I recently found out that Blissmo, an eco-friendly daily deals / flash sale site (off which I recently bought some cozy, organic PACT underwear…that’s particularly awesome because they’re from Berkeley), has launched BlissmoBox. It’s like a CSA box, but instead of fruits and veggies, it’s an assortment of eco-friendly products. And instead of weekly, it’s monthly. And instead of the same types of products every week, they switch up the themes. From a home-and-laundry box to a food-and-beverage box, you get a supply of products—all organic and/or good for you and the environment—for about half-off what you’d normally pay for them.

And what’s one of their three limited-edition boxes for August? The Sex Box. (Or, as Blissmo puts it, the “Night Lovin’” box. But we all know what that means.)

Apparently, Justin Timberlake was onto something back in December of 2006:

But THIS box is full of vegan lube, vegan condoms, vegan candies, and the best (in my opinion, anyway) massage oil candle on the market. Who said being vegan wasn’t sexy?

Being Eco-Sexy

Part of the reason why I am vegan is because of the environmental destruction it takes to get meat from “farms” (in quotes because factory farms are in a class all their own) to our plates. Going vegan is one of the greenest things you can do. (There’s a fun little quote about that here.) But being vegan doesn’t just stop at what you eat. Being vegan is a lifestyle. And intimate moments are (a huge) part of that lifestyle.

While there’s a disconnect between the food we eat and how it got there, there’s also a disconnect between the products we use, what’s actually in them and how they’re so dutifully performing for us. We assume that if it’s on the market, it’s safe. But in reality, a lot of our everyday products, from laundry detergents to lipstick, are rife with chemicals that do more harm than beautifying. And to boot, they go pretty unregulated. (No More Dirty Looks is an awesome resource on this topic.)

For instance, when it comes to sexy time, sex accessories were, for a while, often made with phthalates, a toxic plasticizer. Some still are, but phthalate-free toys are ever increasing on the market. Makes sense, since, according to Stefanie Iris Weiss, who wrote Eco Sex, phthalates “are suspected of having carcinogenic and mutagenic affects on the skin and mucous membranes” (162). Umm, no thanks…especially for anything going near what’s going to help me make babies later.

Speaking of my box, I bet you’re wondering:

What’s going to be in your box?

(If you’ve already ordered it and don’t want to ruin the surprise, DON’T READ BELOW.)

1. Cinnamon Vanilla Lubricant from Good Clean Love (4 oz)
If the lube itself isn’t enough of an aphrodisiac, the cinnamon-vanilla blend certainly will be. Plus, the lube is free from petrochemicals, parabens, animal cruelty and a sticky clean-up. To boot, the company’s founder, Wendy Strgar is the curator of BlissmoBox’s Sex Box.

2. Jimmyjane’s Truffle+Gardenia-Scented Natural Massage Oil Candle
Frankly, I can’t explain it better than this:

Plus, they’re phthalate-, sulfate-, petrochemical-, animal product- and animal testing-FREE.

3. Three-pack of vegan, fair-trade condoms from Glyde
Casein, a milk derivative, is often used to make latex for condoms. Glyde’s condoms are 100% vegan—in place of casein is “a vegetable extract taken from the thistle family.”

4. Raspberry Tart Tin from St. Claire’s Organics
Admittedly, this seems like a weird addition to the box, but St. Claire’s products are free of just about anything you may be allergic to or don’t eat by choice. So, these hit a sweet spot.

Doing the math based on each brand’s ecommerce site, that’s $52.50 worth of sexy. But through BlissmoBox, you pay way less than that. OH YES, it gets better:

If you order by August 31 (yes, that’s this Wednesday! And yes, that’s the last day you can order!), you can get the whole thing for $11. Lucky for you, you have an in. It’s right here.

Going green is more than just taking public transportation or eating less meat. I think there’s a green-or-not-green aspect to most of our daily routines and decisions. And like the CSA box makes getting your hands on good food easy for even the busiest professional, this BlissmoBox is doing the same but for all sorts of everyday products, even our most private ones.

