IT'S ALL ABOUT DEBASE AS SUMMER'S "BIGGEST" MEDIA PERSONALITIES MIX UP-TEMPO ANTHEMS WITH VITRIOLIC UNDERCURRENTS. IN OUR EAGERNESS TO CELEBRATE FULLER FIGURES HAS A BODY APPROVAL MOVEMENT OVERREACHED? AND ARE THESE SINGERS REALLY SAYING ANYTHING NEW IN THEIR PROMOTION OF WHAT ARE IN FACT RELATIVELY MODEST EXAMPLES OF SIZE?
HEREWITH, A VISUAL ESSAY EXPLORING THE LIMITED RANGE OF FEMALE BODY SHAPES TRADITIONALLY EXTOLLED IN OUR FAT-PHOBIC CULTURE, WITH ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF THOSE WHO HAVE HELPED NUDGE THAT BANDWIDTH ALONG SLIGHTLY GREATER INCREMENTS --- AND OTHER PARTIES KEEPING US "BEHIND."
WITH THE BUTT HAVING ITS DAY IN THE SUN, IT ONLY SEEMED NATURAL THAT I ATTACK THE SUBJECT WITH A COMPREHENSIVE TREATISE --- OR, BETTER STILL, TREAT-ASS. YOUR PATIENCE IS APPRECIATED --- I MAY BE CHEEKY, LONG-WINDED, AND TANGENTIAL, BUT THIS TOPIC DU JOUR DESERVES EARNEST CONSIDERATION. FOR IN THIS DISCUSSION, THERE TRULY IS NO END.
WITH THE BUTT HAVING ITS DAY IN THE SUN, IT ONLY SEEMED NATURAL THAT I ATTACK THE SUBJECT WITH A COMPREHENSIVE TREATISE --- OR, BETTER STILL, TREAT-ASS. YOUR PATIENCE IS APPRECIATED --- I MAY BE CHEEKY, LONG-WINDED, AND TANGENTIAL, BUT THIS TOPIC DU JOUR DESERVES EARNEST CONSIDERATION. FOR IN THIS DISCUSSION, THERE TRULY IS NO END.
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Thongs are a many-splendored string: From left, models Nina Agdal, Lily Aldridge, and Chrissy Teigen demonstrate an oft-repeated pose in 2014 (James Macari for Sports Illustrated)
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Of The Wasp-Waisted & Weight-Wary
"I'm in good shape. That shape is round." - Jarod Kintz, This Book Has No Title
"I'm in good shape. That shape is round." - Jarod Kintz, This Book Has No Title
In Nigeria, the status of a man is measured in good part by the body size of his wife, and a person of means will scramble to keep his mate well-fed lest he be interpreted as an inadequate provider. Here and in many parts of Africa, women are encouraged to attend "fattening centers" prior to a wedding. "When you look fat, it makes you look healthy," explained one female who had spent six months fortifying her BMI under specialized care. Engaged to a prince of the Efik tribe, this bride-to-be spoke to the BBC World Service's Outlook Program in a 2007 report titled The Fattening Rooms of Calabar. In their interview, she divulged that larger ladies command greater admiration within familiar communities: "People respect you. People honor you. Wherever you go, they say, 'your husband feeds you fine.'" As an elevated public figure, her fiancee "requires a particularly large wife," the researchers observed, adding that a "slim" mate would have "no appeal."   |
A V-ery Uncommon Sight: Gabourey Sidibe as the face of V Magazine issue #63, January 2010 (for which she was photographed by Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin)
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In fashion-centric corners, it is a "major deal" when a heavy-set, size twelve-or-above actress such as Precious' Gabourey Sidibe or Bridesmaids' Melissa McCarthy lands the front of a major publication (V, above; Elle November 2013) or beauty campaign (Queen Latifah for CoverGirl and Pantene). Yes, in the last hundred years we can point back to shapely icons of sex appeal such as Mae West, Liz Taylor, Marilyn Monroe, Raquel Welsh, Anna Nichole Smith, even Jessica Rabbit to suggest that fuller ladies have always had their day on the sun. But here's the thing: these icons were rarely at their highest level of appreciation when filling XXL garments ---- or at least not for long.
Just like actress Renee Zellwegger, who charmingly wiggled her Bunny tail as Bridget Jones, the legendary MM (nee Norma Jeane Mortenson) was only at her "ripest" for a brief stint, most notably when portraying Sugar Kane in "Some Like It Hot" (during the filming of which she was pregnant). In that unequalled classic, her ample rear may have been referred to admiringly as "Jello on springs" -- but in reality, Monroe was for most of her career fulfilling smallish-medium proportions and a perfect paragon of fitness. (Her exercise and eating habits were described and illustrated to Pageant magazine in 1952, reflecting careful moderation and commitment.)
Furthermore, whenever sexy sirens are at the forefront of culture, the form they fulfill is rarely of rotund Butterball but, rather, the quintessential hourglass. Consider the Gibson Girl of the Victorian Age, or, in subsequent decades, Gypsy Rose Lee, Ava Gardner, Jane Russell, Bettie Page, Moira "Red Shoes" Shearer, Mamie Van Doren, Jane Mansfield, Kim Novak, Sophia Loren, Ursula Andress, Ann-Margret, Brigette Bardot, Sharon Tate, Jane Fonda, Kim Basinger, Pamela Anderson, and on. Skipping ahead, Katy Perry, Kat Dennings, Christina Hendricks, Scarlett Johansson, Shakira, Dita von Teese, Sofia Vergara, Kate Upton, Kelly Brook, and Kim Kardashian-West demonstrate our current ideal for the va-va-vixen, but at the same time they remain fully capable of pulling-off appearances in revealing catsuits, corsets, mermaid gowns, or bikinis. The common denominator: a cinched waist.
Winning Numbers
Steed: I've been embraced to the bosom of the glorious Motherland -- figuratively speaking.
Emma: Do you mean, '36-24-36,' or a more cultural exchange?
- "The Avengers" (episode: "The Correct Way To Kill," 1967)
As a blogger who concerns herself with "weighty" subjects, I generally hesitate to list bust/waist/hip measurements as a concerted effort for preventing comparison. Juxtaposing body size rarely has positive consequence or purpose, especially when we position ourselves against those whose identity and very metier is derived from remarkable physical prowess. However, I find it necessary for my argument to reference a scattering attributed to our most legendary "Calendar Girls" in order to best demonstrate how relatively trim we've liked our badonkadonk, even in the postwar era (when a robust figure was often strived for).
Jane Russell was said to have boasted 38-27-37 curves (in inches); her onetime costar Marilyn boasted 35-22-35 with 36D bra. (This comes, allegedly, from the mouth of a dressmaker, and likely reflects the legend at her most iconic. Other sources, including costume historians, have confirmed these numbers, allowing of course for slight variation.) Betty Brosmer, arguably the twentieth century's first "supermodel," was even more dramatically drawn at 38-18-36, as evidenced below. "There ain't nothing like a dame," sang the sailors of "South Pacific," and their era was one in which girdled flesh and a thick set of gams could leave a man panting.
In 1966's "The Silencers," shapely chanteuse Vikki Carr practically pours out of a translucent negligee --- referring to her endowments as "deadly equipment" more legal than a knife or gun. In this scenario, any given man --- no matter how practiced a spy or assassin --- is helpless against the power of one amongst her tribe. Steely reserve, practiced composure, even black belt defenses are no match for feminine wiles, she intones: And if you're a man not made of wood/ When I flip my hips I'll silence you for good. Once again, the circumference of the vixen's tummy remains tightly in check --- almost impossibly so, especially when contrasted with her ample breasts and thighs. According to the song's lyrics, [I]f you should see a lady who/ Has the kind of waist that measures 22/ And she's a 38 where it is great to measure 38/ Dear sir, she is a silencer. When it boils down to it, to serve within the exclusive ranks of Pussy Galore's Flying Circus --- or any other Fleming-inspired squadron of toxic beauties --- an hourglass figure is the first prerequisite. As Mae West allegedly instructed: "Cultivate your curves --- they may be dangerous but they won't be avoided."
All the models for Mix-a-Lot's shoot were carefully screened for "butt approval," with a grid of their rears made from Polaroids on a board. And they were to be trim --- in fighting form --- as if working with a trainer. "[I]t doesn't mean you're out of shape if you have a nice ass," he clarified to Kemp when defining an quintessential posterior. "Anyone who's ever seen a stripper pick up a dollar bill with her ass knows you can't do that with fat." Implants were never something to be considered, as he sang in his second verse: I ain't talking' 'bout 'Playboy'/ 'Cause silicone parts are made for toys. In last August's "Anaconda," brassy female rapper Nicki Minaj borrows several lines from Mix-a-Lot, with a sample of his voice enthusing: Little in the middle but she got much back/ Little in the middle but she got much back/ Little in the middle but she got much back." With this chorus he cemented the appeal of "an itty bitty waist" to offset one's ample posterior, as also heard in the oft-repeated first line from his rap:
Mix-a-Lot's standpoint was that women should be looking to imitate not Kate Moss but Dolly Parton or Marilyn Monroe, whom he believed "exemplifies beauty." At the time, design house Calvin Klein's influential "grunge-waif" look was preparing to crest, gaining force as the hallmark of Heroin-Chic. In the '90s, print media was awash in its morose C.K. One/Obsession campaigns featuring androgynous models with aloof, distant eyes offset by dramatic cheekbones and lean builds:
In Vulture's retrospective conversation from last December, the surprisingly thoughtful wordsmith explained that he was reacting against the prevalence in early-nineties advertising of the White Girl gamine, a pale waif "shaped like a stop sign, with big hair [and] and straight up-and-down bird legs." He did not agree with promoting what his then-girlfiend referred to as "six-foot-tall girls who weighed 90 pounds." (Recall that this is the decade when a primetime television star like Calista Flockhart, America's then-answer to "girl next door," possessed a BMI count of 15.6 when the average female came closer to satisfying 28.) Before J. Lo, Christina Aguilera, and the Kardashian clan, voluptuous black or mixed-race females --- those with tawny complexions and "a little more broad at the beam" --- were under-represented minorities, especially where glamorous bombshells were in order. These sex kittens were too often of fair skin, with Rita Hayworth or Susan Koehner subbing in for "ethnic" (as Latin and Negro, respectively). This has been true for most of the last century, with the rare exceptions of Josephine Baker, Nina Simone, Lena Horne, Rita Moreno, Dorothy Dandridge, Eartha Kitt Diana Ross, Pamela Grier, Beverly Johnson, Tyra Banks, Queen Latifah, Ru Paul (no joke), En Vogue, Mariah Carey, Halle Berry, Salma Hayek, Jessica Alba, Penelope Cruz, Beyonce Knowles, Sofia Vergara, Kerry Washington, and (on a lesser scale) cutesy TV fashion plate Mindy Kaling. (After all, Whitney "I'm Every Woman" Houston, then topping the airwaves with "The Bodyguard" soundtrack, was lean in her heyday, skeletal in her decline.)
