I read it.

I find it hard to feel sympathy or compassion for her, when there are so many people truly suffering in this world. Her "plight" is because she is a famous, beautiful actress who put herself out there in spite of the fact that gossip rags and photogs have been around for a very long time. Now she wants to whine about it? Let me call the waaaaaaaambulance.

I don't know of anyone who cares one way or another if she's pregnant or not pregnant. But I'm not a celeb watcher, and maybe there are people (or media outlets) who clamor for this sort of info. It's off my radar though. It's not really like procreating is an unusual occurrence anyway.

She has allowed herself to be photographed and portrayed in such a way as to perpetuate the objectification to which she now vehemently objects. She's profited greatly from doing so, as well. She comes across as ungrateful and self-absorbed IMO.

I pay zero attention to Jennifer Aniston but did read her essay because you mentioned it. I will say one thing, I have a sister who is 57, she never married and she is childfree. Does she wish it was otherwise, I really don't know but she has a really interesting life and a ton of friends and she's ok.

And I do love Aveeno products.

I don't know that she was deliberately a part of the cultural pressure for women to be young forever, fit etc., as for her it was part of the business, it was a requirement for getting roles. I wonder if rather, it's an awareness that has come to her as she has aged and matured.

I see her essay as a way for her to use her celebrity statis to try to help non-celebrity girls and women. Nothing wrong with that.

A portion:

"If I am some kind of symbol to some people out there, then clearly I am an example of the lens through which we, as a society, view our mothers, daughters, sisters, wives, female friends and colleagues. The objectification and scrutiny we put women through is absurd and disturbing. The way I am portrayed by the media is simply a reflection of how we see and portray women in general, measured against some warped standard of beauty. Sometimes cultural standards just need a different perspective so we can see them for what they really are — a collective acceptance... a subconscious agreement. We are in charge of our agreement. Little girls everywhere are absorbing our agreement, passive or otherwise. And it begins early. The message that girls are not pretty unless they’re incredibly thin, that they’re not worthy of our attention unless they look like a supermodel or an actress on the cover of a magazine is something we’re all willingly buying into. This conditioning is something girls then carry into womanhood. We use celebrity “news” to perpetuate this dehumanizing view of females, focused solely on one’s physical appearance, which tabloids turn into a sporting event of speculation. Is she pregnant? Is she eating too much? Has she let herself go? Is her marriage on the rocks because the camera detects some physical “imperfection”?"

continued ...

'This past month in particular has illuminated for me how much we define a woman’s value based on her marital and maternal status. The sheer amount of resources being spent right now by press trying to simply uncover whether or not I am pregnant (for the bajillionth time... but who’s counting) points to the perpetuation of this notion that women are somehow incomplete, unsuccessful, or unhappy if they’re not married with children. In this last boring news cycle about my personal life there have been mass shootings, wildfires, major decisions by the Supreme Court, an upcoming election, and any number of more newsworthy issues that “journalists” could dedicate their resources towards.'

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/for-the-record_us_57855586e4b03fc3ee4e626f

David Edelstein, a regular contributor to CBS Sunday Morning had a piece on this week's (7/10) episode that addressed issues women in media face regarding looks and aging. I wish I knew how to post the link...

I'm conflicted about Aniston's situation. While she has profited with beauty product endorsements, I don't think she's done anything to provoke the attention she's been subjected to regarding pregnancy rumors. I don't follow celebrities, but just having been in grocery stores, I've seen scores of magazines headlining her "pregnancies" over dozens of years. It's obviously profitable. And I think that's really an unfair thing to do to someone for as many years as Aniston has been a target.

If she hasn't had a baby by chance instead of choice that's just cruel. I don't care who you are.

Awesome. I like her 'kick ass essay'. I'll give her a high five too. Don't understand why other women would object.

Go girl.

Well, now I have to read it, since I've agreed with both sides.

I'm in amck's corner, I think. I sympathize with her - being a celebrity does not, in my opinion, mean you must put up with constant paparazzi and harassment. It may "come with the job", but they are entitled to their freedom from it when they are not 'on the job', living their private lives, i.e.; shopping, being in their own homes, for crying out loud, etc. They are not their work product.

But I have mixed feelings about her comments about expectations of women. I agree with her that women don't need to be married or have children to be complete, and in fact I think women are much harder on other women over this kind of thing than are men. But I am conflicted because I do think she has been part of the problem of making girls (and women) feel like they are less than something if they don't have perfect skin or have gray hair or are not perfectly fit and able to wear an evening gown with a slit up to their thigh at age 40.