The Details: Summarized
One Night Lovin’ BlissmoBox
The last day to order is Wednesday, August 31. And if you use this special link, it’s only $11 (for $52+ worth of stuff)!

Images via Smithsonian on Flickr, Eric Hews on Flickr, goodcleanlove.com, glyde-condoms.com and stclaires.com

After years of fascination with the topic of food and where ours comes from, and having read several books and numerous articles on the topic, I’ve finally reached the book that tipped me over the edge of vegetarianism into veganism.

I’m reading, and have nearly finished, Jonathan Safran Foer’s Eating Animals. Rather than preaching a no-meat lifestyle, Foer simply embarks on his own quest to analyze the stories we tell ourselves about the food we eat (and thus the stories that guide our food-related decisions), the important roles food plays in our lives (social, familial), and most notably, to learn what’s really going on before eggs are so neatly packaged in cartons, meat wrapped in plastic and fish sliced into pristine filets. I’ve read about factory farms before. (Thank you, Michael Pollan.) But something about Foer’s book drove it all home for me.

I think it was when he made it clear that “free range” and “cage free” are meaningless terms, and that more than 99 percent of animal products are produced under factory farm conditions—including laying hens and the cows used for milk. It was learning that just about all animals involved in the production of animal products, even if it’s not meat, suffer. And suffer dramatically. It was seeing the statistics about our public health—from diabetes and cancer to H1N1 and whatever outbreak is next—and how clearly the diseases stems from our food and how its produced. It was learning that the industry is more or less self-regulating. So basically, it’s not regulated at all. For instance:

Common Farming Exemptions make legal any method of raising farmed animals so long as it is commonly practiced within the industry. In other words, farmers—corporations is the right word—have the power to define cruelty. (Foer 51)

It was re-learning that not eating meat is one of the most impactful things we can be doing to fight global warming.

According to the UN, the livestock sector is responsible for 18% of greenhouse gas emissions, around 40% more than the entire transport sector—cars, trucks, planes, trains, and ships—combined. Animal agriculture is responsible for 37% of anthropogenic methane, which offers 23 times the global warming potential of CO2, as well as 65% of anthropogenic nitrous oxide, which provides a staggering 296 times the global warming potential of CO2. The most current data even quantifies the role of diet: omnivores contribute seven times the volume of greenhouse gasses that vegans do. (Foer 58)

I can no longer rationalize my support of this industry and these choices being made for me. This is something I can proactively choose not to support, the first step of which is choosing my food differently.

I’m vegan, not a crazy hippie

I think the term “vegan” comes off as radical. Dramatic, even. In telling people, recently, about this change, I get a lot of taken-aback, slightly startled reactions. And I often find myself explaining, and on occasion defending, why. (Hence, this post.) It’s as if in saying “I’m vegan,” people think I’ve said “I’m joining PETA.” (Which I haven’t.) Though, anytime I told people I was vegetarian, it didn’t come as such a surprise. And surprising enough to me, going vegan isn’t as huge of a change as I expected. I already rarely make eggs, let alone have any. I’d already meandered from milk-milk to almond milk. And I’m the queen of tofu stir fry with quinoa.

It’s being more conscious about snacking and meals out that’s providing the greatest challenge.

Are Peeps vegan?

No. They are not. But my office manager and I got a tear-induced laugh about it around Easter (long story), and it perfectly exemplifies my new thought process: the need to stop and think first. I can no longer break off a piece of a Specialty’s cookie tempting me in the break room, and I can’t dip my hand into the bowl of foil-wrapped (milk) chocolates. It’s probably a good thing, seeing as the culprit is so often something packed with sugar, which is, evidently, killing us, too. I have to research restaurants’ menu options more than before. And while at first it just seems like more trouble than it’s worth, the more I read and learn, the more I feel motivated to stay committed to my choice.

