Below is what he wrote on his column in Daily Mail in response to the
actress’ scathing article on the objectification and scrutiny of women. Pierce’s response is below..
I like Jennifer Aniston. I once appeared with her on Oprah and it turned
out to be her birthday. So afterwards, I sent her a mortar and pestle
as a gift to help prepare her favourite guacamole.
At an Oscars party a few weeks later, Jennifer came over to thank me.
She was gracious, charming, warm and funny. In fact, an utter delight in
every way and everything any Friends fan would hope Jennifer Aniston
might be in real life.
She’s also, of course, a talented actress and a beautiful woman. Little
wonder then that Ms Aniston gets more attention than almost any other
female celebrity in Hollywood.
I’ve been in numerous Beverly Hills restaurants when she’s walked in,
and watched as every table descended into an instant frenzy of
elbow-nudging and staged whispers.
I suspect the same thing happens wherever she dines in the world.
We ALL have an opinion on Jennifer Aniston and these opinions have been
fuelled by the fact she hates talking about her private life and rarely
gives much away.
The less she reveals, the more we all love to guess:
Who’s she dating?
Where’s she living?
What’s she eating?
And more recently, that burning question which confronts any newly-married woman: ‘Is she pregnant?
Aniston, newly married for a second time, is understandably asked about children – as most newly married woman are.
Well yesterday, Jennifer finally had enough and let rip at all the gossip-mongers in an impassioned outburst.
‘I’m not pregnant!’ she raged. ‘What I am is FED UP.’
On that specific point, I have great sympathy with her.
There can be few things more distressing for a woman than for people to look at you and mistakenly query if you’re pregnant.
The unspoken implication is obvious: ‘You’re looking fatter than usual.’
I’ve fallen prey to dropping this clanger several times in my life and
can still remember the jaw-dropping look of mortified horror on the
faces of the women concerned.
I made them feel terrible and myself even worse.
(Now, I ask all woman I ever meet again if they’ve lost weight. It makes
me hugely popular…)
So Jennifer had me at ‘FED UP’ because it must be exasperating to see
your face blasted all over the tabloids under the headlines: ‘JEN’S
HAVING A BABY!’ when you’re not.
Especially, as she notes, given the ‘perpetuation of this notion that
women are somehow incomplete, unsuccessful or unhappy if they’re not
married with children.’
I also agree with her that her physical condition pales into a certain
insignificance when measured against the current news cycle of ‘mass
shootings, wildfires, major decisions by the Supreme Court, (and) an
upcoming election.’
I even have some sympathy for her complaint about the sheer volume of
paparazzi attention she receives. I’ve witnessed the frenzy around her
close up and it would be tough for anyone to deal with.
BUT….
Now, at this point I will put on my tin helmet in anticipation of the
furious vitriol that will inevitably pour down on my head from the
world’s feminists.
BUT… that’s not going to stop pointing out some unpalatable truths to Ms
Aniston.
Because she also says this in her blog: ‘The objectification and
scrutiny we put women through is absurd and disturbing. The way I am
portrayed by the media is simply a reflection of how we see and portray
women in general, measured against some warped standard of beauty.
Little girls everywhere are absorbing.. the message that girls are not
pretty unless they’re incredibly thin, that they’re not worthy of our
attention unless they look like a supermodel or an actress on the cover
of a magazine. This conditioning is something girls then carry into
womanhood. We use celebrity ‘news’ to perpetuate this dehumanizing view
of females, focused solely on one’s physical appearance, which tabloids
turn into a sporting event of speculation.’
Hmmm.
You may want to dismount from that high horse at this point, Jennifer.
There’s another reason why the media objectify and scrutinise famous
women, and why little girls get confused about beauty and body image.
It’s this: female stars like Jennifer Aniston deliberately perpetuate
the myth of ‘perfection’ by posing for endless magazine covers which
have been airbrushed so much that in some cases the celebrity is
virtually unrecognisable.
This morning, I Googled ‘Jennifer Aniston magazine covers’ and a
veritable avalanche of results appeared.
There she was on the cover of Elle, GQ, Rolling Stone, InStyle, Grazia,
Vogue, Red, Marie Claire, Allure, Harpers Bazaar, Vanity Fair, Hollywood
Reporter, Cosmopolitan, People and… well, I could go on and on but
check it yourself and you’ll see what I found.
I don’t know the inner workings of each magazine or photo shoot, but I
do know with my old newspaper editor hat on that almost all these cover
shots had clearly been airbrushed to make Jennifer look even more
perfect than she already is.
Cellulite’s been removed, crease-lines decreased, pimples expunged.
In many of them, this detailed work has continued to the rest of her
semi-naked or even fully naked body; thighs trimmed, butts toned, the
vaguest suggestion of bingo wings eliminated.
It’s the same type of forensic cover photo cover-up which goes on all
day every day on magazine picture desks the world over.
The aim? To sell a false image of perfect beauty.
Why? To sell magazines and to sell the cover star’s personal brand.
These covers, and I estimate Jennifer Aniston has done over 100 in her
career, have made both her and the magazines a ton of money.
I don’t blame them for the cover-up – who wants to see imperfection if
you don’t have to?
Nor do I blame them for raking in cash on the back of such false
imagery.
If people want to buy it, so be it.
Nor, frankly, do I blame the paparazzi for wanting to get in on this
scam themselves by taking and selling revealing photos of these
cover-girl stars without all the airbrushing.
They are, after all, merely ‘setting the record straight’ in
time-honoured journalistic fashion.
