Jessica Simpson and the Price of Beauty

By Sherrie Gulmahamad on March 5th, 2010

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I know you’re probably more interested in what Miss Simpson had to say about being called “sexual napalm” in front of most of the free world, or at least, the parts of free world that have Playboy Magazine. She told Oprah she certainly did not like it — would you!?

But that’s not the point here, for once. Jessica Simpson has been working on a VH1 TV reality show called The Price of Beauty, in which she travels the world looking at what different cultures perceive is feminine beauty. She visits countries like Thailand, France, Mumbai, Uganda, Morocco, Japan and Brazil in pursuit of these many contradictory, complicated and sometimes downright-harmful beliefs.

When Jessica Simpson appeared on Oprah recently, she brought a clip of the show with her, that reduced her to tears afterward. In the clip, Simpson and her friends talk to a former French model, Isabelle Caro, who suffers from a serious case of anorexia nervosa that put her in a coma three years ago. Caro fearlessly posed nude on anti-anorexia billboards, which were disturbing enough to be banned in Italy (click to see campaign, but it is NSFW).

Simpson was clearly affected by re-watching the interview:

“It makes me very emotional because just the pressure that women feel to be thin or to be beautiful, the pressure that the media puts on women, is so unfair and so disgusting. And if I can do something to make it better for people that’s the reason I did this show.”

This will sound mean, but I was surprised to see Simpson so articulate and I’m interested in seeing more of this show, and I’m one to normally loathe reality television.

She can’t be as ditzy as Bridget Marquardt, can she? Nah.

Will you tune in on March 15? (Or at least DVR it?) One episode even features Jessica Simpson in geisha makeup. Then I will have seen everything.

Photo via VH1