A few months ago, NEWSWEEK published an article called "Generation Diva," about the increased interest tween girls show for things like pedicures, facials, cosmetics and other beauty treatments previously considered grown-up luxuries. (One could argue that "diva" is a pejorative term that puts blame on young kids who don't know any better, kids who are obviously lacking some responsible parental supervision. Let's be clear: we think parents need to step up and start enforcing some innocence—big time—as evidenced by the link below). 

In the article, Jessica Bennett succinctly wrote:

...today's girls are getting caught up in the beauty maintenance game at ages when they should be learning how to read—and long before their beauty needs enhancing. Twenty years ago, a second grader might have played clumsily with her mother's lipstick, but she probably didn't insist on carrying her own lip gloss to school.

Perhaps you thought we were kidding. Perhaps, you thought, we were making a big deal out of nothing; that with today's UV rays, it makes sense to teach 'em young about skincare. Was it really that bad? Were we just a bunch of hyperventilating, over-reacting newsmongers?

Ahem. 

Via Jezebel, those are photos of Miley Cyrus's nine-year-old sister and her eight-year-old galpal. In eyeliner. Drinking Redbull. On the red carpet. In bathing suits. Carrying handbags, and a poodle, and a whole host of psycho-social baggage that will follow them throughout their adult life.

Sometimes we hate to be right. 

By Claudia Kalb

Most of the health books I get from publishers fall into the dreaded self-help camp: how to lose 30 pounds, how to cure depression, how to fix your marriage. So I was immediately intrigued when a book called "A Brain Wider than the Sky: A Migraine Diary" crossed my desk. The poetic title drew me in-it’s a gem from Emily Dickinson. And the book, thankfully, never promises to solve anything. Instead, Andrew Levy, an English proffessor at Butler University in Indianapolis, writes a narrative about migraines-the history of the condition, the physical details of how his own migraines feel, and the way the migraines he suffers affect his relationship with his wife and 4-year-old son.

Not everyone responded positively to the NEWSWEEK cover story on Oprah's role in promoting questionable medical advice. Several commentors questioned if this article is another example of how, as reader Doris Grayson (graysond) writes, "the media can't accept a powerful, decent Black woman as a role model."  Another reader, pencilcase, thinks, "Oprah's being attacked because the thought of a poor overweight black looking black woman from the ghetto transforming herself into one of the richest & most influential people in the world (& daring to use thatt influence to help make a black man president) makes the white media elite's stomach turn."

Everyone knows that road to flat, tight abs is paved with crunches. Lots and lots and lots of excruciating crunches. Or is it?

As it turns out, the exercises synonymous with strong, attractive abs may not be the best way to train your core—and may be doing damage to your back.  

“We stopped teaching people to do crunches a long, long time ago,” says Dr. Richard Guyer, president of the Texas Back Institute.

So should you abandon crunches as well? Read more after the jump to find out.

The Nine Unhealthiest Foods ABC breaks it down, courtesy of Center for Science in the Public Interest.

(ABCNews.com)

Poor Kids Get No Breaks:  Even children who manage to outlive, flee, or move past a difficult childhood may not be able to fully escape:. A new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association shows that many adult diseases are born from negative childhood experiences. Not so much "had braces for five years" negativity as much as poverty, abuse, neglect, severe maternal depression, parental substance abuse, and family violence. These experiences can cause what researchers deem "toxic" levels of stress, and the lingering effects of this stress on the brain could result in diabetes, obesity, heart disease, and stroke later in life. So what's the excuse for those of us with only moderately stressful childhoods? (Rockefeller University)

The Seven Year Itch The friends we have now are a really awesome, lovely, bunch --- too bad half of them might be gone within the next seven years. Scientist found that most people shed about half of their friends every seven years to accommodate newer friends. As a result, the size of the social networks stay the same, but the faces change (MSNBC)

FDA Seeks More Transparency The Food and Drug Administration announced the creation of a new task force, designed to make the group's actions and decisions more transparent. As the Wall Street Journal points out, about what the agency want to be more transparent is not yet...clear.  (Wall Street Journal)