I gather that Glamour Magazine has been thought to be making inroads on the current belief that a size 8 or 10 is plus size. They are considered, or think themselves to be, ahead of the curve — or the curve we hope to see evidenced, because it truly has not been, when we still see wafer thin models advertising everything, so thin they surely don’t speak to the majority of women — because they put Queen Latifah on the cover in May 2004.
Sure, Queen Latifah is a gorgeous woman, but she isn’t average, by any means, even by the measure of talent. We love to watch her in everything she has chosen to act in. She deserves to be on a multitude of covers.
What about the average or plus-sized Jane? Have they ever put a real larger woman vs. a star or model on the cover?
The September 2009 issue has a photo on p 194 that women are identifying with and it is circulating around the net, but I take exception to the idea that she is plus sized. You can see the photo here. And you can tell she has lost a bit of weight by the pooch of her stomach. (They admit she is a normal size 12 here, but sometimes is a 14.) She is a 20 year old model, shot by a fashion photographer. To me, growing up in the fashion business, plus sizes were 1/2 sizes or anything above an 18. By the time you got to 22 1/2, it was a real plus size.
The exception to that might be a very tall woman.
The woman pictured isn’t even close to plus sized. She is probably on the thin side of normal.
143 pounds on someone who is 4′8″ would be entirely different on a woman who is 5′8″. As one pundit put it, her bones alone would be a size 12. And that is not a bad thing, when at the other end of life women are constantly being bombarded with the need to protect their bones.
To think that the normal woman might be a 00 with a DDD bust line without a little help is a testament to the power of advertising, including the advertising of plastic surgeons.
And, if that normal woman were a DDD, likely she would be thinking of breast reduction surgery.
If you have it naturally, it is not the same as the woman who wishes she had it and it will never be a natural state of being.
One interesting — and realistic to me — series of picture in the same issue is on p 193 where 6 pictures are taken of the same woman over 30 days. Underneath each picture are her feelings about herself that day — from
“I am completely motified being in a national magazine wearing essentially nothing but my underwear [a 2 piece bathing suit]…I feel fat…my thighs looked thin and if I held in my stomach all was well…”
And then she realizes that all the pictures look essentially the same. And she recognizes, at least intellectually, that fat days are
“about what’s going on in my head — not on my thighs.”
Why do we do this to ourselves?
Why do we allow current ideas of fashion, that may have started as early as Twiggy, to wrap themselves around our thoughts and begin to constitute what we think and feel about ourselves?
I try very hard not to — and it can be an inward battle for the best of us.
Frankly, I’m looking for something different in a magazine.
Their cover yells:
331 sexy looks you can afford!
25 naked truths about guys bodies
3 flat belly secrets
Not what I’m looking for.
And tucked into the cover:
36 things every woman should know about money
5 dinners absolutely everyone can cook
Talk about mixed messages!
I sure would like less dross and more gold.
How about you?
What magazines do you read? Do any of them speak to you particularly?
What do you consider to be normal vs. plus sized?
Karin
www.savvythinker.com
don’t steal my posts — you know who you are!
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1 comment so far ↓
I read someplace that the typical American woman is a size 14. So by my definition, nothing 14 or under could possibly be a “plus size” – not in the real world.
Betsy
Size 14
That makes me medium, or average – not fatsy watsy
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