Television personality and former supermodel Tyra Banks has hit back at critics who mocked her as fat and dubbed her “America’s Next Top Waddle” after recent weight gains.
Banks, 33, who swapped the fashion runway in 2005 for a career as a TV chat show host and presenter of the reality show “America’s Next Top Model,” said she was hurt by the comments.
Banks, 5 feet 10 inches tall, said she now weighs about 161 pounds — about 30 pounds heavier than in 1997 when she first made it as a swimsuit model.
“I still feel hot, but every day is different. It’s when I put on the jeans that used to fit a year ago and don’t fit now and give me the muffin top, that’s when I say, ‘Damn!’ ” she told People magazine in an interview for its Friday edition.
Recent unflattering pictures of Banks in a swimsuit on a beach in Australia have circulated on the Internet with headlines such as “Tyra Porkchop” and “Tyra Banks is fat.”
“It was such a strange meanness and rejoicing that people had when thinking that was what my body looked like. It was really hurtful to me,” Banks told People.
She said she was worried about the effect such reports would have on her fans.
“I get so much mail from young girls who say, ‘I look up to you, you’re not as skinny as everyone else, I think you’re beautiful,’ ” she said. “So when they say that my body is ‘ugly’ and ‘disgusting’, what does that make those girls feel like?”
Banks said she was criticized in her 20s for her curves and hips when she was a runway model. Instead of dieting strictly, she launched herself as a swimwear and lingerie model.
She has sought to highlight discrimination against overweight people, donning a padded “fat suit” and going undercover as a 350-pound woman in 2005 to show how obese people are treated by others.
Banks said she was dedicating part of her talk show next week to putting the record straight about her size.