Comments

1. Kaycee
2. Tiffany T.
3. Blaize
4. Alyssa
5. Georgia
6. Kathreena T.

Attractive and Fat

The CEO of Abercrombie and Fitch, Michael Jeffries, decided that they won't be selling any clothing over the size of 10. Why? He stated in an interview that "fat kids" will never be a part of the in crowd. He believes that "a lot of people don't belong [in our clothes], and they can't belong." WHAT IS HE THINKING?! He is shallow, exclusionary, and superficial. He publicly ridiculed those who are overweight and told them that they are not good enough which is not true at all. I am the type of person who doesn't like to exclude or discriminate based on someone's looks. It's what's inside the gift box that counts; not the wrapping.

Michael Jeffries makes me very angry and frustrated that people like him actually exists. He targeted a particular group of teens and called them "uncool". It is unjust to overweight teens. Teenagers already have a massive amount of pressure on them to fit in and to look a certain way. If they feel that wearing Abercrombie and Fitch clothing would make them fit in or would make them feel beautiful, then they should be able to buy these clothes in their size.

In today's society, the ideal image of beauty is thin and not at all curvy. Michael Jeffries's beliefs on whose popular and cool among teens contributes to our already biased perception of beauty. He is promoting that being overweight is unattractive and uncool by excluding them, and saying that they can't belong in his clothes and they never will. He is lowering people's self-esteem and pressuring them to be perfect. Hear me out when I say this: perfection is impossible. Everyone's definition of beauty and perfection are different. YOU decide yourself whether you are beautiful. Eleanor Roosevelt once said, "No one can make you feel inferior without your consent."

The Church Reaching Out to Youths

In recent events, the Pope Benedict XVI joined twitter in attempts to attract youth to get more involved in the life of the Church. And now, our new pope, Pope Francis, also became a member of this social network. I think that this will attract more young people to take a role in the Church. A majority of youths use twitter to communicate with their friends and to find out what people are doing, like celebrities and great leaders. Youths will see that the Pope is reaching out to them through a social media that they are most familiar with which shows that he cares for them and wants them to become the best Christian they can be.

They are many benefits that can come out of our Church leader being on Twitter. Social media is often used to spread around information and messages. The Pope joining Twitter will make it easier for him to communicate with anyone, especially with youths, and to send out teachings of the Church. Although there are advantages of Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis tweeting, there are also disadvantages. The internet and Twitter are very public places. Anyone can see your tweets and anyone can send you messages. These messages can be insulting and hurtful. There is a possibility that the Pope could be cyber-bullied.

Using social media to reach out to teenagers is the smartest and simplest way to do so. But there are other ways to encourage youth to take up a greater role in the Church. Parishes should promote youth groups as much as possible and in the meetings, they should make connections between the teachings of the Church and modern situations or trending topics in the world. In this way, teenagers in the youth groups could understand and relate better to our religion. It is important that youths get more involved in the Church because they are the future of this world. If they don't get involved then there is a potential that our religion will be lost.