As Mix-a-Lot explained in the interview, "When I did casting calls for [the dancers in my] videos, curvy women wouldn't show up. They thought they didn't have a chance." (In fact, Beverly Johnson, a prominent face of the era, divulged to People in early 1993 --- the same year that saw the debut of Moss' Calvin Klein campaign --- that she would "always have an eating disorder" after adopting both bulimia and anorexia to stay employable. "In our profession, clothes look better on a hanger, so you have to look like a hanger. It will never change," she spoke bluntly in an interview with Kim Alexis and Carol Alt, all three having had adopted bizarre, stringent relationships with food to achieve runway-ready appearances. "I personally took extreme methods to lose weight," she shared, adding: "I looked like a Biafran.") Mix-a-Lot's women were more Ten Pin than Candlepin, not exactly Supersized but also not off the Kid's Menu. There would be no mistaking his models for teenage boys.
Mix-a-Lot's "Baby Got Back" was meant to relieve an imbalance, to shift attention to "women in the hood, women who had curves." Says one authority on the subject, Dan Charmas, Vice-President of A&R, Def American/American Recordings (1991-1997); author, The Big Payback: The History of The Business of Hip-Hop, "his was the loudest voice for this cultural overthrow of the Euro-centric beauty aesthetic, in favor of something more akin to what America would look like twenty years hence..."
Despite its undignified facade, "Baby Got Back" was not intended to degrade female audiences (most especially those of African or Latino heritage), but instead to boost a community's confidence while having some fun with an established male fantasy --and somewhat less openly-acknowledged fetish. Affirms Charnas, the song was fueled by "an earnest resolve to change body image" as marketed in the developed world. I'm tired of magazines/ sayin' flat butts are the thing/ Take the average black man and ask him that/ She gotta pack much back, the lyrics exuberantly made clear.
In the intervening years, Kim Kardashian-West and Nicki Minaj (above) have certainly not been the only artists to appropriate the Mix-a-Lot creed. At the time, scores of rappers took-up his message, establishing it firmly within hip-hop culture. It was almost immediately lampooned by Jaimie Fox on In Living Color, ridiculously exaggerated to comical effect. (In "Baby Got Snacks," the ribald, straight-faced MC, himself displaying a gut, is a fan of fleshy ladies with large appetites. Dubbed Sir Trail Mix-a-Lot, he enthuses: You wanna put a big girl in a real good mood?/ She gotta have some food!)
Their mannequin-perfect physiques brought to light a troubling dilemma: when Bronx-born Lopez or other movie/music/television stars are used as bellwethers of body acceptance, these superstars rarely take the form of an average fan, even if they insist on being tagged as "from the block." Instead of being subversive and challenging of the then-norm for pop stars, the Destiny's Child brand was typical of an ideal for physical fitness in the age of kickboxing, Spin classes, juice cleanses, carb-nixing. Michelle, Beyonce and Kelly were vixens, yes, but of a precisely-packaged, universal appeal. Though not of the Hustler-level "silicone parts" that Sir Mix-a-Lot bemoaned, their appearance was certainly processed and carefully honed --- even, as a matter of fact, "made for toys":
Bey-ond Reproach: A Side Note On The Beyonce Machine
"Beyonce's hubris makes the world a better, more Beyonce-like place." - Rob Sheffield, Rolling Stone
It wouldn't be a complete discussion of changing ideals of beauty without a tangent on Beyonce Knowles-Carter, "music's glossiest mega-star," according to music industry Bible Rolling Stone. For today's black female role models, with prominence comes the obligation to remain "fierce" in the eyes of a multi-race, demographically-diverse public. Prime examples: fitness ambassador First Lady Michelle Obama, tennis champions Serena and Venus Williams, notoriously muscular Jada Pinkett Smith and Angela Bassett (both enjoying career resurgences). Since taking-on a solo path, Beyonce Knowles-Carter has made ground in distancing herself from the restrictive uniformity of her previous ensemble, and her body --- and body of work --- seem to have matured in tandem. Launched from the Destiny's Child platform, her emergence to the forefront of the international stage was plotted over a series of calculated, hard-earned career milestones. From early on it was obvious she was making efforts to pull from the pack: its 2006 breakup and her inevitable rise was foreshadowed by the title of the group's second album, The Writing's on the Wall. In short order she has embraced the role of A-List headliner with a cool, perfectly-tousled head. Now a humanitarian and mother, her robust, muscular features bely the confidence that comes with selling-out stadiums, performing for a presidential inauguration and Super Bowl, even dropping a bestselling album without the need for advanced word. She is so universally acknowledged as an exemplar of the female rear that an Australian horse fly with "a golden-haired bum" was named for her in 2012.
As for her physical prowess, any observable growth to her loins is of a minor scale --- barely even a pant size at most --- with any increase merely reflective of her efforts to come into her own. As an ingenue, her handlers likely kept their investment on a short leash, with little wiggle room for stepping outside the cookie-cutter sample-size standard. (What's worse, they once made it publicly known that she was in ownership of a nineteen-inch waist, establishing a dangerous precedent for possible emulators.) Below, in a 2009 shoot for Tony Duran, a newly-solo Knowles is shown liberally greased, suggesting the artificial composition of a plastic plaything. Her resemblance to Mattel's officially-sanctioned Beyonce doll of 2005 is indeed remarkable:
In a welcome departure, as we move closer to the decade's mid-point the superstar has taken pains to promote herself as equal parts goddess and real woman. Nourishing her body --- and flaunting it --- is, quite simply, another way in which Knowles remains in the vanguard in a world where most royal figures (be they of official decree or mere token regard) come in the form of perilously slender, pale-skinned fashionistas such as Kate Middleton, Cate Blanchett, Angelina Jolie-Pitt, Keira Knightly, Victoria Beckham, Rachel Zoe, the Olsons, and on.
According to her Wikipedia page, Beyonce --- or Queen Bey, to cite a popular sobriquet that speaks of her aristocratic mien --- identifies as a proponent of feminist theory, and therefore resolves to keep body acceptance a priority ...when not musically reworking speeches from the likes of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.
Upon the release of her fifth and latest album, resident writer and contributing Rolling Stone editor Rob Sheffield wrote: "The whole project is a celebration of the Beyonce Philosophy, which basically boils down to the fact that Beyonce can do anything the hell she wants to." Even with carte blanche artistic license giving her the option to "go dark," new recordings remain "[positive] pageant-ready ballads about believing in your dreams and reaching your goals."
Clearly keeping the best interest of her followers in mind (and the integrity of Parkwood Entertainment), Beyonce positions herself as a paradigm for the ambitious modern career-gal --- the tenacious businesswoman in gladiator sandals. On female music ambassadors directing their careers, she told British life-and-style magazine The Gentlewoman early last year: "I'm controlling my content, controlling my brand and archiving it for my daughter and making sure she has it and respects it but there's not enough of us that become moguls." After all, her global imprint, like Houston's at its summit, depends on knowing --- and testing --- one's own strength. Yet, unlike Whitney's career-defining character in "The Bodyguard, "Mrs. Jay-Z doesn't require a man's arms for protection or rescue. (For evidence, consider that she dismissed her father as acting manager in 2011.) True, she is half of one of the word's most high-profile unions, but Queen Bey has achieved parity with her hip-hop legend husband and artistic/domestic counterpart. "I don't like to gamble," Knowles once declared, "but if there's one thing I'm willing to bet on, it's myself."
Where's The Bey-f?
As much as Beyonce may be changing the ways in which a powerful icon controls her representation, the multi-hyphenate superstar is not really making waves for any sort of envelope-pushing reinvention of the feminine form. (Instead, she's making weaves: just see the amount of money and attention put into her hair alone.) She may be carrying ever-slightly more meat than in her early years tethered to the Destiny's Child machine, but she also isn't challenging the reigning paradigm for the "perfect" size, now falling into the standard requirements for an extra-small by universal measure. In fact, costume sketches leaked by her stylist confirm that the Grammy looks she flaunted in January were envisioned for a sinewy, arachnid model --one hardly larger than what is seen in the fashion trade, or at least not well beyond what makes for a designer muse. (See Roberto Cavalli's distorted, idealized interpretation of her figure below. To the credit of Beyonce and her vocal fan base, much outcry resulted from the the dramatic manipulation of her proportions.)
In a YouTube mini-documentary entitled "Liberation," Beyonce explained the efforts taken to reshape her body between her daughter's birth and the release of last year's self-titled visual album:
Unfortunately, there are corners of the internet devoted exclusively to fueling near-lunatic levels of hysteria and analysis in regards to Knowles' body and lifestyle. Therefore, when she revealed a marked transformation with the turn of 2014, reports passionately detailed her "reinvention" and the measures taken to achieve it. "Beyonce is said to have lost an incredible 70 lbs over the past six months after embarking on a vegetarian diet," enthused The Daily Mail in January. "[She and Jay Z] have a plant-based breakfast and a smoothie made of vegetables for lunch, with snacks on offer including cucumber and edamame beans. Beyonce combined the diet with a rigorous exercise regime, which saw her and [trainer Marco Borges] increase the amount of dancing and running sessions she did in a week, as well as up her visits to the gym."
