We’ve all heard the terms “fat shaming” and “thinspiration.” We’ve also heard women being scrutinized for being either “too skinny” or “too overweight” because it has been going on for decades. It is undeniable that most women in the modeling industry are very thin; thinner than 99.9 percent of the general population. More recently however, our society has introduced “plus size-modeling” which glorifies women who have fuller figures or who may be considered overweight by American standards. I think the question we should really be asking ourselves is “What kinds of messages do we want to be sending out and promoting as a culture?”
The term “thinspiration” refers to the use of a photograph as a method of inspiration for weight-loss. The images are often of dangerously underweight women. Last year, thinspiration was at the core of a pro-anorexia issue on the social networking site Pinterest. The site received accusations that it fosters an environment in which pro-anorexia supporters can too easily share dangerous content. Also last month, Franca Sozzani, the editor of Vogue Italia, admitted that the fashion industry was to blame in part for the ongoing rise of eating disorders.
So what makes a model? Ken Mok, the executive producer of America’s Next Top Model stated “It’s a happy breakthrough for us, in the sense of hoping that we can have an effect on the industry that embraces the skinny white girl.”. It has been argued that there’s room for tons of different types of people in the world to model. It has to do with certain features that a company may be looking for at any given time, being in the right place at the right time, and being able to successfully sell the product in question.
We all know that “fat-shaming” is wrong. No one should be disadvantaged or ridiculed for their weight. In recent years, high-profile cases of fattism, from Karl Lagerfeld,. A German fashion designer, to Abercrombie & Fitch, have caused public outrage. Positive progress, certainly. However, what about the flipside? : Why is skinny-shaming OK, if fat-shaming is not? When asked if he feels responsible for the health of the models he works with, the creative director replies, “I can tell you all kinds of moral tales, but fashion and reality are vaguely different.” But should they be?
What might not help the situation is another under-addressed topic, which is the unhealthy growth in the opposite direction. According to the Centers for Disease Control, 36 percent of American adults over the age of 20 are obese and 33 percent of us are considered overweight. That means that 69 percent of America needs to lose weight in order to achieve optimal health. This is also reflected in women’s view of themselves. A recent Gallup poll reveals that the average woman today feels as if she is 22 pounds over her “ideal weight.” Statistics show that 60 per cent of teenage girls in this country are overweight, and 20 per cent of young mothers are obese. So the other side of the coin presents an issue not discussed as much which is the heavier side of the modeling industry. A concern that many have raised is the relative question of “What is a plus size model?” In most modeling circles, plus size is considered anything over a size 2. But couldn’t one argue that plus size shouldn’t reflect anything under a size 10 or 11, similarly to how the sizes in department stores run? Perhaps we need to redefine our terms here.
Many people who have introduced this concept have been accused repeatedly of “fat shaming” these women. But should it really be considered shaming? Our society is very quick to discuss anorexia, bulimia and the dangers that go along with being underweight or too thin, yet for some reason, the health concerns that go along with being overweight are not mentioned half as often. In many instances, being obese or overweight is considered a disability where being underweight is considered a choice. This should not be the case as both sides are undeniably a public health issue.
I was reading a story recently about a woman in her 20’s who had anonymously submitted an article to a magazine about an experience she had had a few years prior while working in publishing. In short, she described attending weekly commissioning meetings in the boardroom and there being platters of pastries along the table. She described one of her senior colleagues – a lovely woman in her 50s – would always urge her, loudly, to have a croissant. She would urge me and say: “Look, she’s nothing but skin and bone!” The fact that this woman was deeply anorexic and that her colleague was overweight was irrelevant. The writer was alluding to the sad but true fact that her colleague was drawing attention to her size in a way that would have been unacceptable had she done the same to in return. I’m well aware I’m skating on thin ice writing this article but rather than picking only one side, I am trying to draw attention to both extremes being unhealthy and throwing out the concept of health and balance to our society. When you think about it, what could be more irritating than a thin person describing another person as fat? And yet – for a moment – think about how we describe thinness: skinny, angular, emaciated, bony, skeletal, lollipop-head. These terms are tossed around in the media quite casually, without the caution we must now use in our references to fat. Just as the terms use to reference overweight people can be seen as offensive, the same goes for those who are looked upon as skinny. This woman willingly shared that in her own life, she had been called a skinny bitch, a body fascist, and a fat-Nazi and was informed regularly that men “love something to grab on to”, and that “curves” are sexier than skeletons. For her, facing up to the health consequences really helped her in the end but regardless, society in general should learn to be more compassionate because you never truly know what is going on in someone else’s life; much less in their own body.
Situations like those above happen to girls-particularly young girls-more often than not. Some women can “shrug it off” easier because they have confidence and a solid upbringing, but not everyone has been that fortunate and even for those who have, it’s hard not to feel ostracized at least some of the time, especially when one is constantly barraged with body-image reminders on the job, in the media, at stores and across the internet. The more pressing question really is “Why can’t our society promote a healthy body image while avoiding extremes on either end of the spectrum while sending out the message to young girls that it is better to create a balance when it comes to your health and your weight?” For example the Dove campaign for Real Beauty Initiative celebrates real women promotes the idea of “yes someone may need to lose a few pounds,” but for health reasons rather than vanity.
