IS IT OKAY to use the term “plus size” anymore?
Actress Melissa McCarthy, who recently launched a new clothing line, has spoken of her distaste for the term and sparked a conversation about whether it’s acceptable to use anymore.
The actress was speaking to website Refinery29 about her new clothing line Seven7 when she spoke out about the term.
Women come in all sizes. Seventy percent of women in the United States are a size 14 or above, and that’s technically ‘plus-size,’ so you’re taking your biggest category of people and telling them, ‘You’re not really worthy.’ I find that very strange.
Furthermore, she criticised the placement of “plus size” clothes in shops.
I don’t like the segregated plus section. You’re saying: ‘You don’t get what everybody else gets. You have to go shop up by the tire section.’
McCarthy is far from the first person to criticise the term “plus size,” which typically refers to sizes 16 and up in the UK and Ireland.
Earlier this year, Australian model Stefania Ferrario posted a selfie on Instagram and called on the fashion industry to stop referring to her a “plus size model”.
I am a model FULL STOP. Unfortunately in the modelling industry if you’re above a US size 4 you are considered plus size, and so I’m often labelled a ‘plus size’ model.
I’m NOT proud to be called ‘plus’, but I AM proud to be called a ‘model’, that is my profession!
She has since lent her support to Drop The Plus, an organisation that seeks to eradicate the term altogether.
Drop The Plus argues that the term is outdated and implies that certain sizes are not “normal”.
Mixed with all the other body image pressures facing women, the implication that most women are “plus sized”, not “normal” is very dangerous to women and society.
To be labelling a size range “plus”, that actually encompasses the majority of women in the world, is not only harmful, it’s absurd!
And it seems that many agree that the term can lead to women being made feel like they are somehow “other” or “abnormal”.
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Others, however, have stated that the whole thing is much ado about nothing.
For example, Pratik Naik, a retoucher who works in the fashion industry, defended the term on Facebook and stated that it was merely an industry term.
Plus size is more about the designer and the outfits they create than it is about the model or person involved. [...] “Plus size” doesn’t mean that she’s overweight, fat, unpretty, or not sexy. It only means that she’s not “standard model size.” Being upset about this is like being upset that AA batteries have a different name than AAA batteries.
Meanwhile, Marie Southard Ospina of Bustle has also defended the term and states that it is preferable to terms like “curvy”.
“Plus-size” is an extremely neutral term. It doesn’t have these body shaming undertones, nor can it possibly be misconstrued as derogatory toward women of a smaller size.
Arguments aside, Melissa McCarthy has been widely praised for addressing the issue and creating clothes for women who feel underserved by the fashion industry.
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Good going, Melissa.
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