As a bold-faced media starlet, such dedication reflects a strategic game plan not at all unexpected or unusual for those under contract to myriad entertainment outlets, beauty campaigns, clothing lines, personal constitutions. Even so, it was a different contract that garnered the attention of her most vocal devotees: the unspoken obligation that she would act as ambassador for females of naturally larger frame (or in the words of author Alexander McCall Smith, an African woman's "traditional build"). Many who were dismayed by her size reduction cited an assumed bond or sisterhood, one that she upended when stepping into her noticeably petite 2014 Grammy gown.
UK tabloid The Mirror published an impassioned missive under the elaborate title "Beyonce is bootylicious no more and has betrayed us all by surrendering to body shape fascism":
"She was the anti-thigh gap poster girl. She was healthy, strong, fierce and definitely not a size six. Her old body reminded women there was more than one option. Her new one conforms to the very pressures she used to empower us against. Beyonce has abandoned us and gone over to the dark side. There were only about three positive female role models in the world as it was and now we've lost the best one. It feels like there's no point fighting any more, like we might as well all embark on our eating disorders immediately and be done with it."
Surely, such reliance on a public figure --- a literal stranger, mind you --- for one's cues in life demonstrates bizarre levels of attachment and a warped, vulnerable, decidedly uncertain identity. I am going to assume that the author, being of tabloid employment, was purposefully stoking fires, seizing on hyperbolic language for dramatic effect. However, while there were more than a mere "three" respectable and curvy females trafficking red carpets when she was writing last January, there has been a sense, especially in the black community, that most attention is paid to the sort of wan and vacuous "caucasian socialites" parodied by the Wayon Bros. back in 2004. A few years ago such hangers-on might have been able to rely on Jennifer Hudson to offer relief as a shapely counterbalance, but just like fellow "American Idol" veteran and "Smash" co-star Katherine McPhee, the more she's distanced herself from supporting roles (a backup to Beyonce in "Dreamgirls") and on towards higher-profile opportunities (a rumored Aretha Franklin biopic), the more Hudson has hyped her emergence as an ugly-duckling-turned-swan --- a transformation made possible through an endorsement deal with Weight Watchers, naturally.
Since Beyonce's (debatable) abdication as the go-to black celebrity of substance, rapper Nicki Minaj has intervened, volunteering herself for the role. She asserts in the chart topping "Anaconda" that her man (the one with the presumed "snake") don't like them boney, he want something he can grab. Yet even still, her own silhouette --- seen in the video screenshot below --- is deeply cinched, her proportions almost absurdly drawn. (It's as if such "choice" anatomy was conceived as a man's blow-up doll vision of the ideal sexual partner, as conveyed in this 2011 SNL "Bride of Frankenstein" parody.)
"Her artistic persona is driven by a hyper-sexuality," The Huffington Press has said. Like Lady Gaga, her marketability depends on remaining a debate-fueling "spectacle" --- a bold and brassy modern creation capable of turning heads and inciting discussion. Like Kim Kardashian, she has kept herself at the top of "trending" headlines this autumn by increasingly playing into her jaw-dropping measurements.
With Minaj and Kardashian, we've seen Sir Mix-a-lot's vision of "a black man's ideal" fully absorbed into the mainstream, sparking new interest in body modification, with techniques ranging from muscle-building exercises to surgery, and padded underwear selling like, well, hotcakes.
Yes, there is no denying that women of all color are now being shown from behind in order to best emphasize a "saucy round rear," as described in the above panel by cartoonist and diet-and-body-standards authority Cathy Guisewite. Even still, our most hotly-burning icons --- while often demonstrating more ambiguous racial profiles --- continue to offer a limited range for the measurements of their flesh, despite access to the most inventive and dexterous custom outfitters. It's as if the world's elite, instead of ordering designer gowns to fit their bodies, design their bodies to fit the gowns. As Karl Lagerfield once said, "I lost two hundred pounds to wear suits by Hedi Slimane."
The sanded-down, mannequin-level sameness within the Hollywood glitterati has provided fuel for discussion in several respected publications, not just by supermarket aisle scandal rags. This was evidenced by reader response to September's Vanity Fair, in which columnist James Wolcott expressed Award Show Fatigue. One letter in the current issue describes suffering through last September's disappointing, depressing Emmy coverage, in which NBC's cameras (rather unsurprisingly) remained steadily trained on the most commercial and eye-pleasing nominees. This filtered view of a work community that encompasses many people of many callings --- and figures --- is the equivalent to "an inside club where you must be pretty to be displayed," observed Ellen Wacher of Florida. Seconded another disenchanted star-gazer, London's Lisa Westcott Wilkins:
"Awards season used to be my favorite holiday --- all the pretty dresses! But of late, I too have been left feeling empty by the parade of desiccated fembots wheeled out in aspirational haute couture. . . . Imagine the feeding frenzy at the Oscars if someone dared to throw a steak down in front of those women. Jennifer Lawrence would be the only one not in the scrum to savage it, because she'd already have had a cheeseburger in the limo. You'll be able to tell because there's ketchup on her Dior."
(Sure, there will always be the captious nitpickers pushing weightism, but to suggest that she is not hotly sought-after by fashion firms to flaunt their designs at premieres, or being cast as an alluring vixen in films, is to inflate her struggle, handing her a specious appearance of homeliness.) After all, in assigning her to its "X-Men" franchise as a character frequently seen in the (albeit body painted, scale-covered) nude, the blazing juggernaut that is Marvel Studios has endorsed her "Mystique physique" as something global audiences want to see. It would be as if Helen of Troy demurred to the ladies in attendance at her Laconia palace that she was merely "plain" by Spartan standards. So instead of proclaiming pride in how "big" she is, perhaps it would be better if she deferred that positioning to more typical victims of body shaming. Writes Trout:
"Imagine if Melissa McCarthy had made so many public comments about food and McDonalds. It wouldn't be cute or funny, it would be schtick. Look at the fat woman, being human and hungry for something bad for her! How grotesquely humorous it is when fat people eat! When Jennifer Lawrence makes these comments, it's acceptable because her body is still pleasing to our cultural expectation of voluptuous, slim-waisted, long-necked beauty. [...] The reason Jennifer Lawrence is allowed to be a body-positive role model to young girls and 'chubby' women is because she is representative of conventional beauty. Jennifer Lawrence's public image has been built on a foundation of fat girl drag."
"In America, we no longer fear God, or the communists, but we fear fat." - David Kritchevsky, health and nutrition advocate
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A glimpse of Marilyn's rear in "Some Like It Hot," when at its fullest measure. Third husband Arthur Miller acknowledged her posterior in a love letter, dated April 30, 1956: "I will kiss your neck and your back and the sweet cantaloupes of your rump," he wrote.
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Renee Zellwegger as the eponymous heroine in "Bridget Jones' Diary" (2001). Here she sported refreshingly "real" curves, a contrast to her default "Hollywood weight."
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| Ava Gardner, a major draw for American movie audiences of the postwar era |
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Angelina Jolie at the 2012 Academy Awards (left) and Jennifer Lopez, in a similar stance, at the Grammys a year later (photo credits: Amy Sancetta/Associated Press). Here they are clearly isolating their toned calves and thighs.
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Winning Numbers
Steed: I've been embraced to the bosom of the glorious Motherland -- figuratively speaking.
Emma: Do you mean, '36-24-36,' or a more cultural exchange?
- "The Avengers" (episode: "The Correct Way To Kill," 1967)
As a blogger who concerns herself with "weighty" subjects, I generally hesitate to list bust/waist/hip measurements as a concerted effort for preventing comparison. Juxtaposing body size rarely has positive consequence or purpose, especially when we position ourselves against those whose identity and very metier is derived from remarkable physical prowess. However, I find it necessary for my argument to reference a scattering attributed to our most legendary "Calendar Girls" in order to best demonstrate how relatively trim we've liked our badonkadonk, even in the postwar era (when a robust figure was often strived for).
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| Betty Brosmer and her 18" waist. She has been referenced by some as the first supermodel. |
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Bawdy Language: outspoken vaudeville and film comedienne Mae West used an hourglass figure to her advantage
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Sean Connery with the first --- and definitive --- "Bond Girl" Ursula Andress in 1962's "Dr. No"
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| Diana Rigg as Emma Peele of "The Avengers" |
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Julie Newmar as Catwoman ("Batman: The Original Series")
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The Assman Cometh
"Fat-bottomed girls you make the rocking world go round." - Queen
In 1977's funkadelic dance jam "Brick House," the Commodore's proclaimed to the public: She knows she got everything/ A woman needs to get a man, yeah/ How can she lose with what she use/ 36-24-36, what a winning hand! Just like in the sexy fantasy worlds of James Bond, Matt Helm, and Mike Hammer, a woman is most "mighty" when commanding a concave torso framed by a snug, brimming bikini. These same dimensions have a long history in pop culture, and several entries on Urban Dictionary help legitimize their presence as part of the slang lexicon going back some fifty years. They are most frequently attributed (or more to the point, "attriBUTTed") to Sir Mix-a-Lot's infamous "Baby Got Back," a seminal rap anthem from 1992 purportedly conceived as a celebration of natural female endowments:
As in in preceding periods, his appetite was for a voluptuous form --- but one that remained in check. He sought-out girls he could comfortably put his arms around, with greatest girth reserved for the rear. When explaining to Vulture's Rob Kemp a black man's ideals of beauty, and what was ultimately reflected by the dancers in his music video, Mix-a-Lot wanted to see "women who ran five miles a day, with a washboard, six-pack stomach and a nice, round, supple ass." He never intended to promote anything less than the sex appeal that follows one who is confident in her curves --- to help his healthy Real World sisters appreciate their veritable assets. Even so, he maintained strict rules for his vision, more or less repeating the midcentury pinup archetype (as best defined by Betty Grable's unforgettable rear end, once said to lend morale to troops in WWII): |
Betty Got Back: The best-selling pin-up, or "paper doll," of the Second World War was Betty Grable's, who had turned her stomach away from photographer Frank Powolny because (according to legend) she was showing early stages of pregnancy. At the time the bathing suit shot was taken, she measured 5'4" and 36-24-25. Hers were "the limbs that launched a thousand sighs" --- insured by Lloyds of London for $1 million.
