Male models

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When most people think of exploitation in modeling, they think of young women and girls walking the catwalk with alarmingly protruding hips and angular shoulders, or they remember the lurid tales of celebrity photographers manipulating or coercing young women into sex acts. Muscle-bound male models with perfect cheekbones and fat paychecks? They do not seem like obvious victims. But as I found during my short career as a male model, men and boys are increasingly at risk in the odd, unregulated workplace that is the fashion world. Being a man does not make you safe: Male models are often subject to sexual harassment but rarely report it. And, like their female counterparts, they are under intense pressure to have just the right kind of body. Recent menswear trends have polarized male catwalk modeling, encouraging either extreme muscularity or waifish androgyny. Want to look like that? It will likely make you sick.

And there's another factor that makes male models more vulnerable today: Emerging East Asian economies have created a demand for designer clothes and consequently for models. Growing numbers of young models, both men and women, are heading to Asia, far from their families and support networks, and working in poorly regulated conditions that leave them at risk of being overworked and underpaid. It turns out that being really, really, really good-looking—as Ben Stiller's male model character Derek Zoolander describes himself—will not guarantee you wealth, health or security.

Sam Thomas, founder of the U.K.-based charity Men Get Eating Disorders Too, is highly critical of recent shifts in the fashion industry. “There has certainly been a trend in which some male models are getting younger and definitely skinnier,” says Thomas. The industry seems “particularly polarized right now,” he says, with hypermuscular looks becoming increasingly popular at the same time as demand has surged for waifish male models. (Source: www.newsweek.com)

• After reading this text, do you think there is a big difference between being a male model and being a female model?
• According to you, what's the most striking thing about this short text?
• Add five words you learned by reading this text to your vocabulary list.