It's almost as if some of you hold it against her that she's a beautiful, successful woman. That somehow that negates her right to have a voice. I say more power to her.

Why are we not entitled to share honest opinions about the essay without being chastised for our thoughts? FFS, people.

Jen, classy as usual. How many times have I seen you use that word here? Too many.

I don't understand how JA is "part of the problem" of making girls and women feel like they are "less than." She obviously takes care of herself and looks great. Would she be less of a problem if she didn't?

She has made a living in large part due to her congenital beauty. I don't think that means she can not participate in the discussion about the harm that largely unachievable standards of beauty does to more than half of our society.

Where I think she goes wrong is that she's mixing two different messages.

One can seem sort of whiny and ungrateful, the "I want to be alone" bit ... That is the hand you are dealt along with the enormous, tremendous and rare gift of celebrity.

Then, she tries to tie in her displeasure at the lack of privacy with the broader issue of body image and objectification.

The problem is she never seemed to care about the latter until she got fed up with the former.

OTOH, to be fair perhaps she's only recently become enlightened about the issue. Overall, I think it's a good message and she certainly has the right to raise her voice.

I'm not sure why she believes her message is relatable to anyone except the 2 or 3 other women in the U.S. who share her circumstances.

I've never been a victim of tabloid excess, but I don't have the financial and other resources she has. Any message she's sending doesn't even relate to me for a multitude of reasons. I find it odd she thinks it does.

Women can try to relate to her, I guess. Good luck.

"I'm not sure why she believes her message is relatable to anyone except the 2 or 3 other women in the U.S. who share her circumstances."

There are many women who feel the pressure to marry and/or have children.

You don't have to relate to someone's circumstance to have the ability to relate to or to understand their message. If that were the case, why speak out at all about anything whether it be injustices or merely an opinion.

I have the same thoughts that Jennifer Aniston does, as many do, but you really think that Huffington Post is going to print an editorial that I wrote or that my opinion is going to start a conversation - I hardly think so. Just because Jennifer Aniston (who I really think is a light-weight when it comes to acting) wrote it doesn't mean it isn't worthy of thought and discussion.

I think there's a lot of public pressure on Jennifer Aniston to want to have children because Brangelina have so many. That's got to be a terrible thing to live with that comparison daily in a confrontation-hungry media environment. I relate to her message because I get the kids question quite a bit and I actually really want kids and am infertile. I also get the "have you lost weight? You look fantastic!" comment every time I have a miscarriage. Geeeee....thanks!

I don't follow celebrity/tabloid culture mostly because I don't care, but in part because I feel bad for celebrities. Being famous and well paid, IMO, should not be a life sentence of being stalked and harassed. I pay to see actors on the screen, not on the pages of news of the world or people. If I were in that situation I would find it completely unbearable and very injurious to my mental health. I can't envy them for that reason. I think stalking/ harassment laws should protect them not only from individuals (which they do not adequately) but also organizations.

What does FFS mean? I googled and found many different meanings, I'm a bit surprised.

I agree with Tib. I understand her frustration on the baby thing, but she should have stopped there.

Piers Morgan summed up my feelings about body image affecting young girls. She's part of the problem.

Acdc, it's For F's Sake.

I don't think anyone here, myself included, is saying she had no right express her views or raise her voice. Of course she did, and it is a very good message. I'm interested in people's opinions about not even really the message - not sure how anyone other than Donald Trump can argue with it - but whether there is some, "Do as I say, not as I do" going on, or whatever other opinion and insights some might have.

Her comments about marriage and pregnancy are right on, only they are missing a very important part, that whether or why anyone is married, or not, or pregnant, or not, is no one's business, and it is rude and tacky to project onto others one's own idea of how another "should" be living.

I also don't think anyone's comments here are about holding anything against her because she's a beautiful, successful woman, although I won't speak for anyone here definitively. But no one has said that her being beautiful and successful negates her right to have a voice. Criticism of a message, or even a person, is not the same things as saying someone has no right to have made that message.

Nor do I think the alternative is for her to be out of shape and to not take care of herself, as one commenter suggested.

**CindyMac, using the "f bomb" is far less classless than is lobbing vicious, personal attacks toward others here (or via email), and being a surrogate for another in doing so.

People in glass houses....**

Tib, your glass house is just like everybody else's. Many of us have been on the receiving end but most have learned to let go and move on. May I suggest you do the same?

Nonsense, Oakley. And your acknowledgement that, when everyone was attacking you over your "glasses" thread, I emailed you personally to support you is appreciated. Indeed, the reason I did that, even though I disagreed with you on the thread, was because I don't like "gangups", toward anyone.

