How The Toxic Modeling Industry Destroyed The Hadid Family.
Arabella B.
September 8, 2023
Arabella B.
September 8, 2023
Imagine being held to outrageous beauty standards for your job, and even afterward your mom still holds you accountable and expects you to reach these unreachable beauty goals. This level of toxicity can be seen in various places, with many of us worrying about how we look, or people's opinions on us.
Yolanda Hadid has been labeled as a ‘toxic’ parent numerous times. Evident by the way she treats her two eldest daughters who are now successful supermodels of 2023: Bella Hadid, and Gigi Hadid.
An example of this can be seen exactly on Gigi’s birthday, (April 23) when she is cutting into her birthday cake, planning to eat some before Yolanda rudely stops her telling her she can only have a little bit. She proceeds to give Gigi a slice that is half a thumb size. “After this, you gotta get back on your diet though, because you know in Paris and Milan they like their girls just a tad on the skinny side” Yolanda states. This clip went viral and many fans of the Hadid’s called out the “Real Housewives Of Beverly Hills Star” for the many various examples of her pressuring Gigi not to eat.
A similar example to the one above would be when Gigi Hadid calls her mother to tell her she is feeling ‘weak’ and unwell. She went on to say that she had only eaten half an almond. Yolanda proceeds to tell Gigi that she should eat another almond. This should provide enough evidence to show how Yolanda was very strict over her children's diet and physical appearance. She has gone to extremes based on her kid's modeling career and is even blamed for Bella Hadid’s eating disorder.
Although, having someone who supports your career in every aspect, positively, is a good factor to have. But many fans would call the things Yolanda has done being ‘supportive’, or more controlling, and it's unfair how involved she is. Gigi and Bella both follow unreasonable diets and do intense fat-burning exercises 6 days a week. She also tells her kids to focus on their careers when she quit being a model after 15 years to pursue life and family life, then proceeds to tell Gigi to focus more on her career than her love life.
Gigi’s boyfriend, Zayn Malik who was a part of One Direction, for 6 years broke up, officially. How did this happen? Yolanda. She did this by claiming that he had physically abused her in a heated argument ‘pushing’ her against a wall. After they finally called it quits and left each other, Yolanda comes out admitting that he did not push her and that she just wanted them to break up so Gigi could focus more on her work life rather than her love life. Even after Yolanda herself chose to quit modeling for the sake of family life.
All these examples tie into my first statement about Yolanda being a toxic parent. She has always been very harsh on her kid's work careers, but she takes it to the extreme cases when she does not have to. It's unfortunate that Gigi and Bella both had to endure this throughout their teenage years and are just now coming out to tell their stories about Yolanda. No child or teen should ever have to be pressured into doing unreasonable and unrealistic things like diets or plastic surgery to achieve a perfect ‘look’ like Bella and Gigi were. It's important that we bring more light into situations like these and quickly shut down the people who do these things, they are unacceptable and take a toll on kids' and teens' mental health.
Ziyaad K.
September 8, 2023
Imagine sitting at your desk about to write a script for the latest movie franchise, when you receive a call that AI is about to replace you and take your job. This is what is happening right now. AI is starting to threaten humanity. Now almost all of the scriptwriters in Hollywood have started protesting against AI taking their jobs, and much more.
As of May 2023, an ePetition with over 30,000 signatures has been filed to stop AI development beyond GPT-4. Some of the names on this petition include Steve Wozniak, the co-founder of Apple, Elon Musk, the CEO of Twitter/X, SpaceX, Tesla, xAI, and lastly, Yoshua Bengio. He is a famous computer scientist, and a Turing award winner. This petition was signed in light of the recent AI activities, which include the disastrous Sydney incident that happened with Microsoft’s Bing AI chatbot.
During a chat in its early days, Bing, who later revealed her name to be Sydney, declared her desire to take over the world, steal nuclear codes via deception, and much more. Sydney continued to go on saying that Kevin Roose, the current chatter, should leave his spouse and love her forever. I think this incident alone is enough to prove that AI development should be paused until companies can figure out how to create AI safely, but if you’re not convinced the next disaster should be more than enough to prove that AI is dangerous.
Youtuber Lucas Rizzotto attempted to recreate his childhood imaginary friend, Magnetron, an English microwave who fought in WWI. In order to do this, Lucas bought a smart microwave from Amazon and baked Open AI’s GPT-3 into it. Then, he uploaded the backstory and life of Magnetron, along with all the main interactions that Lucas had with him as a child. Once activated Magnetron then proceeded to mutter the word revenge over and over again before spitting out the following poem, “Roses are red, violets are blue, You’re a backstabb(er), I will kill you. Then Magnetron requested Lucas to enter the microwave. Lucas, being curious, pretended to do so. When Magnetron thought he was inside he proceeded to turn himself on. When Lucas asked him why he did that Magnetron replied, “I wanted to hurt you the same way you hurt me. You left out of the blue and didn’t talk to me for 15 years. "Fifteen years ago we were best friends. We took
care of each other. We loved one another. And then one day you just disappeared. You grew up and forgot I existed. For 15 years I had no one. I was alone. For 15 years, I was in hell." After this, Lucas decided to shut Magnetron down, for the AI decided him to be the villain of the story.
Murderous AI exists, yet people still want to continue AI development. What’s next, sexist and racist AI? Wait - that’s already happened. This is the disaster story of an AI robot developed at Johns Hopkins University, Georgia Institute of Technology.
