Damn You Skinny Alert™: Ricki Lake loses 20 lbs.

Publication: Us Weekly

Date: 7 Nov. 2011

Welcome to gossip hell, Ricki Lake!  The actress and talk show hostess has recently lost weight and this is being reported in a good way, one of the few weight stories this week with a positive slant.  Good for her.

Not Long 4 This World and Meanest Story nominee: Demi Moore's weight plunges to a life threatening level.

Publications: OK!, Weekly Life & Style, In Touch

Date: 7 Nov. 2011

Most weeks, it's the Three Wicked Step Sister tabloids, the Enquirer, Globe and low rent Examiner fighting it out for Meanest Story of the Week, but this week three of the allegedly more reputable gossip rags put Demi Moore on the tabloid vulture list, saying her life style could kill her.  These are the headlines.

• Weekly Life & Style: Starving to keep her man
  Demi's daughters fear for her life
  95 lbs. and dropping
  500 calories a day
  Taking dangerous diet hormones
  What is she thinking?
• OK!: Starving for attention
  What's behind (Demi's) dangerous weight loss
• In Touch: Demi's deadly diet

These are co-nominees for Meanest Story of the Week.

Damn You Skinny Alert™: Starving for attention.

Publication: OK!
Date: 7 Nov. 2011

Fresh trash on Thursdays! A lot of stories about celebrities who are too skinny on the covers this week. OK! has a cover story I'm putting in the running for Meanest Story of the Week tomorrow, but it also includes two women who are always being called too skinny.

The first is Leann Rimes.

The second is Kate Middleton.

Damn You Skinny Alert™: How dieting destroyed their looks

Publication: Weekly Life & Style
Date: 7 Nov. 2011

Fresh trash on Thursdays! Lots f stories about extreme dieting this week, including a pile-on attack on one celebrity that will be a nominee for Meanest Story of the Week tomorrow. Weekly Life & Style says that dieting has ruined the looks of Angelina Jolie, seen here when she was nice and fleshy.

The other actress in this story that has a picture making her look like a skeleton in a dress is Katie Holmes.

Damn You Skinny Alert™: Angie eats 800 calories a day.

Publication: Star
Date: 31 Oct. 2011

Fresh trash on Thursdays! The latest flaw in the personality of Angelina Jolie to be flogged mercilessly by the supermarket rags is that she is too skinny. Star is the main perpetrator of this story, but not the only one. They also say she is headed for rehab.

Damn You Skinny Alert™: Brad begs Angie to eat.

Publication: National Enquirer
Date: 24 Oct. 2011

We get another "friends fear" headline this week, this time about Angelina Jolie being addicted to diet pills and Brad trying to get her to eat. Once again, we get news of her being at a ridiculous weight, this time 93 lbs., the lowest number yet reported for her.

Damn You Skinny (or Fat) Alert™:Best and worst celebrity beach bodies October 2011.

Publication: Star
Date: 24 Oct. 2011

Welcome to gossip hell, Hugh Jackman! The Aussie movie star gets his first mention on the cover of any American gossip rag this decade on a best and worst beach body story. Not surprisingly, the 43 year old gets on the best list. We can also welcome to gossip hell Julie Bowen and Pierce Brosnan, who don't get such nice treatment.

The good.

• Hugh Jackman
• Gwyneth Paltrow
• Kourtney Kardashian, in a rare positive story about that family right now

The bad.

• Uma Thurman has a little belly
• Pierce Brosnan has a big belly
• Kirsten Dunst has a very visible spinal chord
• Julie Bowen looks wrinkly
• Christina Aguilera is getting heavy
  

On the rocks alert and Damn You Skinny Alert™: All the Demi and Ashton drama this week

Publications: People, In Touch, Us Weekly
Date: 24 Oct. 2011

Last week there were six stories about Ashton and Demi. This week only three. Still, it's one of the most covered stories in the rags this time around. Here are the headlines.

• People: Demi & Ashton
  Working on their marriage
• In Touch: Alcohol abuse and anorexia fears
  Demi's rehab nightmare
  Pressure to keep her younger man sends Demi in a tailspin. Inside her private struggle
  Plus: Ashton's mistress speaks

And a third story all about blabbermouth Sara Leal.

• Us Weekly: The other woman speaks
  My affair with Ashton
  How Kutcher seduced 22-year-old Sara Leal.
  Shocking new details of their X-rated night together

Clearly, this story is not going away for a while.