Just say no to Tofurky

If you have a food allergy, or decide to eat alternatively, it’s the perfect time for it. The specialty food industry is booming now more than ever before, offering a slew of products for non-meat eaters, gluten-free eaters and the like. (Like the Nooodle and Sophie’s Vegan Seafood.) But there are whole foods, and then there are replacement foods. I didn’t go vegan so I could stock my fridge with fake meats and other sodium-packed, processed junk.

Where does it end?

The research cycle seems never-ending, that I can’t just stop here (and I won’t). That there’s still so much to learn about, say, where the almonds in my almond milk come from and how that is made; learning if buying organic really matters or if local is good enough; keeping up with what fruits and veggies are in season and where and how they were grown, etc. Must I stop buying leather products, too?

At heart of it, I’m simply doing the best I can. However it works for me may not be how it works best for other people. I still eat honey. I’m not the perfect vegan, if there even is such a thing. But for right now, with the information I have, this is what I’m deciding to do. And it makes me ever more thankful to have a best friend who’s vegan (and gluten-free), a sister who’s dedicated to doing it (in her own way) along with me, and thanks to a progressive city, a slew of vegan-friendly establishments at which to dine.

Photos courtesy of Flickr and Creative Commons (Main photo from incurable_hippie. Peeps photo from arimoore.)

Last week, a good friend of mine–and fellow dating blogger–got to talking about this. About what kind of advice we give friends, readers, and in his case clients, about how to get through those getting-to-you-know chats without losing your date’s interest, or losing interest yourself.

He said, “Guys should talk about themselves.” I insisted, “Men should ask more questions and avoid their narcissistic rants.”

Lo and behold, a chat over coffee turned into a He Said/She Said article over on his blog, GKDating.com. So what’s better in date conversation: statements that reveal your personality and awesomeness? Or questions asked of your date to show you’re listening and interested? Here’s what we deduced.

I dropped by simply to pick up a sticker he makes. A sticker that in bold white letters against an orange background reads: Make Love Your Law.

I’d seen the sticker at a friend’s house two days before. She’d received it as a gift and had no idea where it came from. The sticker had no hint of its origin. No trademark of its creator.

Until I realized that the sticker was a trademark.

A quick Google search and a few emails later, I couldn’t be happier to be in touch with the local artist who made them.

Four years ago, Elliman created a series of paintings, each a representation of what happens when life is missing love. The series included:

Objectification.
Vanity.
Violence.
Suicide.
Hate.
Drug abuse.
Poor body image …

Each a subjugation that could be vanquished through the acceptance of love. If one’s life was love-filled, how could those things happen?

Love is the cure, he thought. Make it your law.

With the series emerged the stickers. And while he has moved on to other projects — each with a social message — he still leaves his love stickers all over. Whether he’s biking from Canada to Mexico and distributing them along the way, or simply at a market with a community bulletin board, he leaves them for people to discover.

“There’s love in everything. You just have to be open to seeing it,” he told me.

All I wanted was a simple sticker that embodied so perfectly one of my core values. But I left the studio with a whole lot more than that.

I left feeling inspired that someone else wholeheartedly believes in the power of love and is doing a little something about it.

Plus, I left with a pile of stickers I can use to share the love in Africa, or wherever else naturally lends itself to a small stack.

Here’s a look inside Christopher Elliman‘s studio (Christopher, himself, preferred not to be pictured) — walls of inspiration, first sketches, quotes …

A source of inspiration for his Wonderland-esque piece "Meet Me in the Garden of Your Dreams"

Boundless love is perfect love. The truth is the truth and requires no witness. Love one another.

Stagnation is the mother of decay.

It's that itsy-bitsy sliver of a country that's in the middle of Senegal.

My bags aren’t quite packed … though I have a list scribbled on a post-it and a devoted section of my closet for what’s going into my suitcase.

Most importantly, I have my visa, all six of my shots + malaria medication, and my supply of specially made, packaged with love Inspired Cookies to get me there.

Sarah brought my favorite flavor, Coconut Key Lime Cayenne, out of retirement just for my trip!

While in essence this trip is a vacation, mentally, it feels like it’ll be different than that. I’m not expecting the great sprint of sightseeing. There will be no hotel bookings. No hostels. I don’t even have a specific itinerary of activities.