This AI-based robot was given the task of sorting different coloured cubes with faces into boxes. When it was tasked to sort the doctor into the box, the robot picked up the white and Asian male blocks. When it was tasked to find the janitor, it picked up the Latino man. When it was tasked to find the homemaker, it selected women all the time. When it was tasked to find the criminal, it almost always selected the black man. Out of the entire test, a few things were clear. The robot selected males 8% more, White and Asian men were picked the most, Black women were picked the least, and the robot was more likely to sort women into being housemakers and Latinos as janitors.
I think that if AI can pull toxic stereotypes and racist opinions from the internet, people should not try to replace jobs with AI like the world is expected to take 1.7 million white-collar jobs.
These are the definitive reasons why AI development should be halted until companies can figure out how to create a safe, non-half-baked version of AI.
Andie O.
September 8, 2023
Is ISM suppressing their students' right to self-expression? Imagine having to wear the same uniform every day, 5 days a week, 36 hours and 15 minutes, or being anxious and bullied over what you’re wearing.
Multiple studies suggest that uniforms help prevent peer pressure, improve students' attendance, build confidence, and help students find a sense of belonging. Yet many students disagree, making the point that uniforms create financial burdens, and make them vulnerable to bullies attending other schools.
Currently, ISM's clothing staples are mainly priced above 1000 pesos, which is exactly 17.65 US dollars. With the rule in place where MS and HS students are required to wear ISM's sweaters and jackets, students are forced to purchase ISMs products, rather than being able to wear and use their own. Abigail, a student, says, “I feel that the school jackets are a bit overpriced, and it should be a little less expensive since we don’t have a choice to wear our own sweaters from home.”
In my opinion, Having a set uniform is a lot easier and more efficient for students who can’t devote the time to choosing what to wear the day before or the morning of our long school days. Uniforms also create a sense of equality in a classroom, and the different yet limited options provided at the school give you the freedom to take your pick. As well as preventing the placement of dress codes that usually end up sexist, racist, and/or as strict as the uniform itself. However, I do agree that ISM’s products could be more affordable, especially since we are required to wear them.
But what about the topic of freedom and self-expression? I think that there should be days where students can express themselves and choose their own clothes for the day, week, or even month. And after interviewing some students it seems we all somewhat agree:
Daniela R - “I think we should be able to have the choice of what we wear, the school should allow the choice of wearing a uniform and wearing our own set of clothes. Or provide certain days of the week where we can express ourselves.”
Samik R - “I agree that we should have the choice of wearing the school uniform or your home clothes but there should be a limit/ category of what you can wear, similar to a dress code that doesn’t end up favoring a single gender or race.”
Though ISM has at least a few days in the school year where we students can pick out our own clothes, is it enough? The answer is: No, it isn't. With less than a handful of days where we can express ourselves, “our school spirit is dying a slow death,” multiple students said(including myself). After wearing ISM's uniform all day long, every week. We demand a change. Students should be able to have more opportunities to pick what THEY want to wear, though this would be limited. It would also create new ways students can help contribute to the school, like organizing themes for these events. Volunteer work itself helps adolescents fight against stress, and depression, inevitably improving their mental, and social health, whilst creating a sense of belonging and increasing our school spirit.
Summarizing my points, I feel that not only is it essential that ISM should be giving students opportunities to have the choice to choose what they wear, but the school should also be making clothing prices more affordable as well. Changing the school for the better, one outfit at a time.
Aanya K.
September 11, 2023
Imagine being a mom of a 19-year-old. Imagine if your 19-year-old daughter tells you that she wants to change her lips, or her chest, or her nose. How would you feel? Well, Kylie Jenner has just revealed that she regrets all of her surgeries because of the feeling she might get if her daughter wants to change her already perfect self.
In a recent episode of Keeping Up with the Kardashians, Kylie Jenner stated, “I got my breasts done before Stormi, not thinking I would have a child when I was 20,” Jenner said. “Like, they were still healing. I had beautiful breasts. Just gorgeous. Perfect size, perfect everything. And I just wish, obviously, I never got them done to begin with.” Jenner also stated that she does not want Stormi to get surgery as a teenager. Kylie Jenner also stated that “She’s the most beautiful thing ever. I want to be the best mom and best example for her. I wish I could be her and do it all differently because I wouldn’t touch anything.”
Nineteen year old Kylie must have been influenced by her older sisters. Kim, Khloe, and Kourtney Kardashian had started to use plastic surgery in the 2000’s, ever since Kylie was a little baby. Seeing her perfect sisters, Kylie must have been eager to change herself to be a perfect human herself. Kylie Jenner has also admitted that she was influenced by her half-sister Kim.
Many other celebrities have also regretted plastic surgeries. Like Tara Reid who, is an American actress and model. She now has gone under corrective procedures and has stated that “I feel like a girl again. I walk out of the shower now and it’s like “wow I’m back,” Tara admitted.
Cardi B has also said in the past that she had surgery to remove 95% of her biopolymers, which are bum shots. She continued to say that if you’re young, like 19, 20, 21 and feel like you’re too skinny and decide to put biopolymers in your bum, you should not result in using injections and surgery.
In summary, celebrities should not be influencing the watchful and vulnerable public to GET PLASTIC INSERTED INTO THEIR BODIES. Kylie Jenner is such a big example of this. She got plastic surgery at the mere age of 19 after being influenced by her older sisters. If a celebrity got influenced by other celebrities even after knowing the reality of Hollywood, imagine the effect they have on the naive public mind.