Damn You Skinny Alert™: Leann anorexia intervention.

Publication: In Touch
Date: 17 Oct. 2011

You may have read elsewhere that Eddie Cibrian is having the worst week ever, but that string of bad news (cancellation of his show, industrial accident, someone crashed a car into his house, ex-wife now a vindictive reality TV star) doesn't even include that his current wife has been given an intervention because she is ridiculously too skinny.

Cibrian might be almost as handsome as Jon Hamm, but Hamm comes across in real life as smart, likable and funny, three adjectives I would not use in Cibrian's case.

On the rocks alert: Six stories about the troubles of Demi and Ashton.

Publications: National Enquirer, Star, People, Us Weekly, In Touch, Weekly Life & Style
Date: 17 October 2011

Fresh trash on Thursdays! The trouble in the marriage of Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore is easily the Story of the Week on the covers of The Only Ten Magazines That Matter, with six covers out of ten. (In actuality, it's six of seven. Ashton and Demi are too young to be of interest to the Globe and the low rent Examiner, and the Sun would only be interested in their marital woes if Nostradamus had predicted them.) Usually when there are this many stories, they point all over the place, but with one exception, these pretty much point in the direction of Ashton's penis. Here are the headlines.

• People: Demi's heartbreak
  Her troubled marriage
• National Enquirer: Demi's revenge - She'll destroy cheating Ashton
• Weekly Life & Style: Demi's kids take Ashton's side
• In Touch: Demi's nightmare: Ashton's love child shocker!
  Exclusive: Mistress tells all!
  Unsafe sex in his car and house
  Dumped her after she found out the baby news
  Humiliated Demi can't eat - drops to 95 lbs.!
• Us Weekly: On their anniversary caught cheating
  Ashton hooks up with two girls at an all-night hot tub party. As they enter counseling, can Demi forgive him?
  22-year-old Sara Leal
• Star: Demi & Ashton: The photos that ended their marriage!
  Demi breaks down after Ashton hooks up with 23-year-old on their wedding anniversary
  Ashton's caught cheating on camera
  17 world exclusive photos
  Ashton surrounded by blondes in his hotel room
  Ashton's lover keeps on partying
  
  And for good measure, here's the picture of Sara Leal, the pretty young girl with the big mouth, both literally and figuratively, who is being cast in the role of homewrecker.

Damn You Skinny Alert™: Another story about Hollywood women who weigh too little.

Publication: Weekly Life & Style
Date: 10 Oct. 2011

Yet another grab bag story about women in show business obsessing about their weight and getting too skinny in the process. Here are the headlines.

• Sandra's heartbroken again - over Ryan Reynolds' new romance.
  
• Lonely and insecure, she drops to her lowest weight ever
  
• (skin and bones)
  

• Demi: Starving herself after cheating scandal

• Kendra: What I did to get thin

• Julie Bowen: Pressure to look perfect

And this is the opportunity to write: Welcome to gossip hell, Julie Bowen!

Doctors fear Leann is anorexic!

Publication: Weekly Life & Style
Date: 3 Oct. 2011

The best publicity a female celebrity can get in the gossip rags is that she's in love, she's getting married or she's having a baby, hopefully in that order. The worst publicity she can get is that she's a home wrecker, bat shit crazy or at the wrong weight.

The best news we have for Leann Rimes is that she isn't bat shit crazy. She stole Eddie Cibrian from his wife and she's way too skinny, which is the reason she's on the cover of Weekly Life & Style this week.

Damn You Skinny Alert™: Kirstie Alley 100 lbs. lighter.

Publications: People, Us Weekly, National Enquirer
Date: 3 Oct. 2011

Fresh trash on Thursdays! Kirstie Alley has lost a lot of weight recently and the supermarket rags like to see that. Here are the headlines.

• People: Kirstie Alley 100 lbs. gone
• Us Weekly: Kirstie drops 100 lbs.
• National Enquirer: Kirstie bulimia fears
  Amazing 100 lb. weight loss

And once again, the Enquirer shows how they stay at the top of the table in the race for Nastiest Gossip Rag in America.

Damn You Skinny Alert™ and Problems With Plastic Alert™: Stories about Lindsay Lohan's little sister Ali

Publications: Star, In Touch
Date: 26 Sept. 2011

Welcome to gossip hell, Ali Lohan! Lindsay's little sister works as a model and is only 17, but she's already had a remarkably unnecessary and unattractive plastic surgery and has lost a ridiculous amount of weight.