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A sampling of Calvin Klein print ads from the early-to-mid 1990s
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Jodie Kidd, Chrystele Saint Louis Augustine, and Guinevere van Seenus for VOGUE Paris, September 1995
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The source for this image, the American Music Awards website, dubbed Houston (shown here in the 1980s) a "bombshell" and "the perfect date." She had appeared as a teenager on the cover of Seventeen and her whispy body type reflected a shift in ideals.
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Kate Moss, Harper's Bazaar (July 1993)
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| British GQ's "Woman of The Year" Kim Kardashian-West graced its pages and cover (with the same going for V Magazine) in 2014. Despite a limited skill-set beyond serving as "professional socialite," her image and influence at present is astounding. The Kardashian dynasty's umbrella currently extends over multiple reality shows, endorsement/modeling gigs, smart phone apps, high-profile marriages, "leaked" pornography . . . even diet pills. The latter speaks to the difficulty of maintaining a taut belly offset by a full derriere --- her signature feature. |
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Drumming-up Controversy: A playful Minaj toys with a woman's backside (and in widescreen, appropriately)
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. . .
"Baby Got Back" has been lampooned on popular primetime sitcoms...
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Phil Hartman in NewsRadio (Season 3, Episode 12: "Rap" - January 8, 1997)
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David Schwimmer in Friends (Season 9, Episode 7: "The One with Ross' Inappropriate Song" - November 14, 2002)
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...And by straight-faced spoof "anchormen"
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Above: Stephen Colbert interviews Congressman Jim McDermott for his 47th installment of "Better Know A District" (The Colbert Report, September 12, 2013) |
With its reputation well-cemented, the indelible track has echoed within the zeitgeist in innumerable ways. A successful, "folksy" version was arranged and released by Jonathan Coulton, which was then covered by the television musical Glee as recently as late-January 2013, and, in response, once again reworked by Coulton. Its playful approach to "jiving 'bout junk" has become an easy, non-intimidating way to encourage a discussion about fuller figures. Female entertainers have increasingly taken up the mantel of loving --and flaunting-- their "lady parts." Two years after "Back" landed on the airwaves, saucy sitcom Living Single, known for its wry observations on African American culture, showed its female leads singing "Brick House" as a way of revving themselves up for a night on the town (Season 1, Episode 6: "Great Expectations" - September 26, 1993). In 1995, "Seinfeld"'s 107th installment, "The Fusilli Jerry," paid homage to the closeted assman when Kramer proudly displayed the term on his license plate, leading to the usual puzzle-piece dilemmas and contrivances:
And although she had made her red carpet debut years earlier, Jennifer Lopez's name did not draw considerable press until she went nearly full-frontall in a plunging green Versace gown at the 42nd Grammy Awards (February 23, 2000). Although it featured a provocatively low v-neck, that dress was designed to hug and accentuate the music diva's notorious backside. This past week, it was revealed to gossip site TMZ that "Baby Got Back" was in fact inspired by the onetime backup dancer, or "Fly Girl" (seen then and now):
Fifteen months following J. Lo's Grammy drama, Destiny's Child warned listeners: I don't think you ready for this jelly/ I don't think you ready for this jelly/ I don't think you ready for this/ 'Cause my body too bootylicious for ya babe. As declared in the megahit "Bootylicious," they implied that their endowments could strike shock, fear, awe: I shake my jelly at every chance/ When I whip with my hips you slip into a trance. What they had, the three proposed, was something disruptive and inflammatory: Read my lips carefully if you like what you see/ Move, groove, prove you can hang with me/ By the looks I got you shook up and scared of me/Hook up your seatbelt, it's time for take off. Their appearance on a dance floor, they assured us, would stop bystanders short, leaving men and women alike to "measure up" against their inimitable bodaciousness: Barely move, we've arrived/ Lookin' sexy, looking' fly/ Baddest chic, chic inside. As in "The Silencers" and "Brick House," they were championing the "Mighty might" derived from a woman's healthy proportions.
On its own, "Bootylicious" can be praised as a theme of empowerment --- even if that strength comes sourced from ones thighs, breasts, and buttocks, to be leveraged over "a tender thang" looking to partner-up. However, once you see the girls performing or posing in official appearances from the period, their bodies are svelte and muscular, a long way off from "jiggly."
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| Once you've sold your likenesses through licensing agreements, can you really be considered "Independent Women" or have you buckled to the pressure of "Bills, Bils, Bills"? |
"Beyonce's hubris makes the world a better, more Beyonce-like place." - Rob Sheffield, Rolling Stone
It wouldn't be a complete discussion of changing ideals of beauty without a tangent on Beyonce Knowles-Carter, "music's glossiest mega-star," according to music industry Bible Rolling Stone. For today's black female role models, with prominence comes the obligation to remain "fierce" in the eyes of a multi-race, demographically-diverse public. Prime examples: fitness ambassador First Lady Michelle Obama, tennis champions Serena and Venus Williams, notoriously muscular Jada Pinkett Smith and Angela Bassett (both enjoying career resurgences). Since taking-on a solo path, Beyonce Knowles-Carter has made ground in distancing herself from the restrictive uniformity of her previous ensemble, and her body --- and body of work --- seem to have matured in tandem. Launched from the Destiny's Child platform, her emergence to the forefront of the international stage was plotted over a series of calculated, hard-earned career milestones. From early on it was obvious she was making efforts to pull from the pack: its 2006 breakup and her inevitable rise was foreshadowed by the title of the group's second album, The Writing's on the Wall. In short order she has embraced the role of A-List headliner with a cool, perfectly-tousled head. Now a humanitarian and mother, her robust, muscular features bely the confidence that comes with selling-out stadiums, performing for a presidential inauguration and Super Bowl, even dropping a bestselling album without the need for advanced word. She is so universally acknowledged as an exemplar of the female rear that an Australian horse fly with "a golden-haired bum" was named for her in 2012.
As for her physical prowess, any observable growth to her loins is of a minor scale --- barely even a pant size at most --- with any increase merely reflective of her efforts to come into her own. As an ingenue, her handlers likely kept their investment on a short leash, with little wiggle room for stepping outside the cookie-cutter sample-size standard. (What's worse, they once made it publicly known that she was in ownership of a nineteen-inch waist, establishing a dangerous precedent for possible emulators.) Below, in a 2009 shoot for Tony Duran, a newly-solo Knowles is shown liberally greased, suggesting the artificial composition of a plastic plaything. Her resemblance to Mattel's officially-sanctioned Beyonce doll of 2005 is indeed remarkable:
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Stepping up onstage at Revel Beach Ovation Hall in Atlantic City, May 2012 --- five months after the birth of daughter Blue Ivy
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Beyonce and company performing at the Pepsi Halftime Show in 2013. Rutgers University is confident she captures the zeitgeist of the 2010's, offering a course exploring her impact on "American race, gender and sexual politics."
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Beyonce and Jay-Z face the press at the 2014 Met Ball last May
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"Y'all have no idea how hard I worked. They had me on that treadmill. I ate lettuce!" - Beyonce
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Beyonce modeling composure --- and couture --- as intimately photographed by Alasdair McLellan for The Gentlewoman Spring/Summer 2013
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Cavalli's camp claimed the digital sketch at left was "only meant to be a stylized and artistic vision" --- that "more than anyone else [he] has always exalted and highlighted the female shape, building his signature style on the glorification of sensuality and femininity." To clarify his position, the Cavalli brand official Twitter feed posted an photo of the singer in the actualized dress.
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"I worked crazily to get my body back. I wanted to show my body. . . . You can have your child and you can still have fun and still be sexy and still have dreams and still live for yourself. I don't have any shame about being sexual. I'm not embarrassed about it, and I don't feel like I have to protect that side of me because I do believe that sexuality is a power we all have."
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Booty and the Beyst: Knowles wears a swimsuit by The Laundry Room that reads, in reference to her husband's music, "99 Problems But My Ass Ain't One" (posted to her website November 9th)
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Rehearing for the Superbowl in New Orleans earlier this year (image credit: Beyonce Tumblr)
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"She was the anti-thigh gap poster girl. She was healthy, strong, fierce and definitely not a size six. Her old body reminded women there was more than one option. Her new one conforms to the very pressures she used to empower us against. Beyonce has abandoned us and gone over to the dark side. There were only about three positive female role models in the world as it was and now we've lost the best one. It feels like there's no point fighting any more, like we might as well all embark on our eating disorders immediately and be done with it."
Surely, such reliance on a public figure --- a literal stranger, mind you --- for one's cues in life demonstrates bizarre levels of attachment and a warped, vulnerable, decidedly uncertain identity. I am going to assume that the author, being of tabloid employment, was purposefully stoking fires, seizing on hyperbolic language for dramatic effect. However, while there were more than a mere "three" respectable and curvy females trafficking red carpets when she was writing last January, there has been a sense, especially in the black community, that most attention is paid to the sort of wan and vacuous "caucasian socialites" parodied by the Wayon Bros. back in 2004. A few years ago such hangers-on might have been able to rely on Jennifer Hudson to offer relief as a shapely counterbalance, but just like fellow "American Idol" veteran and "Smash" co-star Katherine McPhee, the more she's distanced herself from supporting roles (a backup to Beyonce in "Dreamgirls") and on towards higher-profile opportunities (a rumored Aretha Franklin biopic), the more Hudson has hyped her emergence as an ugly-duckling-turned-swan --- a transformation made possible through an endorsement deal with Weight Watchers, naturally.
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With the promise of landing above-the-title film roles, Jennifer Hudson went from size sixteen to six
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Junk In The Trunk
"Daaaaamn. I think we're gonna see some werewolves tonight, 'cause that's a full moon." - Bill Hader reacting to Nicki Minaj's rear end on "Saturday Night Live" |
| Born Onika Tanya Maraj, this outspoken MC has called herself not only the "Queen of New York" --- but also its king. Here she appears in a publicity still for a hosting gig with MTV. |
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Begs the internet: Who's bottom is on top? Image credits: Mario Testino (V Magazine)/Jean-Paul Goude (Paper Magazine)
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| Rear View Mirror: This pose from Sports Illustrated's Golden Anniversary Issue (originally in color) is suspiciously similar to Minaj's "Anaconda" stance. Of course, Nicki herself went to Instagram to rate this squat and others, deeming it an "acceptable" display of beach bum. |
More or Less: When 'Plus' Equals 'Minus'
"In Hollywood I'm obese. I'm considered a fat actress. I'm Val Kimer in that one picture on the beach." - Jennifer Lawrence
"Awards season used to be my favorite holiday --- all the pretty dresses! But of late, I too have been left feeling empty by the parade of desiccated fembots wheeled out in aspirational haute couture. . . . Imagine the feeding frenzy at the Oscars if someone dared to throw a steak down in front of those women. Jennifer Lawrence would be the only one not in the scrum to savage it, because she'd already have had a cheeseburger in the limo. You'll be able to tell because there's ketchup on her Dior."
