We Can Rebuild Her (Even Though She Doesn't Need Rebuilding)

There's a bad trend in Hollywood (I know, shocking, right) that sees magazines using old, outdated photos of a celebrity (usually a woman) at his/her worst to trump up a story about that particular celebrity's "drastic change."
Go into any supermarket and you're bound to see a magazine with a headline reading, "How I lost the weight."  Forget for a second that the I in that sentence doesn't necessarily mean the celebrity weight loser actually spoke to the magazine, because that's not the point.  What you need to be worried about is the idea.
The magazine will create the false notion that some celebrity, be it Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, Mariah Carey, whomever, lost some amount of weight (usually between 10-20 pounds), and that they did it in a short time frame (usually one month or so).  Not only is it unhealthy for women to think they can and should be dropping 20lbs in a month, it's just one big fat lie.
When Us Weekly, InStyle, OK! Magazine or whichever gossip rag you subscribe to uses that headline, two pictures usually accompany it: a large photo of the celebrity's current body and a smaller photo of their before body (i.e. the one when they supposedly weighed 20lbs more).  Now, the before picture tends to not actually show the whole body, otherwise we'd all be able to see that there was in fact NO weight loss.  None was needed.
Also, the before picture tends to be from well before the alleged time-frame of weight loss occurred (i.e. two-three years ago).  Therefore, perhaps in that particular photo the celebrity was 20lbs heavier, but the magazine doesn't tell you that photo is three years old, thus causing you to believe the weight loss did occur in the one month time period (and not the ACTUAL three year time period).  Lies.
Recently, Britney Spears hit the beaches of Hawaii in her little bikini.  Practically every magazine has since featured (or will feature) a story on how she got her "body back" (i.e. lost the weight).  Well, as my friend and fellow Britney-devotee/blogger, Poor Britney, said today, her body didn't go anywhere.
When Britney was pictured leaving a recording studio recently, everyone jumped at the chance to proclaim her hot body had returned.  Again, it never left.
Sadly, people buy it.  People will go to the store and see so-and-so lost x amount of weight in y amount of days and will believe it.  They'll believe it because we're a fat country obsessed with weight loss.  Not our own weight loss, mind you, but others'.  We love weight loss stories.  We love those Jenny Craig commercials with Sara Rue and Valerie Bertinelli.  We think if they can do it, we can do it.  But we don't do it, because we never try.  We are the perpetual dreamers in the world of greasy cheeseburgers and friend chicken.
Yes, only in America could you claim to be on a diet while you stuff your face with pizza.
Don't believe the lies.  These people are not losing 20lbs in two-weeks or one month.  And don't buy the magazine, because you sure as hell won't either.