When I first heard about this whole “Thigh Gap” trend, I immediately dismissed it as the latest beauty trend and diet fad for white women and didn’t pay it too much attention. I had learned from watching countless nineties sitcoms like “Golden Girls” and “The Nanny” that while a big behind was admired and praised in the black community, it was shunned in the white world. Of course, things have changed but the lesson from those years remains true, quite often, the beauty standards for white women and black women aren’t the same.
The thigh gap was just another example. I’m black, so it didn’t apply to me and certainly not something I should try to achieve. And so I kept it moving. No matter how many times I saw the words thigh gap mentioned on various women’s websites, I kept scrolling.
That was until yesterday. We were watching an episode of “The Dr. Oz Show” and of course the topic was “The Thigh Gap.” Ugh. Not Dr. Oz too. I’m sure there were women who are out here trying to get this look but it seemed like a trend middle schoolers and teenagers would be obsessed over, not the grown women who watched Dr. Oz’ show and again, certainly not the women of color.
Oh, how wrong I was. Not only was there a women of color interested in the achieving the highly coveted thigh gap, Dr. Oz was interviewing the black woman who literally wrote the 250 page book on the subject. Camille Hugh, author of The Thigh Gap Hack: The Shorcut to Slimmer, Feminine Thighs Every Woman Secretly Desires says “I think a thigh gap makes all the difference in how feminine and how sexy you can appear. The closer that you get into that, the more attractive you look.”
Hugh, who has no medical or nutritional training–but has done a lot of research– offers advice on how to get the gap. One of her methods suggest women skip breakfast and not eat for 12-16 hour periods.
Dr. Oz asked if she was teaching women how to starve themselves. She said it was a way to teach women to eat only when they’re hungry and not because society or their friends are eating at these times.
Dr. Oz went on to explain that a thigh gap has more to do with the closeness of the bones and muscles than it does with fat. People with bones that are set closer together would literally have to burn muscle in order to achieve this thigh gap thing.
Needless to say, burning muscle is not healthy and Hugh sounded grossly ignorant.
Be careful where you get your advice. Hugh would have you starving yourselves out here.
And that’s the takeaway. Going through extraordinary means to lose weight in this arbitrary area is potentially dangerous.
But allow me to offer another perspective. There is nothing wrong with a little jiggle. I prefer it actually, in moderation. And I’m sure you’ll find plenty of men who share the sentiment. One of the best thing about being a woman is having a body that is not like a man’s. It can be quite nice to be soft, with soft pillowy thighs that kiss each other. Sure they can be a little annoying when they’re rubbing together in the summer time heat but other than that, they serve quite a few functions. When you’re seated and you notice that your hands are cold, placing them in between thick, soft thighs will provide the warmth you’re seeking. For the dancers out there, when you’re shaking and popping it, your thighs are just as much if not more vital than your actual booty itself. And since we’re on the topic of dancing, if you ever want to do the move detailed in the video below, you’ll need a little thigh meat.
http://swf.tubechop.com/tubechop.swf?vurl=pUeegKa8zVQ&start=122.27&end=127.41&cid=2114960
And while I’m not advocating that we drastically alter our bodies, one way or another solely for the attention of men, a lot of them like to have something to hold onto. Just something to consider.
Now, there are some women who naturally have a thigh gap. And whether you like it or loathe it, it’s yours. And that’s the point of all this, we all need to identify our various body types and embrace them. Personally, I’d never even noticed whether a woman had a thigh gap or not. In the grand scheme of things, does it really matter?
But for those of you still lamenting the fact that there’s not a gap between your thighs, let me leave you with this. According to my grandmother, the most important function of thick thighs is to keep your “fishy” warm. And that’s important.
