New ad doubles as fashion mag dumping ground

New ad doubles as fashion mag dumping ground

The NEDIC ad at Queen and Soho

The war on thin models is playing out on the streets of Toronto. A new streetcar shelter ad from NEDIC, the National Eating Disorder Information Centre, is getting its message across with help from fashion magazines.

At the corner of Queen and Soho, the words “Shed your weight problem here” appear on a bright fuchsia box with a slot through which women can dump their lady mags, which have come under increasing fire in recent months for glorifying ultra-skinny body types. We wonder if there is a male-targeted version of this with discarded copies of GQ and Men’s Health. After all, it’s not just women who are held up to unrealistic (and potentially unhealthy) beauty standards.

So far, the pile is composed of crisp, obviously unread copies of Elle, Marie Claire and Seventeen that NEDIC probably dumped to get the pile started, but it’ll be interesting to see if regular people ditch their beloved glossies or just use the ad as a receptacle for empty Starbucks cups and copies of Metro.