I’m just going. And I’m not particularly worried. I’m not particularly stressed out. I feel ready and calm.

I’m going to see family.
I’m going to experience what it’s like to live somewhere dramatically different.
I’m going with hopes of learning how a different culture thinks and functions.
I’m going out of my comfort zone in hopes that I’ll discover more about myself in the process.

Perhaps going to the Gambia will be more like going home than going away. My sister and brother-in-law will be welcoming me with big hugs and a comfortable house, a home in which I’m excited to transplant my life for a solid six weeks.

The view from Jen and Doug's roof.

My sister and I have talked about a few things we can do while I’m there — like visit the Bijilo Monkey Forest and Abuko Nature Reserve and drive down the coast to spend a night in a beach bungalow treehouse. And we’ll assuredly spend some time swimming in and relaxing by the resort pool she frequents. That is, when it’s not thunder-storming.

Beyond the sightseeing and relaxing, I feel like in six weeks I’ll be able to absorb and appreciate their community and gain a sense of what life is truly like there — not just what the country wants life to look like to tourists.

Extreme Sitting

Despite the (perceived) calm, I’m bracing myself for the 3 a.m. wake-up call Wednesday morning. (Or would you call that Tuesday night?) My 28 hours of travel starts with a 6:15 a.m. flight to Philadelphia. From there, I transfer and hop over the Atlantic into Brussels, then connect to a flight into Dakar, Senegal that, after a short stop to let passengers off and new ones on, continues on to Banjul, where I’ll finally de-plane (at 5 p.m. the next day).

9,161 airline miles — just to get there. But as my sister lovingly reminded me as I started to over-think the lengthy journey, 24 hours of my life is going to pass no matter what. This particular 24 hours will just so happen pass in and out of airports and planes. I don’t have to fly the planes. All I have to do is sit there.

And what’s so terrible about that?

Predictions: What I think I’ll miss

It’s only six weeks. Simultaneously a long time and not that long at all.

A good friend of mine reminded me recently that: “you’ll be in an entirely different food culture for weeks and should pack in your faves while you can.” So in the last few days, I’ve stuffed my face with homemade french toast, Belgian beer, dessert crepes, sushi and tofu. In addition to those, I’m hypothesizing that it’ll be weird going six weeks without:

Clean feet
Low relative humidity
Sweet white nectarines perfectly in season
Vanilla almond milk lattes
A cell phone
Jeans

Predictions: What I’m looking forward to

Living in the moment without being constantly connected
The people I’ll meet while in The Gambia and on my way to and from it
Seeing the beach in a whole new light
Jen and my biggest sister adventure yet

Stay in touch!

For updates, photos, and musings while I’m away, you can follow me here and on Facebook. I’ll also have access to G-chat and Skype.

Thanks for all of your support and well-wishes! I’ll see you when I’m back home.

The weekend, while enlightening, also decidedly startled me. I realized what is completely missing from our conversations about sexual health: passion and pleasure.

We are lucky enough to be among the few species that can actually enjoy sex because it feels good, and perhaps take for granted that we don’t have to fight for survival when making love with a partner. And yet, we continue to omit from the sex education conversation our innate, normal and healthy drive to be sexual, and rarely celebrate our ability to bask in the pleasure in the first place.

The result? Teens don’t realize that their feelings of love, lust, arousal and perhaps even mind-blowing passion are normal, and they aren’t equipped with the tools to navigate their developing emotional intelligence. Instead, the current education models are telling them they’re broken, weird and shouldn’t be feeling that way about sex, let alone be having it. And they’re reaching out for answers in all the wrong places.

We can be sex positive without being sluts, and yet that message gets completely lost, or ignored, in nearly all forms of sex education.

To foster positive sexuality in younger generations, we need to talk to kids comprehensively and openly about sex and provide them with resources that allow them to make informed decisions about their sexual encounters.

