in the last year or so, which, along with the long working days, is what her weight loss has been attributed to.

Steph,

And her body is nobody's business but hers.

Is that true for people in the public eye? It is true for you and me I suppose, but if we can talk about a star's behavior, or what they say publicly, appearance seems to come in there too.

Earlier people criticized the show for marginalizing "ugly" characters to support some members of "Glee", so appearance has already come up.

And her body is nobody's business but hers.

Is that true for people in the public eye?

Yes. Unequivocally. I'm not sure how, because someone is in the public eye, their body is anyone else's business. It's that person's body. Not mine. Not yours. Not anyone else's. We don't actually own that person, despite paying (in some form or another) for the product that person helps create (TV, movies, advertisements).

Her body. Her business.

I apologize. You are right that that phrasing is offensive and unnecessary. I succumbed to a popular phrase that, in retrospect, I do not think is fair.

I do not know if Lea Michele has an eating disorder, as I do not know her personally (and sometimes you don't even know then). I can tell, however, that she's lost a significant amount of weight since she was on Broadway - and this is a woman who probably weighed less than 100 pounds then. I suspect, though I am admittedly unsure, that this is a decision she has made (to eat less, work with a personal trainer, whatever) and not based on other factors such as stress. I don't know if that's entirely her decision or one encouraged by her agent / the show's producer's / the Hollywood life in general, but I personally find her current appearance to be significantly less attractive than before - as le nubian stated, I think it makes her look unhealthy. In fact, she's almost certainly severely underweight, which IS unhealthy. If her current weight is intentional, I think it's a bad medical decision, and I am sad that she (or the people around her) think that it is necessary. If it is unintentional, due to metabolism and stress, etc, then I think she needs to try to correct it as best she can. Unfortunately, her support system is probably not designed to help her gain weight - that's not the Hollywood way.

I think it's important to try to make it clear that I, for one, do not support the Hollywood culture of taking attractive young women and convincing them they need to be a size negative 8 to make it. There are body types that are attractive beyond Twiggy. And because I am invested both in Lea Michele and Rachel Berry, I wish I had a way, beyond posting on the internet, to make it clear that I don't think that look works for her.

Steph,

So we can comment on other parts of a person but not their body? I don't get your larger point. Would you make it clearer?

So we can comment on other parts of a person but not their body? I don't get your larger point. Would you make it clearer?

I'm not sure I can be clearer than to say that someone else's body is their business. It is not my place, or yours, or anyone else's, to decide that someone who is thin and/or appears to have lost weight should "eat a sandwich."

Let me ask you a question: it seems that you think it's okay to police other people's bodies, or at the very least, police the bodies of those in the public eye. Is that correct? Do you think that, and if so, why?

Steph, if, instead of the flip sandwich comment, Gris had said, "She looks so thin now that she looks unhealthy," is that the same thing to you?

Steph, if, instead of the flip sandwich comment, Gris had said, "She looks so thin now that she looks unhealthy," is that the same thing to you?

Eh, I still feel that, unless we know she really is unhealthy by medical standards, then why is it our judgment call?

What if he had just said "Wow, so-and-so's weight loss is kind of shocking?" as opposed to "eat a sandwich?" Because I have definitely had that thought about some actresses, especially if I haven't seen them for a while, but I'm not, consciously at least, trying to be the boss of them. Despite our parasocial relationship that I learned about on HBO this week.