Now to be certain, Lawrence (photographed here for a high-profile print campaign by Willy Vanderperre) is not exactly straining the seams of her Hunger Games unitard or second-skin Mystique bodysuit. Rather, she has simply achieved notoriety in the press for voicing a brazen predilection for junk food, an unrestrained appetite that seems perfectly in concert with the uncensored, unapologetic attitude she maintains. Featured as the cover subject for the same Vanity Fair referenced above, the 24-year-old is described as the quintessential "anti-vegan, anti-gluten-free consumer, having just eaten a breakfast of spaghetti and meatballs." In January it was revealed that she compromised the condition of her "American Hustle" wardrobe by shedding Doritos dust on a key gown; two years earlier she spoke of downing a Philly cheesesteak before the Academy Awards.
As explained at the time to Entertainment Tonight's fawning reporters, "I think that people are built the way that they're built. And you just, I mean, there's that quote, that Kate Moss quote that's like, 'Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels,' and I'm like [scoffs] 'I can name name A LOT of things that taste better than skinny feels: bread, potatoes. . . . I just think, 'I exercise, I'll be fine." Of course, interviewer Nancy O'Dell had only just complemented her on being "gorgeous" and with "an incredible body", immediately sending a mixed-message with: "And you said that you love your curves... And by the way, you look very fit, and skinny yourself." (In the context of their encounter, which included raw and loose "girl talk" regarding one's need for slenderizing hosiery, it could be thought that this was a two-faced approach to conversation. However, given the nature of O'Dell's career-defining glad-handing and sycophancy, I highly doubt it was intended as such.)
As explained at the time to Entertainment Tonight's fawning reporters, "I think that people are built the way that they're built. And you just, I mean, there's that quote, that Kate Moss quote that's like, 'Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels,' and I'm like [scoffs] 'I can name name A LOT of things that taste better than skinny feels: bread, potatoes. . . . I just think, 'I exercise, I'll be fine." Of course, interviewer Nancy O'Dell had only just complemented her on being "gorgeous" and with "an incredible body", immediately sending a mixed-message with: "And you said that you love your curves... And by the way, you look very fit, and skinny yourself." (In the context of their encounter, which included raw and loose "girl talk" regarding one's need for slenderizing hosiery, it could be thought that this was a two-faced approach to conversation. However, given the nature of O'Dell's career-defining glad-handing and sycophancy, I highly doubt it was intended as such.)
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Jennifer Lawrence poses a question of vital concern (with E! anchor Ryan Seacrest at the 85th Academy Awards, February 24, 2013)
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Of course, like Minaj, Lawrence is being credited far too ardently, adoringly and as a stand-in for "real" (i.e. larger) figures. The Huffington Post's Jenny Trout calls out the preposterousness of writing-in Lawrence as a "'Spirit Animal' to fat girls everywhere," pointing-out, "one thing that may have escaped your notice ...is that Jennifer Lawrence is a fit, attractive 20-something woman." Later, she opines: "I'm not going to cover the fact that it's messed up that a girl like Jennifer Lawrence has to justify her perfectly gorgeous body to every single media consumer in the world. [...But] to appease our own self-doubt about our weight, we, the Internet, have decided to ignore how body-shaming [our adoration of her perceived curviness and clumsiness, her love for Doritos] really is."
In celebrating the outspokenness of "J. Law" and her insistence that she will resist pressures to lose weight, we lionize her bravery despite the undeniable fact that her measurements represent an (almost) universal ideal. Evidence of this is on display in the conception and fulfillment of Michael Wilkinson's design for her character, a de facto trophy wife and scheming sex kitten, in 2013's "American Hustle."
In celebrating the outspokenness of "J. Law" and her insistence that she will resist pressures to lose weight, we lionize her bravery despite the undeniable fact that her measurements represent an (almost) universal ideal. Evidence of this is on display in the conception and fulfillment of Michael Wilkinson's design for her character, a de facto trophy wife and scheming sex kitten, in 2013's "American Hustle."
"Imagine if Melissa McCarthy had made so many public comments about food and McDonalds. It wouldn't be cute or funny, it would be schtick. Look at the fat woman, being human and hungry for something bad for her! How grotesquely humorous it is when fat people eat! When Jennifer Lawrence makes these comments, it's acceptable because her body is still pleasing to our cultural expectation of voluptuous, slim-waisted, long-necked beauty. [...] The reason Jennifer Lawrence is allowed to be a body-positive role model to young girls and 'chubby' women is because she is representative of conventional beauty. Jennifer Lawrence's public image has been built on a foundation of fat girl drag."
. . .
Much like Marilyn Monroe --- who was especially slender in her final days ---
Jennifer Lawrence is cited (rather perplexingly) for being a woman of "substance."
While an accurate assessment of both women's minds, their bodies speak differently:
Jennifer Lawrence is cited (rather perplexingly) for being a woman of "substance."
While an accurate assessment of both women's minds, their bodies speak differently:
Both icons have been deemed fit enough to undergo reincarnation
as Barbie fashion dolls --- the ultimate bellwether of America's physical ideal:
*And, yes, J. Lo has also been "i-doll-ized" in two Barbie variants
(yet another indicator of our collective views on glamour, celebrity, and the covetable body)
Nonplussed"In America, we no longer fear God, or the communists, but we fear fat." - David Kritchevsky, health and nutrition advocate
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| "One of these things is not like the other," once sang Birg Bird. Around this time last year, Melissa McCarthy appeared on one of five covers used for Elle's November issue -- yet only hers featured baggy attire. Was the (somewhat) ropy-poly Mindy Kaling cropped by the magazine for similar reasons this February? And what about the omission of Gabourey Sidibe's body (and lightening of her skin tone) in October 2010? Might the choice to use only Penelope Cruz's face (above right) related to hiding pregnancy pounds? |
Clearly, there is a ceiling to how far our public figures can expand before deliberate strategies are summoned to mask their size. Calvin Klein, no stranger to controversy, has rekindled discussion about what makes for a plus-sized model after hiring Myla Dalbesio --- a size 10. Her seemingly fit form points again to the sober truth that our celebrity menagerie boasts few genuinely rotund members. Aside from ample Adele or the unapologetically pear-shaped-and-loving-it Lena Dunham, outliers rarely break ground into major mainstream awareness. This of course goes double for the fairer sex, an unbalanced rule that has permitted men of larger stature to succeed in positions of high visibility that would never welcome the same from competent and capable female candidates. On this front, commendation must be paid to Los Angeles newsman Sam Rubin, who on October 27 published his personal take on "the most delicate self-examination of all" --- that which "the mirror reveals":
"In 2014, Morning News TV personalities are expected to be upbeat, even jolly. The same expectations are there for the on-air woman as well; with one major exception. The world won't end if I am jolly and maybe a touch jiggly, but heaven help us, if one of my female colleagues is truly heavy. There are women on air who, like me, could stand to lose a few pounds, but that is a very rare circumstance; and in the entire 20-plus years I have worked on the air, none of my bosses have ever said anything to me about my weight. I know that virtually every woman I have ever worked with has not been able to avoid those same conversations."
Offers Rubin: "the F word is particularly loaded, because our definition of fat has changed over the years; mostly as many of us have gotten fatter." Indeed, with obesity now recognized as a spreading epidemic, a great deal of energy goes to worshipping our "Biggest Loser" heroes, with exacting details made available on how they continue to manage and reduce, especially in the face of temptations shared by the Average Jane or Joe.
Responding to a piece in The New Yorker's September 22nd edition detailing the history of plus-size clothing, Eva Jeffers of Boston noted that there is a chasm between what we are and what we yearn to be, that "more people continue to struggle to become 'normal-sized'" --- with the numbers on our labels demonstrating that inflation. In February, The Huffington Post cited a comprehensive visual essay by Rehabs.com detailing the widening of women --- and the widening disconnect between ourselves and the Hollywood ideal: "[In a joint study with digital marketing agency Fractl, the addiction and eating disorder recovery site] found that the difference between models' weights and the weight of the average woman has grown from 8 percent in 1975 to over 23 percent today." Maintains Ms. Jeffers, "...I am beginning to wonder if this isn't creating a sharper dichotomy in the fashion world. In American culture, at the peak of fat phobia, it seems only natural that legions of wornen would channel their disconnect into the body-positive movement, creating such events as Full Fashion Week."
In this far-reaching landscape, who is best qualified to provide us our answers? Surely, the people who prominently benefit from a purchase and its application. Who can we trust to demonstrate the effectiveness of that commodity and its envious benefits? The World's Most Beautiful, that's who. Especially those who weren't always that way. They better demonstrate what we might achieve.
The Us Weekly smartphone app organizes its splashy, trashy tabloid concoctions under wildly superficial categories such as Entertainment, Style, Beauty, Moms, Body, etc. A casual tour through the latter unearths these leads:
Kate Winslet Shows Trim Post-Baby Waist While Filming New Movie / Missy Elliott Has Seriously Slimmed Down -- See Her Weight Loss Here! / Kim Kardashian Complains About 'Sweet Tooth,' Says She Needs To Make Diet 'Changes' / Kelly Osbourne Shares Impressive, Full-Body Bikini Shot: 'I Look Good!'