Full disclosure about contraception, STIs and testing, how you get pregnant (and what your options are if you do) and even information not typically covered in sex education, like anal sex and definitions of slang terms, are imperative to creating this open dialogue. But what about education that goes beyond intercourse and the protection of your parts from disease and babies?

Currently, sex education in the states evokes feelings of fear and risk, whether it’s abstinence-only or liberals’ attempt to be all-encompassing. We emphasize all the bad and scary things that can happen from sex, without discussing the facts that:

1. Most often, you have sex because it feels good — not just to procreate — and that masturbation is an important form of learning what turns you on, especially for women. And,

2. The deliciously out-of-control feelings of sex can sometimes rise to a climax that overwhelms our rationality, our good sense, and even our values. Feelings by which teens may be more surprised and unsure how to navigate than the physical p-in-v (…or p-to-p or v-to-v) action itself. Feelings that make it difficult to understand what you need to do to remain in charge of your own sex life until you’ve been there and done that.

The second point is often one of the sides abstinence-only education fights — the idea that sex is too powerful, thus you should only ever have it with one person … your spouse. And while it ignores the physical mechanics all together (because, you’re not having it anyway, right?! [face palm]), it’s at least giving the emotional side a chance (mind you, with overwhelmingly huge blinders on) most “liberal” sex education (that focuses prominently on condoms! birth control! penises! vaginas! and the like) doesn’t.

Both sides, however, are still missing the mark.

Instead of being judgmental, unapproachable, assuming extremes and emphasizing dangers, we need to validate the normalcy in the way teens are feeling, help them sort through their levels of sexual readiness and acknowledge that developing sexual autonomy is just another way in which teens mature.

Part of developing a healthy sexuality is knowing the difference between healthy and unhealthy relationships, knowing what feelings are normal and age-appropriate and how to deal with and talk about them, and knowing your insides — your personal values, what physically makes you feel good and how to speak up for both. The healthier our sexuality, the more conscious our choices will be.

Of course, we need to continue educating our younger generations (as well as ourselves!) about the potential risks of sexual behaviors and how to avoid them, but in an ongoing conversation that doesn’t just stop there.

Youth are sexual beings just like the rest of us. Let’s help them celebrate and accept who they are without judgment, without alienation and without secrets.

Also published on BitchBuzz.com, a refreshing lifestyle website for women that spotlights the best in style, food, sex, technology and everything in between.

Main image via Tom Kemp Starley‘s Flickr

There are often not enough outlets for affection in platonic relationships. Friends provide emotional support, memorable nights out, advice and adventures, but few friendships are so close that it’s comfortable and acceptable for you two to, say, snuggle on the couch together, or hold each other in a longer-than-usual embrace — one long enough to communicate sincerity but short enough not to be awkward. The line becomes especially blurred if you’re of compatible sexual orientations, because, oh my god, then it must mean you like each other.

But wanting to be touched is a basic human need. (Without it, we’re so much more susceptible to depression, stress, anxiety, loss in self-confidence and loss in drive and motivation!) And sadly though not surprisingly, we live in a touch-deprived culture that’s comfortable with touch only if it has sexual meaning, if we’re celebrating, if someone is consoling or being consoled, or if it involves raising our kids.

Outside of those exceptions, our culture looks at touch as suspect. We assume something’s wrong, or make meaning where there isn’t any. So, if none of those situations apply to us at the moment — if we are single, happy and not particularly close (physically or emotionally) to family — how can we meet our touch needs without that uh-oh factor?

Yeah, of course there are inappropriate ways to meet touch needs, through hookers, massages with happy endings and the like. But how about giving new meaning to things most of us already do every day? How about hugging, but without an agenda and where no one’s holding on too tight or for too long? The average hug is 1.7 seconds long. And after about 4 seconds, most people become squeamish. Why don’t we eliminate the space between our hearts, stop burping each other with those manly pats on the back, and embrace for — gasp! — 5 seconds, maybe even 10? That time is nothing compared to how long we spend writing emails, updating our Facebook statuses or how long it takes to check-in somewhere on Foursquare.

