Many modern cultures do not place the same value on thinness as much of western society. Some, such as those in Polynesia and east and central Africa, value fat women to the extent of fattening up daughters to make them more marriageable.
Human bodies evolved in response to a struggle to survive with an uncertain food supply. The ability to store fat was a valued genetic trait. As long ago as 30,000 to 10,000 B.C.E., statues like the so-called Venus of Willendorf show an ideal of feminine beauty that includes large thighs, broad buttocks and pendulous breasts. The Biblical book of Proverbs says, "He that putteth his trust in the Lord shall be made fat." Even in Medieval Europe, when the religious art showed lank, acetic Marys and Eves, the secular art pictured round, fleshy women, brimming with laughter and sexuality. A fat, dimpled buttock or thigh was a universal symbol of sex appeal.
On the contrary, thinness was viewed as a sign of weakness, disease, and poverty. Eighteenth-century diet specialist Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin called thinness "a terrible misfortune" for a woman. "Every thin woman wishes to put on weight," he said, "This is an ambition that has been confided to us a thousand times." He obliged them by prescribing fattening diets.
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