Rita Panahi: No excuse for thin-shaming women like Bec Judd

There would be hell to pay in 2024 if one were to mock an overweight woman’s appearance, but it seems you can do just that if the woman is thin, without any fear of being called a bully, a body-shamer or misogynistic.

The Daily Mail indulging in cheap clickbait is nothing new but they stooped particularly low on Tuesday with a nasty, mean-spirited and above all misleading piece on Rebecca Judd.

Now, the online publication is hardly alone in using Judd to generate clicks, half of the Melbourne media has been guilty of the same, but to run a piece with a headline “Rebecca Judd shocked fans for all the wrong reasons” and another claiming “Judd sparks concern with her appearance at the Brownlow Medal … as fans compare look to her showstopping debut 20 years ago” was simply absurd.

Bec Judd at the 2024 AFL Brownlow Medal. Picture: Michael Klein

And, that absurdity was laid bare with the side-by-side images of Judd they ran, one from Monday night and the other from 20 years ago in that iconic red dress.

Far from showing a dramatic decline in her weight, the images proved that Judd’s shape has remained largely unchanged, close to identical in fact.

The most notable difference being the thickness of her eyebrows.

Rebecca Judd, then Twigley, at the 2004 Brownlow Medal.

There would be hell to pay in 2024 if one were to mock a fat woman’s appearance, let alone devote an article to how bad she looked based on nothing more than a handful of comments from random online trolls.

But it appears you can do just that if the woman is thin without any fear of being called a bully, a body-shamer or misogynistic. Judd has given birth to four children, including twins, and still manages to have a six-pack. That is a win in anyone’s book.