How about massages — from friends or professionals — with no strings attached? How about encounters — like hooking arms with your girlfriend when out shopping — where touch has no specific reason or communicates no specific intention other than hey, this just feels nice? What is so awkward and socially uncomfortable about that?

Isn’t it also possible that, since we are trying to survive in a touch-deprived culture, part of what the dating scene satisfies is our need to be touched? We need touch to thrive. And as backwards as it may sound, we are being told that to do so, it’s more acceptable to jump into bed with someone than it is to sit closely next to your best male friend on the couch with your head in his lap.

Because it’s not as socially acceptable or natural to go to even one of your closest friends and ask to be the little spoon, is our simple need to be touched fueling the mindset that we’re not okay unless we have a man? Are we so desperate to feel loved that we settle or fall for the wrong people?

Perhaps like the 1980s AT&T ads proclaim: we just need to reach out and touch someone.

Also published on BitchBuzz.com, a refreshing lifestyle website for women that spotlights the best in style, food, sex, technology and everything in between.

Image via hien_it‘s Flickr

When I think about marriage, about the thought of spending the rest of my life with one person, I continuously wonder: what does it take to devote yourself mentally, physically and emotionally to one soul … forever?

My parents divorced when I was six, and I grew up with my mom’s boyfriends walking in and out of my life. I wasn’t raised in a functional version of “forever,” nor have I since encountered a seasoned marital relationship — through friends or family — I want to emulate.

We all know that divorce rates are insanely high, that only 50% of (first) marriages last anymore, and that the institute of marriage itself is a tradition that pre-dates recorded history, when human lifespans were half of what they are today. “Forever” wasn’t nearly as long then, and the meaning and social issues married couples face now versus way back when is like comparing a blow-up doll to the real thing: there is no comparison.

I think the problem lies in our societal assumption that after marriage, our lives are only devoted to one person, or to one + a family. That you and your life partner then have to focus heavily on building a life together — moving into (and potentially buying) a (bigger) home away from where your other friends live and where it’s more appropriate to raise kids.

That then, you are each others’ lives. There’s less focus on the continuous building of your friend network and sense and strength of community. That your life partner has to provide you with absolutely everything: he is your go-to emotional support and air bag; he is your best friend and constant companion; he is your partner in crime; he may even be your business partner.

Providing emotional and intellectual support, having similar core values and senses of adventure, and being able to communicate openly and candidly are imperative to a healthy and lasting relationship. And yet, in the process of valuing those things and the relationship itself, we can’t let slip away those people who have helped shaped who we are. It’s in letting that happen that too much pressure builds on the relationship to be absolutely everything — performance anxiety that can slowly erode the connection you felt when you first fell in love.

All of a sudden, your partner is the person with whom you’re over-analyzing the little things that don’t really matter — the things your best girlfriend would have talked through with you; the person on whom you take out your frustration or who feels the brunt of your bad moods.

You shouldn’t have to give up everything you know, everyone else you love, for one person, for an “idealized” life together. Lifetime commitment and partnership should be about the integration of two independent lives and adding your union to the whole community versus isolating yourself from it.

When you can incorporate your community as one more important piece to what supports your relationship, to what helps make it work — when you can balance the just us with the energy of everyone, then it’s easier to look “forever” straight in the eye, with a smile and ever-growing excitement, knowing that for the journey on which you’re embarking, you’ll never be alone, even in the absence of the one you truly love.

It takes a village, right?

Photo courtesy of Flickr user Niffty.. via CreativeCommons

That’s how some parents down in Menifee, California think, anyway. So passionately that a complaint about “oral sex” being in the Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionaries purchased for advanced readers at the local elementary school caused the books to be banned.

Banned! It’s a dictionary. At an elementary school.

How else are kids expected to develop a vocabulary? How are we empowering children to learn things on their own if we’re keeping from them one of the most useful writing, reading, grammatical and researching tools out there? Slapping their hands with rulers, so to speak, for using a school-provided resource to find the answers to their own questions. This is … bad? Shouldn’t we be encouraging kids to learn, to explore their sense of curiosity, especially on their own?