The common denominator is that all four of these headline-generators gained initial stardom when still sporting "softer" contours reflective of young flesh, a.k.a. "baby fat." Now, a respectable distance into their careers, they, too, have shed those "excessive" pounds, and in so doing have removed themselves from the ever-shrinking list of plus-size role models. Kardashian, in a shameless bid for simulated kinship with insecure adherents, sells herself as "relatable" by focusing her hyperactive Twitter feed on weight-loss and exercise goals. Reads one post from early August: "Not gonna complain anymore. Starting diet TODAY! No carbs, crazy workouts. Who's with me?" Here is someone raised aloft, with roughly twenty-five million registered followers, and even she maintains "relevancy" in the pop culture firmament by broadcasting dissatisfaction with her goddess body.
What sort of message does this leave for the impressionable audience basking in her spray-tan glow? Where can we look for a break in the clouds --- or, rather, the velvet ropes --- that so strictly delineate lofty Mount Olympus and its A-List inhabitants from the rest of us here at sea level?
Three and a half years ago, Tina Fey --- herself no stranger to being judged on appearance --- took a moment to issue a staggeringly prescient aside on modern-day beauty standards and their near-impossible realization. Nestled within Bossypants, her bestselling collection of dry and wry comedic essays and personal origin stories, the following sardonically-leveled censure has been receiving fresh attention, awarding her "the final word" on the subject --- all the more remarkable given that these observations date from 2011:
"But I think the first real change in women's body image came when J. Lo turned it butt-style. That was the first time that having a large-scale situation in the back was part of mainstream American beauty. Girls wanted butts now. Men were free to admit that they always enjoyed them. And then, what felt like moments later, boom --- Beyonce brought the leg meat. A back porch and muscular legs were now widely admired. And from that day forward, women embraced their diversity and realized that all shapes and sizes are beautiful. Ah ha ha. No. I'm totally messing with you. All Beyonce and J. Lo have done is add to the laundry list of attributes women must have to qualify as beautiful. Now every girl is expected to have Caucasian blue eyes, full Spanish lips, a classic button nose, hairless Asian skin with a California tan, a Jamaican dance hall ass, long Swedish legs, small Japanese feet, the abs of a lesbian gym owner, the hips of a nine-year-old boy, the arms of Michelle Obama, and doll tits. The person closest to actually achieving this look is Kim Kardashian, who, as we know, was made by Russian scientists to sabotage our athletes."
"All" Aboard The Shame Train (In Which The Caboose Comes First)
"If you're gonna be two-faced, at least make one of them pretty." - Marilyn Monroe
All three artists (Mix-a-Lot, Minaj, and Trainor) position themselves squarely against deprivation or denial, especially when it comes to "owning who you are." Despite her eeny-beeny torso, Minaj includes a section of her video to rewarding oneself with food, post work-out, having said that her hubby can tell I ain't missing no meals. Having energy, especially for dancing, is fervently encouraged in "Baby Got Back," which references being pumped like a turbo 'vette, and even eating regularly gets called-on: Give me a sister, I can't resist her/Red beans and rice didn't miss her...
"In 2014, Morning News TV personalities are expected to be upbeat, even jolly. The same expectations are there for the on-air woman as well; with one major exception. The world won't end if I am jolly and maybe a touch jiggly, but heaven help us, if one of my female colleagues is truly heavy. There are women on air who, like me, could stand to lose a few pounds, but that is a very rare circumstance; and in the entire 20-plus years I have worked on the air, none of my bosses have ever said anything to me about my weight. I know that virtually every woman I have ever worked with has not been able to avoid those same conversations."
Offers Rubin: "the F word is particularly loaded, because our definition of fat has changed over the years; mostly as many of us have gotten fatter." Indeed, with obesity now recognized as a spreading epidemic, a great deal of energy goes to worshipping our "Biggest Loser" heroes, with exacting details made available on how they continue to manage and reduce, especially in the face of temptations shared by the Average Jane or Joe.
The Winter of Our Discontent
"It did what all ads are supposed to do: create an anxiety relievable by purchase." - David Foster Wallace, Infinite Jest
...But accepting our present condition does not feed into sales as effectively as anxiety and restless ennui, and consumerism --- the very platform of the modern world --- is dependent on offering-up solutions to these unquenchable desires.
Discontentment is a part of the human condition; but so are the often contradictory traits of self-awareness and ivory-tower ambition. An industrious species, we apply our curiousness and abilities to scratching the undisciplined, traveling itch. And in pursuing that common goal, we look in and around ourselves for solutions. It is advertising's job to be the first thing that sticks. And advertising today is delivered best by our abounding, robust multimedia cues.
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| Fear And Loathing: Be wary, housewives, of commercial copy that instills paranoia and uncertainty |
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| "I think, therefore I scan" |
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French theorist Andre Malraux once observed: "the attempt to force human beings to despise themselves is what I call Hell."
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"We are buried beneath the weight of information, which is being confused with knowledge, " noted offbeat musician Tom Waits --- in a 2008 interview he held with himself
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Kim K.'s roller coaster weight saga lends sympathy to her narrative
--- and authority to her voice as QuickTrim spokesperson
Kate Winslet Shows Trim Post-Baby Waist While Filming New Movie / Missy Elliott Has Seriously Slimmed Down -- See Her Weight Loss Here! / Kim Kardashian Complains About 'Sweet Tooth,' Says She Needs To Make Diet 'Changes' / Kelly Osbourne Shares Impressive, Full-Body Bikini Shot: 'I Look Good!'
The common denominator is that all four of these headline-generators gained initial stardom when still sporting "softer" contours reflective of young flesh, a.k.a. "baby fat." Now, a respectable distance into their careers, they, too, have shed those "excessive" pounds, and in so doing have removed themselves from the ever-shrinking list of plus-size role models. Kardashian, in a shameless bid for simulated kinship with insecure adherents, sells herself as "relatable" by focusing her hyperactive Twitter feed on weight-loss and exercise goals. Reads one post from early August: "Not gonna complain anymore. Starting diet TODAY! No carbs, crazy workouts. Who's with me?" Here is someone raised aloft, with roughly twenty-five million registered followers, and even she maintains "relevancy" in the pop culture firmament by broadcasting dissatisfaction with her goddess body.
Three and a half years ago, Tina Fey --- herself no stranger to being judged on appearance --- took a moment to issue a staggeringly prescient aside on modern-day beauty standards and their near-impossible realization. Nestled within Bossypants, her bestselling collection of dry and wry comedic essays and personal origin stories, the following sardonically-leveled censure has been receiving fresh attention, awarding her "the final word" on the subject --- all the more remarkable given that these observations date from 2011:
"But I think the first real change in women's body image came when J. Lo turned it butt-style. That was the first time that having a large-scale situation in the back was part of mainstream American beauty. Girls wanted butts now. Men were free to admit that they always enjoyed them. And then, what felt like moments later, boom --- Beyonce brought the leg meat. A back porch and muscular legs were now widely admired. And from that day forward, women embraced their diversity and realized that all shapes and sizes are beautiful. Ah ha ha. No. I'm totally messing with you. All Beyonce and J. Lo have done is add to the laundry list of attributes women must have to qualify as beautiful. Now every girl is expected to have Caucasian blue eyes, full Spanish lips, a classic button nose, hairless Asian skin with a California tan, a Jamaican dance hall ass, long Swedish legs, small Japanese feet, the abs of a lesbian gym owner, the hips of a nine-year-old boy, the arms of Michelle Obama, and doll tits. The person closest to actually achieving this look is Kim Kardashian, who, as we know, was made by Russian scientists to sabotage our athletes."
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| Behold! Man's greatest artificial creation! Clockwise from top left: Kim Kardashian in W Magazine (November 2010), an advertisement for Svedka Vodka, animated frames from Fritz Lang's seminal silent motion picture Metropolis (1927) |
"If you're gonna be two-faced, at least make one of them pretty." - Marilyn Monroe
This is where dark horse Billboard topper Meghan Trainor fits in. At the start of her August smash single "All About That Bass," the singer-songwriter greets listeners with: Yeah, it's pretty clear I ain't no size two. It was Minaj, lifting from Sir Mix-a-Lot, who said, Don't want none unless you got buns, hun, and this notion of tangible heft is strongly echoed by Trainor.
Roughly halfway into her frothy ear worm (neologism acknowledged) the knowing and, yes, roly-poly 20-year-old reassures insecure weight watchers: Yeah, my mama she told me don't worry about your size/ She says, 'Boys like a little more booty to hold at night.' Sunny, blonde, and cherubic, Trainor is somewhat less exclusionary and self-righteous than Minaj, a welcome approach made stronger in that she doesn't boast the advantage of an implausibly small center to offset her ample end. With Every inch of you is perfect from the bottom to the top, she, like Mix-a-Lot, promotes a woman's natural form, per the expression "as God gave you." |
Nicki Minaj gives food a "thumbs up" (while dressed as a saucy French maid, natch) in an interstitial sequence from "Anaconda"
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Bitter Pills
"To the beanpole dames in the magazines: you ain't it, Miss Thing!" - Sir Mix-a-Lot
Superficially and in deeper context, using "All About That Bass" to remit and reroute ideas of resounding social significance is akin to administering a spoonful of sugar to help the medicine go down.
"Admittedly, the premise of 'All About That Bass' would not make it through a Gender 101 course intact. [...] Trainor sings while conventionally attractive female backup dancers in colorful, size-eight dresses shimmy innocently. Elsewhere in the cutesy, GIF-ready clip, a man of color dressed in pastels plays the role of prop in two different ways: the sassy gay best friend and the sole overweight person who doesn't give a fuck."
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Dancer and Vine star Sione Maraschino "doesn't give a fuck," wrote Flavorwire.com
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What's more, it mustn't be ignored that, as in "Anaconda," the first-person vocalist is using approval of the opposite sex to reaffirm a woman's value, and happily. This has led to mild and even fervid outrage from feminist circles, who use the cogent argument that if a "so-called empowering song" uses "the opinions of men and the tearing down of other women, we dig ourselves a deeper hole." 'Cause I got that boom boom that all the boys chase, she croons with somewhat obnoxious braggadocio, and can shake it, shake it/lLike I'm supposed to do. Notably, even in the widely-distributed cover image for her song Trainor is literally serving sweets to a rather comfortable, "casual cool" male guest:
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The "All About That Bass" official release poster, as sanctioned by Epic Records
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Discouragingly, Trainor thus finds it necessary to isolate body forms "deserving" of disapproval. Herself clocking-in above the sample sizes, Trainor quickly proceeds to take-down Barbie as a symbol of the sort of silicone, pink artificiality lampooned in her video's visuals, as well as voicing disdain for "stick figure" types. And despite a separation of twenty-two years, her official video directly recycles a gimmick from Mix-a-Lot's.
