Companies claim to be embracing all shapes & sizes. It’s not OK to be unhealthy, in fact, it’s damaging

Brands must cut out online shock tactics

A heated debate broke out on Twitter, the breeding ground for divisiveness.

O’brien, who is a social media influencer, posted the photo to her Twitter feed during a trip to Cuba and was contacted by Gillette asking if they could repost it.

Tweets immediately began flooding in and varied between some saying the image promoted acceptance for all shapes while others spurred a slew of fat shaming.

One read: “The fact is they’re not promoting being obese or underweight or being pale or tanned. They’re promoting self love.”

Another posted: “Unfortunately I see a young woman who is unhealthily overweight and it is not good to promote something like that.”

Others said the ad glorifies and promotes obesity for profit.

One online user remarked: “Has Gillette marketing actually used social media? Twitter and Facebook are full of people waiting to destroy an ad like this.

“They used this poor girl for promotion, they didn’t care it was bad promotion. It’s not fair to this young woman to be torn apart to fill their pockets.”

The razor firm countered this by saying: “Venus is committed to representing beautiful women of all shapes, sizes and skin types because ALL types of beautiful skin deserve to be shown.

“We love Anna because she lives out loud and loves her skin no matter how the ‘rules’ say she should display it.”

The plus-size model spoke out

of adults in Ireland are overweight or obese

of Irish adults aren not getting enough exercise

after the controversy saying she was OK despite being told by one Twitter user she might “die” from being so overweight.

Anna said: “What people who aren’t plus-sized don’t know is this is our everyday existence.

“I wanna show women they can do whatever they want.

“If you look at my image, joyful. It’s happy. It’s inspired.

“I’m living a great life. But for a lot of people, all they can see is it’s fat.” Cruel tweets didn’t dampen her spirit with one saying: “Imagine how many razors she goes thru.”

And aother taunted: “I love that Gillette is saving the whale. @peta should get involved with this campaign.”

So where do we draw the line between body positivity and health issues?

The NHS spends £1billion a year on obesity-related illness