Ashley Judd's "puffy face"

Today people expect women to be perfect in every aspect. Society seems to find flaws in everyone; even beautiful celebrities like Ashley Judd face hurtful criticism. I love her response to the attacks she's been receiving lately...

Ashley Judd Slams Reaction to Her Puffy Face as 'Woman Hating'

BY TIM NUDD

Update Thursday April 12, 2012 12:30 PM EDTOriginally posted Thursday April 12, 2012 07:55 AM EDT

Ashley Judd, in 2006 (left) and in January 2012

Jeffrey Mayer/WireImage; Katy Winn/AP

Ashley Judd says the generally horrified reaction last month to her puffy face, caused by the medication she was taking for a sinus infection, is a sad commentary on our society's obsession with appearance.

"I think it's hatred of women that invites the criticism," the Missing actress, 43, said Wednesday on NBC's Nightly News, with additional comments on Thursday's Today show. "I think it's the objectification of girls and women and this hypersexualization of our society that invites the criticism."

She added: "It doesn't have anything to do with me, really, and how I look."

Judd says the reaction to her appearance was swift and negative. "There was no presumption of goodwill," she says. "The conversation went straight to, 'Oh my gosh.' "

Particularly galling, besides the "nasty, vitriolic and gloating tone," she added, was the speculation that she'd had plastic surgery.

"I started to catch the double bind where, you know, my face looks puffy, 'She's had work,' you know?" Judd says. "And then, look at the same image in a different interpretation by a separate set of people is, 'Oh, come on, she doesn't even have any wrinkles at all, she's clearly had work.' So, I look bad, I've had work. I look too good, I've had work."

Judd made many of the same points earlier this week in an op-ed column in the Daily Beast.

In that piece, she said she decided to address this incident "because the conversation was pointedly nasty, gendered, and misogynistic and embodies what all girls and women in our culture, to a greater or lesser degree, endure every day, in ways both outrageous and subtle."

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Love yourself the way you are

Ok ladies, in a world filled with diet fads, always changing clothing trends, tanning, plastic surgery, and the next new miracle cream to give you younger looking skin, how are we ever going to learn to just love our bodies the way they are?? We are surrounded by the media, pushing us to want to be thinner, younger, and in every other possible way "better" than how we look like right now. What's worse, these messages aren't merely directed at adult women. Young teenage girls are susceptible to the same scrutiny and opinions, girls who are already struggling to love and embrace themselves the way they are.

I absolutely love and support the message that Dove is sending to women around the world! These are photos of women who are gorgeous in their own way, beautiful without fitting the stereotype that surrounds us...

You are beautiful the way you are! You are an extraordinary woman with traits and qualities that make you unique and exquisite in your own way! Learn to embrace and love those things about you that make you stand out; don't try to blend in with the rest of the world. When I saw this ad it broke my heart...

Those are pretty scary odds, so let's change it! My hope is that this message will reach reach women everywhere, and that they will share it with their beautiful daughters. We need to show the world that we are perfect the way God made us. Every woman, no matter what her age, race, weight, height, or appearance, deserves to love and respect her body the way it is.

What the media has done to women's bodies

Kate Winslet says, "I don't look like that and I don't desire to look like that". The media has severely distorted the image of "women". They've sold us a false idea of what we should look like and they've convinced us that if we don't look like the women we see in magazines, thin, tan, and flawless, that we aren't beautiful. What's worse, the women in these magazines that we spend hours wishing we looked like them, they don't even look like that.