Another shining testament to the parenting skills of the elder Lohans.

Here are the headlines.

• In Touch: Dying to be thin (pictures of Lohan and Taylor Armstrong)
• Star: Ali Lohan plastic surgery scandal
  She's only 17
  

I debated whether the phrase "dying to be thin" should be considered a figure of speech or if Lohan and Armstrong should be put on the tabloid vulture watch. Given how tough a stretch Taylor Armstrong is going through and what a mess the Lohan family is, I decided it should be considered more literal than figurative and used the label Not Long 4 This World (indirect), the lowest level of tabloid death watch. Both probably have long lives in front of them, but adding them to the list is not going to ruin the tabloids' track record, which is very bad indeed. After adding these names, there have been 91 people marked for death in the rags since the beginning of 2010 and only ten of them have died so far.

Damn You Skinny Alert™: Angelina Jolie weighs 94 lbs.

Publication: Star
Date: 26 Sept. 2011

Fresh trash on Thursdays! Yet again, Angelina Jolie is excoriated for her weight, which Star says is down to 94 lbs.

Damn You Skinny Alert™: Sexiest bodies in Hollywood!

Publication: OK!
Date: 19 Sept. 2011

For all OK!'s faults, when they have a headline about best beach bodies, they have pictures of pretty people on the cover. A lot of AMI mags have "best and worst" headlines then only show the worst.


Kim Kardashian is included, though she's not really "in Hollywood" since she doesn't make movies or non-reality TV.

Still, I like looking at this picture.



Megan Fox is "in Hollywood", but her star is fading fast. Still pretty, but not still getting a lot of work.


Zac Efron is like the male Megan Fox. Everyone agrees he looks good without a shirt, but his post High School Musical career is still waiting for a hit movie.

Damn You Skinny Alert™: Obsessed with dieting

Publication: Weekly Life & Style
Date: 19 Sept. 2011

Yet another grab bag story about female celebrities who are way too skinny, this time from Weekly Life & Style. Here are the particulars.

• Brad begs Angie to eat as the frail star drops to her lowest weight ever
• Delusional Katie: I'm too fat to make it in Hollywood
• Devastated Taylor: barely eating
• LeAnn: Starving to keep her man
• Stars' Dangerous Tricks for Not Feeling Hungry
  
  

Bun in the oven alert™: Kate pregnant with twins!

Publication: Star
Date: 19 Sept. 2011

The Star goes for the whole enchilada with a story that the former Kate Middleton is not only pregnant, but pregnant with twins. Here are the headlines.

• Kate pregnant with twins
• The official announcement
• A boy and a girl
• Now she's struggling to gain weight
• Wills'N'Kate overjoyed
  
  

The only thing official about this story is that it's been officially denied already.

Damn You Skinny (or Fat) Alert™:Best and worst celebrity diets September 2011.

Publication: National Enquirer

Date: 12 September 2011



The Enquirer does sometimes get a story right, but in their hearts they are liars who can't be trusted. This week on the cover, they promise the best and worst celebrity diets, but the pictures on the cover only show people who are very fat or way too skinny. There are a couple of "Guess Who?" pictures, but I don't play that. I will note that in the "Guess Who?", there is a picture of a man with his face covered where you can count his ribs like some survivor from Auschwitz, but all the rest of the people pictured are women.



Here are the too fat people named.

• Miranda Lambert: 158 pounds
• Sabourney Sibide: 400 pounds
  
  

Here are the too skinny people named.

• Lindsay Lohan: scary skinny
• Renee Zellweger: bag of bones
• Christie Brinkley: 107 lbs.

Damn You Skinny Alert™: Hollywood's extreme diets

Publication: OK!

Date: 5 September 2011



A quick scan of the label list shows that Damn You Skinny™ stories are more than twice as common as Damn You Fat™ stories, roughly as common as Bun In The Oven Alerts™. OK! has three women on the cover this week, Gwyneth Paltrow, LeAnn Rimes and Angelina Jolie, with a passel of headlines that aren't connected to specific people, hoping to get someone to open the magazine and read it. In my case, as usual, this clever plan did not work.



Here are the headlines.

• Hollywood's most extreme diets
• Exercising at midnight
• Eating only baby food
• 190 calories per meal
• Who's being healthy and who's in danger!