Hannah

This is interesting. A model in the UK named Katie Green has not started a "Say No to Size Zero" campaign.

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepag...o-campaign.html

As the article has it:


The article comes with a picture:



It's definitely a commendable endeavour. I just wish that the model who was promoting it was fuller-figured herself. If only a plus-size model would start such a petition!

M. Lopez

Here's the direct link to the petition page:

http://www.katiegreenofficial.com/petition.html

It sounds like an excellent item to sign:

I especially like the final statement, about encouraging high-street stores to use plus-size models. That is the equally important corollary to banning size-zero models.

It's not enough for size 0s to be replaced by size 2s or 4s. Only when genuinely, visibly full-figured models appear widely in magazines and in commercial campaigns will the industry stop damaging the body image of young women, and begin fostering healthy self-esteem.

Hannah

The story behind Katie Green's campaign is an interesting one. This article is kind of pointlessly gossipy, but it gives a more precise account of the circumstances that led this model to start this petition:


It's sickening to think that any client would basically try to force a model to starve. That is, without exaggeration, a practically criminal act. It should be against any profession's most basic code of standards and practices. It's an attempt to put a girl's health at risk.

The article also includes a conversation between the Minister of Parliament who is backing the petition, and Ms. Green:


It really is an appalling situation that this client told Ms. Green (who, as the pictures show, is closer to being underweight than curvy, let alone full-figured) to lose weight, let alone 28 lbs. She deserves a round of applause for rejecting such an absurd stipulation, and instead starting such a positive campaign.

If only all models would similarly reject calls by clients or bookers to starve themselves, the industry would be far less toxic than it is today. I hope that many young models will follow Ms. Green's example in the future.

Kaitlynn

When I came across the following article about a model who has slammed- and I mean, really slammed- Karl Lagerfeld for his offensive comments, I knew I remembered her name from somewhere. Then I located this thread.

Here's the article:

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepag...urvy-women.html

Her critique of Lagerfeld is devastating:


So true. That's the ultimate consequence of the so-called "illusions" that Lagerfeld and his ilk want to create- women suffering and even dying from self-imposed starvation.

The most appalling thing is, I doubt if even a trip to a hospital ward would persuade these designers to stop pushing anorexia as a standard of appearance. Their insistence on a skeletal look in the face of massive public criticism and condemnation from the medical community has proven that they just don't care whose lives they ruin. They only care about pushing their own warped vision, and are sociopathically indifferent the dead bodies and ruined lives that they leave in their wake.

Good for Katie Green for attempting to do something. More such efforts are needed- from everyone.

Nazira

Thank God that someone has finally chastised Karl Lagerfeld for his grotesque comments on curvy women. Though I don't really believe that Katie Green at all qualifies as curvy, the fact that she is labeling size 0 for what it is, is a step forward. A lot of times the fashion industry excuses these corpse models because some of them might not have eating disorders. Whether the models themselves eat or not isn't the point. The fact is constantly viewing these images does cause eating disorders. Bravo to Katie Green for recognizing that.

HSG

Yes. That is precisely the point. The emphasis should not be exclusively on whether the models themselves are clinically anorexic, or merely look that way. If they are ill (and most of them appear to be), this is tragic, and shows the need for serious medical scrutiny of the fashion world. But what really matter is the damage that their images do to others--to women in general, and especially to young girls, who are the most vulnerable of all to thin-supremacist brainwashing.

Let's say that a model were immune to the effects of a certain narcotic. That still wouldn't make it acceptable for her to promote that narcotic. It would be illegal because of the effects of the drug on others, not on the model herself.

Likewise, anorexic imagery has been proven to have a toxic effect on society, and to ruin women's body image, so a model should not be allowed to create such imagery, whether she is personally immune to its effects or not (although very few actually are immune).

* * *

What distinguishes Green's campaign from similarly efforts is the that it doesn't just seek a (commendable) ban on size-0 models, but stresses the need for introducing plus-size models in their place. Simply replacing size 0s with size 2s or 4s would be no advance at all. But introducing size 16s instead of size 0s-6s would constitute real progress, and would genuinely improve the body image of the majority of women.

Courtney Maxwell, Australian model with BGM in Sydney, with very shapely measurements of 46-37-49, modelling for City Chic:

Beauty in full bloom.