Reebok claims you can work out your legs and butt muscles just by wearing their EasyTone shoes. Everyone’s looking for an easy way to a bikini body – whether that be through “skinny pills” or shoes that tone your butt and legs. There’s so much damn pressure to look good (i.e. skinny) and marketers know that people will buy almost anything if there’s a glimmer of hope that it will work. Despite the lack of proof that these shoes actually work, people are buying them up. Officials from Reebok say the EasyTone is the company’s most successful new product in at least five years.
So, how are these shoes supposed to work? While most athletic shoes offer support and cushioning, these “muscle-activating” shoes are engineered to create instability. “Balance pods” inside Reebok EasyTone’s are said to force the wearer to engage stabilizing muscles further, resulting in more toned leg and buttock muscles.
An article from the New York times basically states that Reebok’s claims are bullshit. “To support the claims, the shoemakers each offer company-financed exercise studies suggesting that the shoes produce a higher level of muscle engagement, at least in a controlled research setting. But the studies don’t show whether more engagement leads to meaningful changes in muscle tone or appearance over time. Nor is it clear whether the high level of engagement continues once the walker becomes accustomed to the shoe.”
I think what disturbs me the most about these EasyTone shoes is their advertising campaign. Erm, make that assvertising campaign, cos asses are about the only thing you see. I’ve included two of their print ads, and you can also watch their obnoxious television ads on YouTube, but I warn you that watching these ads may lead to lower self esteem and feelings that your body isn't good enough. (Thanks, Reebok!)
The print ads are frustrating because they’re so obviously fake. The legs have been Photoshopped to such an extreme degree that they look like plastic Barbie legs. Real people’s legs don’t look like plastic, they have veins and different colours/tones on the skin. Caucasian skin is not a peachy-plastic colour: it has tones of red, purple, green, and blue within it. The only conclusion I can come to is that these legs must belong to some new race of humans with impossibly flawless skin!
Also what’s up with the see-through panties? It’s bad enough that they throw these fake skinny legs in our face, and now we have to look at ass-cracks too? It’s just a bunch of anonymous Barbie legs and asses being thrown into our faces, and we’re meant to believe that we can actually achieve this look? Let me save you the $150 on the shoes and some of your dignity by telling you now that even the fittest most athletic women in the world don’t have legs and asses that look like this because these are computer-generated bodies. Refuse to compare yourself to a Photoshopped body. Refuse to believe their bullshit lies that you too can look like this - all it takes is walking in these shoes!
No, Reebok. All it takes is a greedy advertiser and a soulless Photoshop editor who’s willing to air brush all the veins, colour, personality and individuality out of your legs until they look like two sticks of peach-coloured plastic.
So Reebok, I have a request for you. If you shoes ACTUALLY work, then have the balls/eggs to show us REAL women’s legs after they’ve walked around in these shoes. Until then, I’ll continue to believe that the only woman capable of legs like that is a computer-generated woman.
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