Can We All Leave Gisele Alone, Please?

The internet has been a condemnatory stew the past 48 hours over some of Gisele B?ndchen’s recent actions. Earlier this week the 35-year-old attracted headlines of rage because she wore a burqa as a disguise to visit a plastic surgeon in Paris, specifically the famous Clinique du Parc Monceau. The New York Post reported that the Brazilian supermodel, and her sister Rafaela, donned the traditional Muslim dress during the holy month of Ramadan while out and about in the French capital, in a bid to shake the press.

Instead, everyone found out, and a lot of commentators took issue with her using the burqa for such a task, and during Ramadan. There’s also the matter of France’s rather difficult relationship with the item of clothing. Wearing the burqa in public has been effectively banned since 2010.

Okay, there are legitimate complaints surrounding cultural appropriation in a country that isn’t exactly opening its arms to women who want to wear that item of clothing. Gisele should have maybe asked someone who reads the news regularly if her disguise was inoffensive. They would have shaken their head and handed her a cashmere beanie and sunglasses instead.

I just can’t take it!! #love #yogapartner ?????? Eu n?o aguento!!! #amor #parceiradeioga

A photo posted by Gisele B?ndchen (@gisele) on Jul 26, 2015 at 8:26am PDT

However, we’re finding the judgment around B?ndchen’s alleged choice to get plastic surgery a little bit hard to take. While embracing one’s body and ageing is a fantastically positive thing to do, just because some women want to get a nip and a tuck does not mean they deserve the ire of the internet world upon them. Especially when some of the world’s most popular websites derive acres of traffic from minutely tearing women’s bodies apart if they so much as differ from what struts down the Victoria’s Secret runway every year.

Gisele has spoken about plastic surgery before, and told Fox News in 2008 that there was ?no way? she’d go under the knife – hence the cries of hypocrisy from some quarters. While we think Gisele looks pretty amazing as she is – see that yoga shot – our, and your, opinion doesn’t really matter. Why? Because Gisele is an independent woman, who earned $47 million last year. She can do what she wants.

Via Page Six