The Controversial Yoga-Celeb Tara Stiles and Sexploitation in Yoga
The New York Times just published an in-depth profile on celebriguru and former Ford model Tara Stiles titled “Rebel Yoga.” The article tries to spin her anti-yoga-establishment approach as some sort of Robin Hood Does Yoga “rebel” streak, making her out to be some sort of noble, ego-less avenger on a mission to take back yoga from the mean, prudish traditionalists who want to keep yoga all to themselves.
While I’d recommend reading the article, it’s not because I think Tara Stiles should be idolized. Nor do I think all of her intentions are entirely selfless. Rather, if you are a thinking yogi, you might find the article an interesting lens on the intersection of celebrity and yoga. And, if you are concerned about the exploitation of women’s bodies in yoga, you’ll get a glimpse into the mindset of one young women, who obviously capitalizes on her own body for her fame and fortune, while simultaneously being in denial about it.
Never having met Tara Stiles, I can’t laud her nor nor bash her with impunity. My personal feeling, however, from reading the article, seeing some of her YouTube videos in the past, and perusing her website, is that she’s young and idealistic, and simply a bit misguided on a few things.
On the one hand, her idea of making yoga more approachable by throwing out sanskrit terms and being more “real” is something I can get behind. She also has an issue with the yoga establishment charging high prices for classes, and so the classes at her Strala Yoga studio are only $10. To this I say, you go, girl!
It’s not that I think we should throw out all tradition in yoga, but sometimes overdone sanskrit terminology and high yoga prices are more about being pretentious, not spiritual. So some of what Tara is doing is a good thing, I feel.
Where Tara is a little disingenuous is in the intersection of her personal celebrity, her exploitation of her own body, and her poo-pooing of formal teacher training.
Tara got her start as a yoga “guru” by doing YouTube videos for the Ford modeling company. Without the backing of Ford, and without having been a model in the first place, Tara would be just another anonymous yogini who maybe teaches a few classes here and there…or maybe not any at all – it’s not clear that she actually has a 200-hour yoga certification.
According to the New York Times article:
But Ms. Stiles, who said she has a 200-hour certification but refused to say from where because she does not want to sanction the program (it is also absent from her bio), believes much of the training available in New York and elsewhere does little to actually prepare someone to teach yoga, and can give people a false sense of confidence. “I did training in New York City to teach yoga,” she said. “It was absolute crap. It’s not useful.”
It’s no wonder that Tara’s bio on her own website sounds like a press release for a celebrity self-help guru as opposed to someone with actual training and knowledge:
Tara Stiles, author of Slim Calm Sexy, yoga expert for Women’s Health magazine, and personal yoga instructor to Deepak Chopra, founded Strala to provide an authentic form of yoga that clears the body and mind, and brings you back to your self.
Tara has been featured in publications including Elle, InStyle, Esquire, Men’s Health, Ascent, and Yoga Journal, and has inspired a wide audience around the world with her healthy and relatable approaches to exercise, awareness, nutrition and everyday well being. She?s (sic) also the Yoga Master in Nissan?s (sic) nationwide race program, together with Lance Armstrong and Ryan Hall. Tara is making yoga part of cross-training for athletes, preventive health care, and all-around feeling good. As Vanity Fair noted, “Tara Stiles has got to be the coolest yoga instructor ever.”
Speaking of celebrity self-help gurus, I can’t help but feel a little creeped out that she’s advertising everywhere on her website and she teaches yoga to Deepak Chopra! And I’m thinking to myself, why on earth would Chopra need to be taught by a 20-something model when there are so many other more experienced teachers out there? The guy is from India! Shouldn’t he have already been taking yoga from some wizened old Indian guru? So now I’m wondering if Chopra is not just a dirty old man, getting kicks from his hot young yoga model teacher.
And yes, these things do cross your mind, when a young woman claims she needs no formal yoga teacher training experience, but only got her “guru” credentials because of her pretty face and slim body.
So you are right, Tara, who needs an actual yoga certification when you are a 20-something model and have the trendiest modeling company pushing your yoga videos? When you have Deepak Chopra on your resume? Or when Vanity Fair, obviously the arbiter of all things yoga, makes you out to be the queen of yoga…not just for this year, but forever!
Wake up, Tara! the rest of us peons, who don’t have a Ford modeling pedigree, have to actually put some actual training and hard-work into our yoga careers. (Cue the creepy horny yoga guys coming to this blog entry to rant about how old, fat, ugly and bitter anyone who criticizes yoga models must be…they are so darn predictable.)
And while I don’t fault Tara for taking advantage of the lucky hand she was dealt in life, she’s a bit oblivious as to how her “as seen on TV” bio and dismissal of yoga training comes off to other hard-working yoga teachers. It’s no wonder then, that she gets a bit of yoga shit in the blogosphere.
Sexploitation in Yoga
There’s a bigger issue here. Many feminist-minded female yogis (such as myself) are trying to fight the rising tide of yoga porn and exploitation of women in yoga. It’s a losing battle. And it’s made even harder when young, 20something women such as Tara, who grew up in a post-feminist world, don’t get that they are contributing to an environment that is ultimately toxic to women.
Tara wrote a book titled “Slim, Calm, Sexy Yoga.” That right there is going to steam a lot of serious yoga practitioners. What about yoga is inherently slim? Or sexy? I agree only with the “calm” part.
