Oprah's Ego & The Femnine Mystique

So, I watched the new Oprah show last night, her Lifeclass, whereupon she reflects on past shows she's done and how she sees them now. It was fitting that she started with the episode that I always hated the most. The one where she lost all the weight, bringing out the fat on a radio flyer and wearing size 10 Calvin Klein jeans. Eighteen million people watched her that day and I was probably the most disappointed viewer of them all. Though I understood it and her, empathized and even related to her on a molecular level, it sill angered me that such a role model for women fell prey to the kool aid and fed us the same garbage the rest of popular media does. That thin is the ideal, that's it's better and has more value in the world. She went on to explain the ego that drove her and the error that she made, but I still wish she had acknowledged the potential damage she had done by propagating those misconceptions, especially as that show has come back to haunt her so many times over the years.
Attaching our worth to our weight, our value to our beauty. When will the media stop abusing us, punishing us and stealing our self worth? When will we stop letting them do it? Is there really a difference between an apron and spanx? Are they not both symbols of oppression and the ideal woman? I despair for a gender, a race, a vast number of individuals still allowing themselves to be bound. Would men allow this? What happened to the women's movement? We work, bear children, serve our country, but if we're not a size 2, we're still not enough.
Why do strip joints still exist in 2011? Why is there no male equivalent to Hooters? Come to it, why does Hooters still exist? What happened to the Feminine Mystique? Have we forgotten the lessons of our foremothers? Have we become complacent in the present? We need a revolution.
I want thin not to be in 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 375 days a year. I want it to share the spotlight with other body types : In magazines, and not just the one 'special edition' devoted to 'plus size' women : On TV, and not just on Mike & Molly : In films, where the rule clearly doesn't apply to men, and I certainly don't mean Gwyneth Paltrow in a fat suit.
I need my sisters to stand with me and not be shamed, cowed or frightened. Gloria Steinem burned her bra, I ask my sisters to burn their spanx and fight the good fight for women.