My mom’s a therapist and sex educator. And even though my sex education started before I could even pronounce the names of anatomical parts correctly, my elementary school sex education happened in fourth grade. (Yes, my mother was one of two parents who actually accepted the invitation to sit in on the “lecture” and painfully bad video.) It’s wasn’t all that comprehensive, and it sure as hell didn’t cover why adults have sex for pleasure and not just for procreation. But if we’re teaching kids about “how babies are made” in elementary school, it makes no sense to ban books — especially dictionaries! — that mention the topic.

Kids and pre-teens aren’t stupid. I can almost guarantee that they know more than their parents and teachers think they do. And if they’re looking up the term “oral sex,” it’s not because Mrs. Smith in Room 19 went off-key with her sex ed curriculum. It’s because that’s what the kids are talking about at recess, on the playground. Perhaps someone thinks they’re cool because they overheard their older sibling talking about “oral sex” on the phone, heard it on t.v., or most likely on the Internet, and decides spreads the “wisdom” (i.e. I know something you don’t know!) on to friends, or wannabe friends.

Instead of hiding from them the answers and taking away their right to curiosity, why aren’t we teaching them the truth?

The more they know and the less afraid they are to ask when they’re curious, the more they’re likely to make the right decisions when faced with them, and the more likely they’d be to approach an adult if faced a serious problem. Rumors about how babies are and are not made (“If you have oral sex with a guy, and swallow, you’ll grow a baby in your stomach!” … NO. Fail.) spread less like fire.

Way to put your town on the map, Menifee. What’s next? No Internet?

Dove was, however, already way ahead of the game. Their Campaign for Real Beauty launched in 2004 and continues to empower girls and women of all ages and shapes. But last I heard, Dove doesn’t drive home magazine sales. Sexy things do. And naked sexy things will sell even more magazines.

And suddenly, we embraced the body — naked (or nearly so) and often un-airbrushed — while we also further embraced the plus-sized.

Glamour ran a spread of naked-and-not-insanely-thin models in November. You might remember that infamous picture of plus-sized model Lizzie Miller with tummy flab? (No! Not tummy flab!)

A couple months before that, model Natalia Vodianova bared all on the cover of British Vogue‘s June 2009 Body Issue, an issue that vowed to look at how women — yes, even women thinner and more famous than you — felt about their bodies and how they, too, obsessively watch their weight and wished their butts were perkier. (But wait, if even the “perfect” feel insecure, is there hope left for the rest of us?)

And the trend continues on into 2010:

• Naked and un-airbrushed Jennifer Hawkins will grace the cover of the Australian Marie Claire in February.

• V magazine has dedicated its whole January issue, out on the 14th, to plus-sized models in all states of dress and undress.

If all bodies are beautiful, shouldn’t we focus equally on the thin and not so thin? The short and tall? The curvy and boxy? Despite the valiant efforts, we can’t assume that occasionally swapping out rail-thin models for those with some meat on their bones will, on its own, make 2010 the year the fashion, beauty and advertising industries suddenly changed their minds.

These women — underweight or slightly overweight — are still models. The images we digest are the results of teams of makeup artists, hairstylists, wardrobe assistants, lighting specialists and creative photographers that none of us “real” people have at our disposal. Fashion spreads, despite the model and her size, are still perpetuating parts of a beauty myth — the glowing, perfect skin, the undimpled thighs — and the message that you are not good enough the way you are. (And that products! They have all the answers!)

Designers’ samples are still size 4 … or smaller. Runway models are still hired as emaciated hangers that catch your eye and on which designers can hang their art.

Shedding light on the fact that different body types exist — sure, it’s a step in the right direction. But for maximum impact, to make the change that communicates my body and my self are awesome just the way they are, we have to be able to prove that a different message and image will make the industries more money than what they’re making now.

What sells the most — whether it’s putting women down or lifting women up — will eventually win in the end.

Main photo via NYMag.com
Center photo via Glamour.com