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Spain bans skinny models
Jaded
Posts: 2,682 Boards Guru
Its a few days old, but I just came across this article - Skinniest models are banned from catwalk.
The article says
So what do you think? Over reaction? Unfeasable? A step in the right direction?
Madrid is quite a small show compared to others, but is this a good way of beginning to address the issue of the normalisation of the unhealthily thin body type, or do you think that it is all a big fuss over nothing, and people aren't as impressionable as they are made out to be?
The article says
The organisers of Madrid Fashion Week have announced that they are banning skinny women to develop a more healthy image for the event this month. If any very skinny models do turn up, they will be classed as unhealthy and in need of medical help.
So what do you think? Over reaction? Unfeasable? A step in the right direction?
Madrid is quite a small show compared to others, but is this a good way of beginning to address the issue of the normalisation of the unhealthily thin body type, or do you think that it is all a big fuss over nothing, and people aren't as impressionable as they are made out to be?
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Comments
I don't think they should be banned, though I suppose the "there'd be outcry if the larger models were being banned" argument is invalid since in most catwalk shows and in most designer's collections the plus-size model (who is probably still slimmer than your average woman on the street) has been consistently snubbed for years.
I think it's obvious to us all that what's needed on the catwalk (not to mention in print campaigns etc) is all-round representation of women from the thinnest to the curviest. We all wear clothes, don't we? But high fashion has been pretty much solely the reserve of the rail thin for too long now, and it's so incredibly jarring when such a great number of women are overweight.
Wonder what Posh will make of this!
and there is still an difference between slim and for example nicole richie scrawny.
(I swear to god, I read those girly magazines just for forensic research.)
That really pisses me off.
Being a Very Skinny girl, I find it so f*cking irritating.
I hate the way it's Uncool to be thin, but yet I'm not the one who's gonna be costing the tax payers more money, when there is gonna be an uncontrollable mass of overweight people with heart problems in a few years time!
So No, Not a step in the right direction if you ask me :no:
As opposed to all the money spent on counselling for anorexic and bulemic girls aswell as the drugs and whatnot for the conditions associated with such illnesses? I'm not saying all skinny girls have eating disorders, far from it, but it is dangerous to your health to be underweight aswell as overweight, hence why these girls have been labelled as unhealthy.
I guess the Madrid fashion people can do whatever they want but I saw a very good argument on the BBC where a guy said that if these people say that models should be banned for being under a certain weight for being unhealthy and glamorising an unhealthy way of life, surely they should be banned for being over a certain weight too as that clearly also demonstrates an unhealthy way of life.
To be honest, I don't really care two shits either way. It's their right to be able to discriminate against whomever they wish but double standards are things I cannot stand in this world.
I agree with all that,
Allthough, Just by walking down the street, you will see, there are more people grossly overweight than under?!
The underweight people just turn sideways and become invisible.
LOL. People [and by that I guess I largely mean young, impressionable females] don't tend to idolise any randomer walking down the street, though. These models are marketed to the world as desirable style and beauty icons with no real variation of weight or representation of what women are like, thus making fashion - specifically, high fashion - a very restricted market. Though of course, that's the way they like it, as the whole point is to be exclusive.
It's fair enough to have thin models. It's well-known that the reason for this is because they make the best clothes hangers; garments fit, drape and move well on a sylph-like person. I don't really have a problem with that, but like I said before I find it very jarring because it is like there's one extreme on the catwalk and in magazines (being painfully thin) and one on the high street (being - sometimes grossly - overweight). Obviously, these are generalisations
It's unhealthy to be underweight, it's unhealthy to be overweight - glad we've cleared that up. As for people snapping back saying "oh they should be banning overweight models, too"... well I think that statement is made pretty redundant by the fact that you'll look a long time to find an overweight model on a fashion show runway. Unless it's specifically "plus size" (very insulting, but that's another issue), and those shows are few and far between, especially in the various fashion weeks.
What I mean is, If there's bigger models, then more people are going to want to be like them, and with state of the burger eating nation today, people don't need to be assured that being bigger is a healthier way to be.
Good on them!
I wish england had as much common sense as spain =]
Maybe girls will stop tryin to make themself's ill and look horribly stick thin now.
There's a huge expanse of middle ground between being unhealthily skinny and unhealthily fat; I'm not for one minute advocating overweight, breathless models lumbering down the catwalk (or held up as poster-people for normalcy in any other circumstance, either). Would've thought that was obvious. Being bigger than your average catwalk model is a healthier way to be.
I don't doubt that catwalk models are naturally as thin as reeds, but many do diet, exercise and all the rest to excess to maintain their clothes horse figure. But if the fashion world was ever going to rethink its unattainable standards then it would be nothing to do with changing the attitudes to the models and a lot more to do with changing the attitudes of the designers, promoters etc. Of course, high fashion will never change as it's actually all about being unattainable. If they had a regularly thin girl working the catwalk then it wouldn't seem quite so special and glamorous, I don't think.