So yes, it distresses me to see young women who obviously have some talent and ambition sink to the lowest common denominator in order to sell things. Why does everything we women do, including our personal fitness and spiritual practices, have to return to the core issue of making us “slimmer” and more “sexy”? Is this the only value we women have to the world? Because that’s kind of what Tara is saying with that book title. It’s not like she titled it: “Smart, Relaxed, Free Yoga.” Or “Inspired, Intelligent, Amazing Yoga.”
We need to stop making “sexy” the highest aspiration to which women strive.
But like a lot of young women whose egos are unwittingly caught up in the attention they receive from their bodies, Tara just doesn’t get it. At least not yet. But I’m hoping she will someday.
I get it, because I’m older (and not so freakin’ old I can’t get a date, guys-who-will-come-here-and-post-in-my-comments-that-I’m-just-a-bitter-old-hag). I’ve been a 20something, and gotten the thrill of having men pay attention to me for my looks alone. And then it gets old after a while. You realize it is meaningless. And you move on to more important things, like developing other sources of self-esteem and realizing that deep relationships are more important than strange creepy men giving you catcalls.
The New York Times pieces tries to make this big issue about how “down-to-earth” Tara is and how she normally is no fuss, no make-up, baggy clothes and what not. So why then, is her midriff showing on her book cover? Why does she continue to do photoshoots in sexy poses? It really doesn’t matter if she doesn’t wear much make-up at home – the upshot is, she chooses to do photoshoots that are exploitative.
Yoga Dork wrote a good piece on a provocative spread (literally) that Tara did for American Apparel. In it, Tara is wearing a white leotard with see-through white tights. This in and of itself isn’t bad, although it’s very 1980′s, and no-one wears that attire these days in yoga studios. So why is she wearing it? Could it be that it shows off her ass, which is the focal point of the main photo, where she’s perched on a couch with her back arched, one leg seducingly up in the air, as if she’s waiting to be mounted from behind?
I’m sorry if that’s a crass description, but we need to really dissect this sort of imagery. I think it’s harmful to women and to women in yoga.
Sadly, Tara doesn’t see the problem with this sort of thing. From the New York Times article:
But Ms. Stiles, who is beanpole thin, makes no apologies. “We should not be hiding behind our bodies,” she said. “Our bodies should be empowering.”
Groan. Oblivious. Totally oblivious.
Let’s set the record straight, Tara: Your body is empowering solely because you are 20something and you are hot right now. Because of your body, you have gotten fame, attention, and adulation. So of course your body is empowering.
Let’s try an experiment. Go and gain 20, 30, 40, 50 pounds. Then see how many photoshoots you do. And tell me how empowering your body is then.
Now, I don’t think Tara means to be sticking her middle finger up to the average American woman, but she just doesn’t get it. She’s young, clueless, and doesn’t understand. She’s caught up in the fever, in the press, and in all the opportunities she has. So is she going to kill the cash cow by telling her photographers, “No, I don’t want you to take sleazy pictures of me in revealing yoga clothes. Take pictures of me in baggy pants instead”?
At her age, probably not. Now, maybe she’ll take a cue from Jessica Simpson and start to fight some of this media exploitation. And maybe, as she gets older, she’ll understand a little more why feminist yoginis are concerned about the exploitation of women in yoga. Because the thing is, all pretty young women become old someday. All of them. And at some point, they will realize that what they had in their 20s and early 30s is gone forever. Men will slowly start to treat them differently, and eventually ignore them altogether. And then they will do one of two things: Accept this, or fight against the tide with all their might, wasting time, money and energy on plastic surgery that ends up making them look pathetic and desperate.
Unfortunately, we older and wiser women do not seem to be doing a very good job of educating younger women as to why they shouldn’t get so seduced by the attention they get because of their bodies.
Quite the opposite: We’re indoctrinating them into the cult of beauty at an even younger age. Witness the travesty and horror of shows such as “Toddlers and Tiaras.”
In this case, we can’t really blame Tara for being blithely unaware of the sexploitation that fuels her little yoga empire. But I hope, in her fever to toss out all tradition and training, she’ll start to mature a little bit and respect those who came before her. Which brings me to the issue of her dismissal of formal training. While I do appreciate that some people can be naturally good at teaching, and she obviously has a knack for explaining things in easy-to-understand language, there’s a lot more to yoga than just that. After my 200-hour teacher training, which was excellent, I know that there’s a lot more I don’t know.
I understand that there’s much more I could learn about anatomy, and physical limitations, and proper alignment. I want to learn more, so why doesn’t she? Why does she feel that she’s above learning? That she knows it all before the age of 30? And hell, I don’t even want to be a full-time yoga teacher! I just want to learn to learn!
So it does concern me that she’s starting her own teacher training program, not certified by Yoga Alliance, in which one of the main activities for the students is to blog and tweet during the program. “We want to bring out you in your yoga and teaching,” the training webpage says breathlessly.
Tara, we can’t all be yoga celebrities. And not all of us want to be anyway. I’m actually quite content that my ass is not plastered in the spread of some magazine, because I’m not really interested in being the subject of some strange dude’s masturbatory fantasies. I’m quite OK with not being that, thank you very much.
A lot of things that aren’t really yoga get called yoga these days, but by far the creepiest is the following: Some women in Russia have put up Internet videos showing them swinging their babies around like they are ragdolls…and calling this “baby yoga.” This “baby-swinging yoga” has now been covered on the Gawker website, and people are still debating as to whether the babies being swung around are even real. 