I think that the acceptance of diversity and a wide range of appearances that celebrate the healthy image of women is a fantastic start. No image that could cause harm to a human being should ever be glorified or considered glamorous. We need a greater push from all members of that industry: advertisers, clients, designers, agents, models, media and regular consumers. Though fashion can’t take all the blame for all insecurities of body image that plague the world, it does fall into the sociocultural factor that influences the way women view their bodies in society. It is a part of the problem, but it can also be a part of the solution. Here in America, we have the opportunity to use our voice and our images for the greater good but will enough people be brave enough to take a stand?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2134632/Its-better-skinny-fat-Top-model-Natalia-Vodianova-lashes-critics-culture-fashion-industry.html#ixzz40Fp486Tc
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/14/karl-lagerfeld-skinny-models-interview-quotes-weight_n_1964978.html
http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/story?id=4873965
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/the-womens-blog-with-jane-martinson/2013/aug/05/skinny-shaming-fat-size-appearance
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Of course any kind of shaming is not good on a personal level…. But thin is the privileged position. Few people get paid less, passed over for promotions, ignored by potential romantic partners, or left out of social situations for being too thin.
I am seeing a lot of what you’re saying as feminist issues. When we stand up for ourselves, we are usually, as women, called bitches. I stand up for the body positive movement. Why? I am 365 pounds. I starved, binged, and purged to get where I am. My eating disorders were recognized by people telling me that I looked better. When I stopped dieting/disordered eating, I was able to stand up and get other things done, like finish my degree, volunteer, enjoy exercise again. I also get to still be aware that people may stare at me while I eat a burger. I also know that I have to give %150 at a job interview to another’s %100 because I must prove that my size doesn’t hinder my ability.
I understand your point here, but it is not something to blame on size acceptance. We are still fighting for our rights as women in many ways.
Thank you ladies for your feedback and also for commenting in a respectful way. I appreciate that.
Hi Lauren, I agree that thin shaming is just as problematic as fat shaming. All bodies are good bodies and no one should be shamed for their body. There are a few problems with your premise about health and larger bodies though that you might want to consider. Health and size are not necessarily strongly correlated, there are thin people who are unhealthy just as there are large people who are healthy. Furthermore, to imply that healthy bodies are somehow better than unhealthy bodies is also deeply problematic and ableist. If you are interested in the research relating to weight and health an excellent book to start with is Health at Every Size by Linda Bacon PhD. A lot of the research regarding weight and health that is coming out is demonstrating that weight is not necessarily the strongest predictor of health and lifespan. What is known is that stigma has a negative effect on health and quality of life and that concern trolling/health trolling is a one form of oppression that is a result of the stigma of larger bodies. This article gives many good points regarding health/concern trolling http://everydayfeminism.com/2016/01/concern-trolling-is-bullshit/
You may have been trying to talk about “both sides,” but you missed the mark by an enormous margin. Here are some of my concerns with your essay:
1. I think you talked about only one side: commenting on other people’s bodies in harmful or hurtful or shaming ways. I mean, I think that’s the point you’re trying to make, even though it is also true that by and large women who are subject to scorn from people saying they are too thin are also subject to a lot of praise for fitting into a size 0 or 2, and there is no analog for women (or men, but I think in general the conversation is mostly about women) who nicely fill out a size [pick your arbitrary larger number] and are subject to scorn for being too fat. The “other side” here is NOT doing that, but… whoops, you did it yourself in the body of this essay, because,
2. You made some huge erroneous assumptions. One is that achieving optimal health is actually reliant on weight. It’s not. There are literally no studies that support the notion that it is, although there are many that make the same assumption unchecked. Another is that being healthy or in a particular size range is some kind of obligation of humans so that they will have worthwhile opinions — this is implicit in the notion that in order to be a role model, one should be of a healthy weight (although how you propose to tell by looking anyway is still unclear. Body composition is only somewhat visually discernible). Another is that attaining optimal health is entirely in anyone’s control, but unfortunately, lots of medical conditions don’t care in the least about the weight of the person who has them; even a lot of studies that show links between weight and, for example, cancers, actually only show that outcomes are worse for people who are fatter but don’t address the social reasons that might be (such as medical offices not doing tests on the assumption the fat person has a fat problem rather than a cancer problem, etc).
3. You accepted as science the CDC’s numbers regarding overweight and obese populations. So here is the problem with that: the CDC itself knows very well that the BMI system, which is where that data comes from, was explicitly not intended to be used to compare individuals. It was designed to compare population averages (e.g., to notice if as a group young men in Cambodia and young men in Nigeria have notably different height/weight ratios). It is literally a simple height-weight ratio. I know you didn’t say it was about BMI, but it is, and BMI is not magic science. It’s literally a height-weight ratio and takes into account absolutely nothing else. Not muscle size or strength, not blood pressure, not cardiovascular capacity, not hormone balance, not endurance, nothing. So there’s that, which is a problem, and there’s also this: do you know that about 25 years ago, the people who are in charge of deciding what constitutes overweightness actually changed the definition overnight? They suddenly said that the old BMI categories were wrong, and made new ones (based on no science), and the next day millions of people who were normal the day before were now fat. Seriously, it’s that arbitrary.
:/