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Barbie 2013 "Raquelle" Fashionistas doll
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Perhaps sensing resentment, Cosmo posted a weak missive to its website this July explaining Photoshop's enduring relevance, inevitable flubs
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But one thing is clear: this self-professed exemplar of body pride doesn't want her impressionable audience --- especially those still growing, with "beauty building" -- to fixate on or become the quintessential ballerina nymph/Cosmo Girl. As her video conveys, a "foreign" substance such as ass fat is perplexing and, at least initially, revolting for such breeds of Barbie stand-ins:
"Oh God man, I don't criticize skinny people! I would never shame a skinny person! I don't know who would want to. I guess they stop listening immediately after I say 'skinny bitches' and just turn it off. But I say '...just kidding, I know even you think you are fat.' For instance, I have skinny friends and some of them will stand in front of the mirror and go, 'eugh, I'm just like so big. And I'm standing there going, 'JESUS! If you're big then what am I?' That's not right. So I was just saying that. There was a huge Twitter account that made a blog about 'this is a body-shaming song.' I was like, 'oh my goodness, okaaay...' I don't get it. No, I would never shame a skinny person, it makes no sense."
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In a brief Q&A, Trainor repeats the same reasoning for any misunderstandings (TIME Magazine volume 184, no. 14 - October 13, 2014, as framed by Barbie's signature gams)
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Seconds Trainor, when asked about her stance on feminism by UK's The Guardian: "I'm a 20-year-old girl, and I don't know a lot about all that stuff and don't want to be labelled as anything at such a young age." Just as she tries to distance herself from any sort of political agenda, the singer also deflects her interviewer's suggestion that she isn't able to handle the responsibility that comes with stirring up attention, having provided the world with an "emblem of self-acceptance":
"It's helped me on my path, knowing all these girls look up to me, and it helps me learn to love myself. Their support, reading their messages, makes it that much easier. It's not a lot of pressure, it's just amazing that one song can change all these lives."
Reaction From the Online Jungle
"Faults are thick where love is thin." - English proverb
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Animal savagery (courtesy of Marvel Comics, June 1973)
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It brings to mind Bob Dylan's words from "Talkin' New York" (1962): "A lot of people don't have much food on their table/ But they got a lot of forks and knives/ And they gotta cut something."
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Rich And Stabulous: Dolce & Gabbana, Winter 2006
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Whether or not the pitchforks and torches are necessary in Trainor's case I'll leave up for debate, as there certainly is much of it to be found. On the very same page that published Sullivan's Q&A, The Guardian features links to three additional stories within its archives exploring feminist implications in "All About The Bass." And that's to say nothing of the reader posts.
Many of those who are disgruntled with Trainor take on Nicki Minaj in tandem, killing two bards with one stone, so-to-speak. "Anaconda" was released in the same season, and, like "Bass" includes derogatory, cutting remarks towards less-endowed females. As much as Trainor insists that skinny-shaming was not part of her original design, Minaj's opinion reads less opaque: Yeah! This one is for my bitches with a fat ass in the fucking club/ I said, 'Where my fat ass big bitches in the club?'/ Fuck the skinny bitches/ Fuck the skinny bitches in the club/ I wanna see all the big fat ass bitches in the motherfucking club/ Fuck you if you skinny, bitches! What?/Yeah!/Ha ha ha ha hahhhhh. [Tongue trill.] Yeah!/ I GOT A BIG FAT ASS!!!/ Yeah! Come on!
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| This snake's got bite: "Anaconda" depicts Nicki's venomous side |
"I understand the allure of skinny-shaming when it comes to songs like this. The word 'fat' is thrown around to insult women as often as the word 'ugly,' because women are still overwhelmingly judged by their looks regardless of what they are doing or saying to make someone else so angry to begin with. I can understand why it might be nice to have to be able to throw an insult back in their faces, since our society places women of a certain body type on a pedestal above women with fuller figures. I'm not dismissing that at all.
"However, Minaj, for one, has always made it a point to preach to her fans that women should be building each other up instead of tearing each other down so it was incredibly disappointing for her to sell a competitive mentality to her fans in 'Anaconda.' In Trainor's defense, at least 'All About That Bass' went on to say No, I'm just playing although it sounded disingenuous in the song. It would have been very simple for both 'Anaconda' and All About That Bass' to avoid skinny shaming in their songs, even without doing a complete rewrite of their lyrics."
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| Ass The World Turns: A feature was carried by the Associated Press on November 16, 2014 titled "Quest for bigger butts boosts bottom lines." Appearing in the Business section of The Maine Sunday Telegram, the piece, written by Joseph Pisani, details the current demand for foam panty inserts as well as implant surgery and "derierre enhancement" exercise tutors. |
"As today's premiere, most recognized MC, it would have been nice if Minaj had given a shout out to all women -- those with and without the bubble. That would have been empowering and encouraging. She could have chiseled away at men's obsession with a fat ass by redirecting their attention and realizing that it's not physically possible for every woman to have a large behind."
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Warm shades make only one "end" of the cleavage rainbow
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| Portuguese underwear and swimsuit model Sara Sampaio posted a plea to online "body bullies" on November 12th, writing: "The amount of hate I see thrown at me . . . is ridiculous." She later pleaded, "Be happy with ur body and stop shaming others." Within days she was back to Instagram, defending herself to Jezebel after the "women's interests" blog criticized her for being self-deprecating when speaking admiringly of fellow Victoria's Secret Angel Candice Swanepoel in a company-sanctioned video. The ongoing back-and-forth has been picked-up by news services such as the UK's Daily Mail. |
"I'm all for body positivity. Like hello. Duh. But it is SO UNNECESSARY to insult one body type in order to elevate another. Skinny girls are not better than fat girls and vice versa. Fat girls don't like it when people make them feel bad about the way they look, right? Well skinny girls don't like it either."
Sweet 'N Sour
"There's been some girl-on-girl crime here..." - Mrs. Norbury (Tina Fey), "Mean Girls"
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Fashion Thrashin': females brawl in Versace (as captured by the inimitable Richard Avedon, spring 1995)
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They Hunt In Packs: "Plastics" Gretchen (Lacey Chabert), Regina (Rachel McAdams), and Karen (Amanda Seyfried)
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| Recall that both Sir Mix-a-Lot and Trainor, in no small coincidence, also referenced the unrealistic ideals of fashion dolls, raising objection to their misleading proportions and enchanted fun-in-the-sun lifestyle. |
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The last laugh goes to Joan Crawford after being (deservedly) betrayed in 1939's "The Women"
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Two-faced Twosome: Drizella and Anastasia Tremaine guarantee double trouble for Walt Disney's "Cinderella" (1950)
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It's as if assumed that those who are thin have an innate advantage in life, and are therefore "fair game" for attack, their unbridled egos in need of taming. Skinny girls have had their day in the sun, they seem to suggest; these entitled snobs are well overdue to meet their comeuppance. For Trainor, it upends her song's purported intention when she resorts to casting broadsides, especially given their manner of delivery, which is casual, fluffy, upbeat. It stinks of disingenuousness and misdirection. I'd compare it to seeing a resentful Snuggle bear snuff-out Boo the Pomeranian under all those downy-soft sheets, perceiving him a rival for "world's cutest."
It's Been Said
"On the whole, people who say demeaning things... feel excluded or not part of the core group, so as a result they just mock it." - Anna Wintour
Thus spoke the steely VOGUE editrix in R.J. Cutler's 2008 documentary "The September Issue," whose words may help explain the facetious tone packaged by Trainor's team and their ultimately glib approach to feminist thought. Despite protestations that she was misinterpreted --- that criticisms of her wording are "base"-less (pun intended) --- there is clearly a grudge being illustrated in her video. I speak of course of how she mangled her message of universal body love by including that scorned brunette, she so isolated from all the other kids, forsaken, with only her heels and cling wrap couture as consolation. Yes, we still witness "the obvious malnutrition of most Fashion Week supermodels" (to quote from Chloe Hamilton of London newspaper The Independent, as referenced in my previous column). However, slamming the thin in popular media is no solution to a dilemma far more nuanced than tawdry websites like Skinny vs. Curvy might suggest. Are we truly helping to address a First World obsession when so-called "forward-thinking" artists (and I'm speaking beyond Trainor here) continue to fan the flames of body dysmorphia and the related routes in which we --- girls especially --- screen, compare, and, consequently, appraise our physical selves?
As for the advancement of our gender, some have argued that Trainor accomplished nothing with "Bass," leading us in a circle, progress-wise. One letter published to Entertainment Weekly's Feedback page (see the #1335/October 31, 2014 issue) reads: "It's infuriating when women want to make some empowering statement about body image and only end up feeding into the hypocrisy. Either you want women to accept their bodies or you don't --- leave size out of it."
I will begrudgingly give her video some commendation, as it is certainly not without merits. I especially appreciate its intention to lampoon censored, campy entertainment from a more "innocent," bygone era of soda jerks and "Beach Blanket Bingo," and it does well to counterbalances squeaky-clean with erotic lite. For instance, in some shots she stands frozen with arms bent at ninety-degrees. Posed, poised, she hovers in attendance of her Ken-clone date --- herself a doll, a store display, a lobotomized, cheerfully-servile Stepford Wife. Contrastingly, in others she takes full permission to trace up and down her own hips and bust, or to lay suggestively (as shown above) on an unkept field of rainbow chiffon, not unlike Mena Suvari in her "American Beauty" rose petals. Throughout, the "come-hither" bedroom eyes on Trainor's face communicate that girl power and sex appeal mustn't be mutually exclusive --- nothing Madonna or Lady Gaga haven't said before, but nonetheless worth repeating. Of course, she's not exactly charging out of the starting gate when it comes to poking fun at '60s camp --- even Doris Day poked fun at her own Avon Lady image with the remarkably self-aware "Pillow Talk" comedies. And as far as art direction, I would be more eager to applaud the tangy magenta-and-meringue color scheme if it wasn't such a close match with what "My Best Friend's Wedding" used in its title sequence some seventeen years prior. That memorable, adorably chaste three-minute routine was likely groomed as a wry homage to Ann-Margret's singing-to-the-camera start-off for 1963's "Bye Bye Birdie" and it remains one of the more striking elements of an otherwise tame, mainstream romantic feature:
All Creatures Great And Small
"Some people are cruel and dishonest for sport --- but there are lots who are fighting a good fight and running a fair race. That is what deserves the attention and energy." - Julia Roberts
The strongest thing going for "All About The Bass" is ultimately the acknowledgement that close to everyone sees themselves as flawed: "No, I'm just playing. I know you think you're fat," Trainor says, albeit in a garbled aside when panning "stick thin Barbie doll" types. That commonplace dissatisfaction can be remedied, or at least partially relieved, by searching deeper --- learning to detect value beyond a superficial facade. After all, the notion that our quality of appearance, especially as perceived or by others, determines how we feel is achingly flawed.