Sorry, Oakley, but I do not attack people personally here, ever (I did once, regretted, and came back and apologized to the person), never mind ganged up on anyone in a gangup (as you have done), nor have I sent one nasty email to anyone here.

Attacks on the person are different than criticism of the content of a person's comment. Learn the difference, Oakley.

And let what go? A comment on this thread???

No. I'll respond as I see fit.

And btw, I was not referring to just myself here.

K?

If you exchanged ugly emails with someone and then bring that history here to throw it in their faces, over and over again, that is a personal attack. Those emails are private between the two of you.

We're sick and tired of hearing about those damn emails!! hehe

Aniston has been a tabloid phenomenon and I can't recall any celeb being so closely watched for a "baby bump". The narrative never goes away for Aniston. Maybe when she turns 70, the tabloids will give it a rest!

My push back on Aniston's complaints about being hounded everyday as she exits her gajillion dollar home is, well, she's rich, so move out of the L.A. fishbowl.

Many celebs choose to live away from the b.s. of L.A./Hollywood, but still work there. They live within a couple hours, or in other regions of the country, and they have relatively "normal" lives.

Aniston choices have in part, driven this never-ending cycle that seems to have staying power for many years to come.

acdc, if you knew the history, you might not be surprised. One can only take so much.

I wasn't going to return to this thread, but you know how it is ... moth to flame. Rubbernecker to train wreck.

Yes, there's ancient history here that many have no clue about. That said, I'm tired of the animosity and the backbiting. In that light, I offer my sincere apology and an outstretched hand to anyone that I have ever offended - anyone who has ever found me difficult or hostile or hurtful or just annoying. I am sorry. I really am. You're a person, I'm a person, and we're all just doing the best we can. Let us therefore move on.

Re the "f" word - I don't see it the way some of you do. I don't find it shocking or classless; it's just a word that I take no issue with among most of my contemporaries. I won't purposely go out of my way to offend someone with it, but I don't feel the need to qualify my use of a common online abbreviation. And if that remains offensive, then I don't quite know what to say. I'm not a delicate little fleur, and I assumed nobody else here was either. The day that someone comes out and uses "THE ACTUAL WORD", well, then let's regroup. For now, we'll just have to agree to disagree about it. ;-)

Peace y'all. This is a good place, and I like coming here.

I really like Jennifer Aniston as a celebrity. I think she has a lot of charm and charisma, seems smart and funny - lighthearted. I don't remember the details, but think she's shown a lot of class and restraint in public over some hard things that have gone on in her life. I've not seen her in too many things but Friends, where I really adored her character, thus her, I guess. Oh, and I recently watched Cake and like her in that.

I don't follow celebrities at all except when I see them on Ellen or a late night talk show and I've always liked what I see of her. Like Mtn said, she has the genes that give her a look that seems to be popular, sought after. It appears to be natural and not obsessive, healthy and wholesome. Not a look that most girls would have to harm themselves to try to achieve. And she, as far as I know, has never sunk into a spiral of drugs and alcohol that would be bad role modeling for girls.

I agree with everything she wrote in her essay, but would never have seen it or heard about it except for here. I'm sorry for her and every other person like her, who can't simply go to "work" and then leave her job behind. I can get plenty of "celebrity" by watching their work, where they have a choice about what they give and do. I think it's sick that the public rewards the lowlifes that invade every space (or try to) to fulfill the lust for private information about other people. Sick.

What I wonder is when celebrity meant complete loss of privacy in public and fair target for any photog? I understand when the celebs go out to the big shows with the red carpets...but I don't understand when going to the grocery store or walking the dog became an event worthy of publication.

I completely agree that there is a hidden presumption in the many comments about female celebrities-that they are only happy when getting engaged, when married, when pregnant or as mothers. For myself, I just figure that most of those publications must have male editors and that is what those editors want to believe - it would be interesting to research-whether traditional feminine role models sell more magazines, or if that's just the presumption. After all there is a lot of money changing hands; it is the fact that the photographer gets paid that is driving this frenzy. Funny, how we never focus on who is pulling the strings behind the scenes...

I think you can assume that what they are doing is selling magazines, or else it wouldn't continue, nor would it have ramped up to the ridiculous level it has.

I miss Tibb.

Hey Sushi, it’s your favorite necrospammer at work again.

Just flag it. He's got another on "Household Finances", too.

Timely timely thread. Thanks Jose Miller.

i still remember Tibbix’s green kitchen with the real brick backsplash! Maybe she is still around but under a new name?

OMG that is so AI-y.