F.A.T. just me bitching...

so, sparked by my 'i am not a fat activist' post i've decided to start a category about being fat. i figure, my blog was named F.A.T. for a reason, and maybe i should live up to it. so, occassionally you'll see a post with a title that starts with F.A.T. and you'll know why.

having said that, don't expect every F.A.T. post to be deeply interesting or philosophical or anything.

case in point, today's post. today i will be simply asking a question. a rhetorical question that is actually just (not very effectively) masking me bitching. ready?

would it kill Addition-Elle to actually hire a fat model in addition to their not-fat spokesmodel? seriously people. this woman, she's not even as big as zellwegger got in bridget jones.

now, she's no kate moss, she's pretty much a normal sized person. which says something about clothing sizing, since the implication is that she has to shop at a fat lady store.

at this point i have no doubt that someone will hasten to point out to me that women who model 'normal sized' clothes are no where near the size of the average women buying those clothes. i absolutely agree. the last time i saw a 'normal' sized woman (or man for that matter, but i'm going to just stick to women for this post) in a calvin klien ad was, um, oh, right, i remember now, it was that time hell froze over for a bit a couple years ago...

so why should it be different for fat clothes, right? well, i don't know. i feel somehow like it's a different audience. for one thing, i want to know what those clothes are going to look like on a fat person. for another, you're dealing with a group of people who are already out of the cultural norm, so why not take a stand, advertise outside of the cultural norm, i'm betting your customers will reward you, just look at the success of dove's campaign for real beauty. there is a hunger for affirmation in this world.

but most of all, it's the slogan. they have huge billboards that have pictures of this 'normal sized' woman, advertising fat lady clothes, and the slogan is "the curves make the woman". well, just 'cause a model has boobs and isn't emaciated, it doesn't mean she's curvy. in fact, the accompanying image on the poster of a not-so-curvy and certainly not fat woman, well, that kind of seems to work against the goal of the campaign.

i don't know. maybe i'm the only one this bothers.

unfortunately i can't directly link to any pictures because it's all a flash site, but if you go to the site and click on collections you'll see who i'm talking about. she's very beautiful, just not fat by any stretch of the imagination.

okay, bitching done...