"Wouldn't it be great if [instead] we could worry about our intellect and our character, [rather than our looks]?" asks one professor, Renee Engl. studying body image and objectification at Northwestern. Women need to move the conversation away from beauty, she tells Vox in a compelling critique published September 12th.
It all comes down to embracing our perceived enemies, to finding common ground with those who seem on the surface so different. If "All About That Bass" had emphasized this more, perhaps inviting that "bitch" brunette to dance with the other revelers, I would be happier with the ultimate impression of the Meghan Trainor product. To work together, curbing our divisiveness, with less importance paid to defining (or, in this case redefining) a woman's most appreciable assets --- THAT could really have said something worthy of world wide dissemination and prattle.
As it stands, we will continue to overgeneralize and misinterpret, to rank and pigeonhole while halfheartedly scrolling down, passively swiping left -- leafing through and "channel surfing" (to use dated parlance). When we "like/unlike" with knee-jerk immediacy we leave little room for nuance. That is the nature of prejudice -- hate requires less effort than amity and propagates as a naturally occurring human reflex. Compassion asks you to look beyond that which is immediate, comfortable, easily embraced, digestible. A person can't be reduced to a selfie, and ideas stretch out and over any combination of headlines, hashtags, or memes --- no matter how aggressively trending. No one --- and nothing --- can be reduced to three minutes of YouTube, or 140 characters.
"You are worth more than a waistline," proclaims twenty-five year-old singer-songwriter and spoken-word artist Mary Lambert in "Body Love." "You are no less valuable as a size 16 than a size 4. You are no less valuable as a 32A than a 36C." Her video moves between poetry's brusque recital and a collection of black and white portraits of "real" women up close --- each one honest and tender, strong and sad. In tone, it's not far off from what one meets at the therapy circles of recovery centers specializing in abuses of the system, whether for addiction or eating disorders or both. It's nothing if not cliched, especially considering how familiar many of us are with the credit sequence for Netflix's "Orange is the New Black" (which features revolving closeups of female faces as paced to Regina Spektor's "You've Got Time"). Lambert has seen recent recognition for her raw, unapologetic, open-diary compositions as well as collaborations with Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, as learned when I happened upon a briefing on her in the November 17th issue of People (see the still life below). Unlike Meghan Trainor, who presents as a friendly girl-next-door with an uncomplicated medium build, Lambert is truly of a larger, less commercial, packagable presence. Physically, her size is far beyond Trainor, her story also richer and more challenging. A survivor of sexual abuse who was diagnosed as bi-polar at the tender age of fifteen, her lyrics reference anything from self-harm to her own homosexuality. With a five year lead on Trainor there is discernible difference in the nature (and expression) of their perspectives.
Neither one strikes me as awesomely deep, but of the two Lambert is more interesting, her voice more practiced and artful. I can imagine "All About The Bass" doing well in households with children still playing in their mother's castoffs, whereas introspective, angsty high schoolers would likely respond to something more freeform. (And to those put off by the rainy Prozac ad drudgery of "Body Love," her more uplifting "Secrets" will likely reverse your eye rolls.) In my mind, Mary Lambert drips beads of black coffee on the sugar-spun cloud of Meghan Trainor, by degrees deflating and dispersing the pop star's rose-colored, hypnotic haze.
And in a welcome departure from any of the artists I have explored here, "Body Love" points to our unique personal experiences as the true measure of our attractiveness. "Your sexiness is defined by concentric circles within your wood -- it is wisdom," she reads. This visual I have personally identified with in my own process of growth, as it has helped me to own past traumas and joys as equal parts of my composition. In discussing Lambert's work, one contributor to The Huffington Post expounds:
"Every circle in our tree is proof that we've lived. Every lesson is a notch in our bark. Every person who has crossed our path is represented in the rings that form our personal redwood. The concentric circles are the guestbook of your life. Why would you want them to go away?"
Know your roots, in other words. Recognize your knots; find seated security in your trunk. Regard girth and bulges, or Olive Oyl lankiness, or stains, stretches, scars, cracks, pox marks, and split ends as the products of experiences weathered; an indication that you are of organic, living material. Secretly salute the same in others.
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Snuggles can't be trusted (nor anything so outwardly cheery).
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"On the whole, people who say demeaning things... feel excluded or not part of the core group, so as a result they just mock it." - Anna Wintour
Thus spoke the steely VOGUE editrix in R.J. Cutler's 2008 documentary "The September Issue," whose words may help explain the facetious tone packaged by Trainor's team and their ultimately glib approach to feminist thought. Despite protestations that she was misinterpreted --- that criticisms of her wording are "base"-less (pun intended) --- there is clearly a grudge being illustrated in her video. I speak of course of how she mangled her message of universal body love by including that scorned brunette, she so isolated from all the other kids, forsaken, with only her heels and cling wrap couture as consolation. Yes, we still witness "the obvious malnutrition of most Fashion Week supermodels" (to quote from Chloe Hamilton of London newspaper The Independent, as referenced in my previous column). However, slamming the thin in popular media is no solution to a dilemma far more nuanced than tawdry websites like Skinny vs. Curvy might suggest. Are we truly helping to address a First World obsession when so-called "forward-thinking" artists (and I'm speaking beyond Trainor here) continue to fan the flames of body dysmorphia and the related routes in which we --- girls especially --- screen, compare, and, consequently, appraise our physical selves?
I will begrudgingly give her video some commendation, as it is certainly not without merits. I especially appreciate its intention to lampoon censored, campy entertainment from a more "innocent," bygone era of soda jerks and "Beach Blanket Bingo," and it does well to counterbalances squeaky-clean with erotic lite. For instance, in some shots she stands frozen with arms bent at ninety-degrees. Posed, poised, she hovers in attendance of her Ken-clone date --- herself a doll, a store display, a lobotomized, cheerfully-servile Stepford Wife. Contrastingly, in others she takes full permission to trace up and down her own hips and bust, or to lay suggestively (as shown above) on an unkept field of rainbow chiffon, not unlike Mena Suvari in her "American Beauty" rose petals. Throughout, the "come-hither" bedroom eyes on Trainor's face communicate that girl power and sex appeal mustn't be mutually exclusive --- nothing Madonna or Lady Gaga haven't said before, but nonetheless worth repeating. Of course, she's not exactly charging out of the starting gate when it comes to poking fun at '60s camp --- even Doris Day poked fun at her own Avon Lady image with the remarkably self-aware "Pillow Talk" comedies. And as far as art direction, I would be more eager to applaud the tangy magenta-and-meringue color scheme if it wasn't such a close match with what "My Best Friend's Wedding" used in its title sequence some seventeen years prior. That memorable, adorably chaste three-minute routine was likely groomed as a wry homage to Ann-Margret's singing-to-the-camera start-off for 1963's "Bye Bye Birdie" and it remains one of the more striking elements of an otherwise tame, mainstream romantic feature:
"Some people are cruel and dishonest for sport --- but there are lots who are fighting a good fight and running a fair race. That is what deserves the attention and energy." - Julia Roberts
The strongest thing going for "All About The Bass" is ultimately the acknowledgement that close to everyone sees themselves as flawed: "No, I'm just playing. I know you think you're fat," Trainor says, albeit in a garbled aside when panning "stick thin Barbie doll" types. That commonplace dissatisfaction can be remedied, or at least partially relieved, by searching deeper --- learning to detect value beyond a superficial facade. After all, the notion that our quality of appearance, especially as perceived or by others, determines how we feel is achingly flawed.
It all comes down to embracing our perceived enemies, to finding common ground with those who seem on the surface so different. If "All About That Bass" had emphasized this more, perhaps inviting that "bitch" brunette to dance with the other revelers, I would be happier with the ultimate impression of the Meghan Trainor product. To work together, curbing our divisiveness, with less importance paid to defining (or, in this case redefining) a woman's most appreciable assets --- THAT could really have said something worthy of world wide dissemination and prattle.
As it stands, we will continue to overgeneralize and misinterpret, to rank and pigeonhole while halfheartedly scrolling down, passively swiping left -- leafing through and "channel surfing" (to use dated parlance). When we "like/unlike" with knee-jerk immediacy we leave little room for nuance. That is the nature of prejudice -- hate requires less effort than amity and propagates as a naturally occurring human reflex. Compassion asks you to look beyond that which is immediate, comfortable, easily embraced, digestible. A person can't be reduced to a selfie, and ideas stretch out and over any combination of headlines, hashtags, or memes --- no matter how aggressively trending. No one --- and nothing --- can be reduced to three minutes of YouTube, or 140 characters.
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We were all once children, and remain so. Challenges Oprah, shown above in youth: "Are you ready to stop colluding with a culture that makes so many of us feel physically inadequate? Say good bye to your inner critic, and take the pledge to be kinder to yourself and others."
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The concentric circles within wood serve as a metaphor in Lambert's "Body Love"; the article depicted comes from People Magazine, Vol. 82, No. 21
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"Every circle in our tree is proof that we've lived. Every lesson is a notch in our bark. Every person who has crossed our path is represented in the rings that form our personal redwood. The concentric circles are the guestbook of your life. Why would you want them to go away?"
Remember: a tree throws shade only when it is intended as shelter and relief, a helpful respite.
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