I think the main problem isn't that girls have impossible standards when it comes to being physcially attractive. It comes with young girls thinking that this is the only way they can ever be worth anything. Men have the same standards physically. Not all men are ever going to be tall, dark and handsome, but that's okay, because men have so many role models that have achieved things other than looking good. When girls role models are mainly people who have gotten where they are because of their looks (Kate Moss, Vicky Beckham, most female pop stars) girls can't help but think they're never going to be anything. These people may have talent, but I think girls are told that talent without looks is useless, whereas men are told that talent and achievements are the most important thing, and looks are just a nice bonus that might let you do a few Calvin Klein adverts.
You have a point about the difference in the models in men's/women's magazines and in actual catwalk and print campaigns for fashion houses being very different. But I wouldn't say that the models in a male-targeted magazine were anything better to aim towards for the female population, or anything to be heralded. Often the only actual difference between them and these catwalk models is about a foot in height and pneumatic breasts attached to an equally bony sternum. You definitely get glamour and teen magazine models (I feel strange lumping them together, but nevermind) who are more toward the average slim figure but it's no majority. So I suppose in that same breath it could be said that the fashion industry may boost esteem among flat chested and naturally waif-like women because it shows that they too can be a shape that is desirable (even if maybe mainly by other women) as the majority of the supermodels aren't exactly buxom... unless we count the plastic surgeon's GM daughter Gisele
It's all a huge smokescreen though, yes, and only serves to ply womankind with continuous messages about looks being their most valuable currency in the world we're living in. Very sad.
Spot on.
The world of catwalks and high fashion is massively removed from real life. It's all warped and egocentric and the reason that they have such skinny models is that the last thing a designer wants is for some pretty, sexy girl to take anyone's attention away from the fit or details of their latest collection.
Sadly, our society is so fucked up that people see scrawny models on the catwalk and somehow equate that to a crazy and generally unattainable ideal body image.
As for it promoting eating disorders, well, I think people are missing the point. Perfectly normal, happy people don't starve themselves to death, regardless of how thin the latest Cosmo cover girl is. End of the day, anorexia is a mental illness, and for those affected if it weren't not eating, it would be something else.
If you tell someone enough times that the ideal of beauty is the stick-thin waif, or the muscle-bound hunk, then they become insecure. It isn't even just that the magazines promote this unrealistic image as ideal, its that the whole world is geared about making people become insecure. When you can't fit into the hottest fashion, or it looks shit on you, rather than think that its because the designer is a prick, you think its because you're too fat.
There's a reason why so many women are permanently on a diet. And it's so they are slim enough to fit into clothes that are deliberately designed not to fit them.
The diet industry and the media and the clothing industry all make money off each other, and they are all about extracting as much money as possible from people. The best way of doing it is to give everyone a complex, and then sell them an expensive quick-fix solution.
Eating disorders are about control, and are about mental illness. But most people who are obsessed about their weight, and feel unhappy about how they look, don't have eating disorders. Obsessing about how many syns you eat, and how you won't fit into those skinny-fit jeans if you don't lose that magic stone, doesn't mean you have an eating disorder, but it does make you very unhappy. And the entire industry knows sadness = cash.
As for the banning, I don't think it makes any difference, and I think its just a PR stunt. What would be much better is to ban the young models from the catwalk, and have a minimum age of, say, 21. There's a reason why all these catwalk models are so young, and that's because their pubescent bodies are free of all womanly features.
As for the obesity "epidemic", I think a lot of it is bullshit. It's all based on BMI, which makes every professional rugby player in the world clinically obese, which is quite clearly stupid.
That's the textbook answer. In reality, they're about all different kinds of things, but that's a whole other issue. Essentially, I think we are in agreement. Skinny models don't cause perfectly healthy people to suddenly develop eating disorders, but they can cause perfectly healthy people to feel shitty about themselves cause their dress size is in double figures. Which is plainly ridiculous.
However, I also agree that it's all about PR, and nowt at all to do with them wanting to make the world a happier place. I would be very surprised indeed if the 'healthier' models they are using are above a size 10.
I agree with Kaffrin and Briggi on what they've said really. But also agree with Kermit about the BMI thing as mine is only about 19 but i'm fit as a flea and not skinny so it really is rubbish. But i do think that the really ill looking girls and the younger ones shouldn't be on the runways. As Briggi said the middle ground is a minefield.
Kermit- i won't argue that the bmi scale is a wrong way to measure weight/base figures of epidemics on but you have to admit that in the UK nowadays there is a growing problem with overweight children and teenagers?
So... How about, Having models of all shapes and sizes, All aiming at their own market, it would make life so much more easier for everyone!