Fashion designers need to stop blaming models for the industry's anorexia problem
Fashion Week, the glitzy annual fashion festival in New York, starts today. And the Council of Fashion Designers of America has responded to the annual furor over anorexic models with a health initiative and editorials that claim to address the problem — but really just shift blame from the fashion industry to the models.
The council's new guidelines encourage greater awareness of eating disorders, urge models to seek professional help if they have a problem, and call for organizers to have healthy snacks available backstage. In addition, the standards say models should be at least 16 to participate in a show.
What the guidelines don’t do is endorse the most obvious solution: for designers to make larger sample sizes. Sample sizes are the prototypes that models wear in shows, and they are growing vanishingly skimpy. Instead, the basic thrust of the guidelines is that models just need to do a better job managing the demands of being unrealistically thin.
An editorial on the CFDA site co-written by council president and veteran fashion designer Diane von Furstenberg acknowledges there's a lot of pressure from the industry to be thin, but still places most of the blame on models.
"Some models have difficulty maintaining the body ideal as they move into adulthood," it reads, "and run the risk of engaging in unhealthy eating behaviors that lead to eating disorders." Furthermore, "No single influence is responsible for the development of eating disorders. Genetics, neurochemistry, personality, weight- conscious occupations, and sociocultural factors all play a role in the etiology of these illnesses."
The old tried-and-true victim-blaming game is alive and well in the fashion industry. Does the council really think that the rampant problem among their models is caused, as is first on their list, by "genetics?" Or, even more insulting, "personality?" Or that models are the key to changing the problem?
Note to the fashion industry: Do you know what causes eating disorders? Not eating. And do you know why models don't eat? Because your sample sizes would make a broomstick look fat. Because you won't hire them if they don't take drastic measures to remain rail-thin. And if you don't hire them, they have no job.
If the council had true, heartfelt concern, models would hardly be mentioned in the initiative. The leader of the fashion world control the industry. They can create real change. While their ideas such as "an Ambassador Program aimed at helping young models develop the tools to meet the challenges they face" may have good intentions, it's not enough. It will never be enough.
Quit blaming the models. Mandate larger sample sizes for shows. Cast models who have curves and aren't a haircut past being little girls, and do it consistently, not just for the occasional good-P.R. grab. If you are a fashion publisher, don't run shots of women who are unhealthily thin. And, if you're a model, don't accept the blame.
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Really, extra thin models are a cheap way out for designers. Then, they can't readjust their patterns for people with actual bodies. Maybe we need some designers that have more flexibility?
2 more inches of fabric all around isn't going to cost a designer their business.
Fashion is a big circle jerk. The designers give the buyers what they want and the buyers purchase clothing to get the customers they want. It explains why every department store in NYC was in Chapter 11 towards the turn of the Millennium!
when people price things for retail too, they do it based on the largest size produced-- so really, smaller people are paying more for less, because they're being charged what it cost to make a size 14.
good quality fabric is expensive-- which is what these ~big designers in question all use.
what they put out on the runway are merely samples, with no guarantee of what from those will be bought. you're going to want to use as little as you possibly can with those samples, because you're not guaranteed that you're going to make any of that money back.
i'm not saying this is the ~ultimate reason~ why designers like smaller models-- but it definitely has it's advantages.
"okay, okay, I just got 58 feathers intricately woven into place, that was simple enough -- but ugh, how frustrating it was to design the dress for a model with breasts!"
(Not trying to give you a hard time, I promise. Unfortunately, the fashion scene is a monster in and of itself and it will take actual laws and regulations on the federal level in order for any proper change to occur.)
Common fucking sense right here. But does the fashion industry listen/care? No. :\
...also icon love.
wtf is it going to take? Cause they really don't care, and it's not even New York that is worst when it comes to the sample sizes - Milan is the worst of the Fashion Weeks on that score, the samples are even tinier and the models with them.
And on profiles of stars that are considered "curvy" irl, they always tell you in fashionspeak/mag-code that actually, they're not really fat after all! They're tiny!
So much bullshit going on, and I can't believe people in the fahsion industry actually blame models for it. They're the ones who are often poorly paid, subject to harassment, constantly hassled to lose weight if they dare to grow tits or hips (in which case, they can't do much high-fashion work any more, it's off to commercial/lingerie work with them!). /rant over.
Edited at 2012-02-18 08:26 pm (UTC)
Ugh, it's such a fucking trap.
Seriously....98% of profiles are like this. It's like mad libs.
I'm not fat by any standard except fashion ones, but reading shit like this - 9 times out of 10 written by other women - can make me think I'm only fit to dress up as a sex object (standard style advice for girls with tits? Get them out! Be "sexy"! Never mind if I detest showing cleavage irl, "sexy" is apparently my only default style option, UGH) and will never be chic or cool enough.
It's like the way it's written, chicness and style comes mainly/only from being thin enough, and rich on top of that. Which really gets to me sometimes.
Edited at 2012-02-18 08:43 pm (UTC)
Designers blame magazines, the magazines blame designers, but no one is really stepping forward to take any blame. I love fashion and I'm more than just a fan, as it's an industry that I'm trying to pursue, but I just can not get behind this at all, I'm totally disgusted with the ones in power who aren't making any real effort to make a change.
idgaf if a thin model helps them save money on a sample size. is it really that much considering what these assholes make? omg omg. rage. and i'm sure the material used for samples is a tax write off anyway. bigger sample sizes wouldn't break them JUST SO THEY KNOW
Now the models seem like the majority are so young, and it's like they're expected to stay looking 15 forever. The last couple of fashion weeks have seen models in their late 20s/30s making a breakthrough, but as long as fashion passes the buck nothig will change.
rme @ da word "curves"
this. because the challenges they face are created by the designers/industry. lol these assholes. i can't
I love fashion so much but it's so full of fail.
However the fashion industry definitely doesn't help. To think that most high fashion models are naturally that thin or can attain it in a way that isn't unhealthy mentally, physically, emotionally, and/ or socially is delusional, ignorant, and immature.