As much as I love plus size fashion, I think we tend to seperate ourselves from “mainstream” fashion problems and concerns, which isn’t the best road to take. MamaVision (along with back in skinny jeans) pointed me to a newspaper article on Diane von Furstenberg’s letter to fellow members of the Council of Fashion Designers of America that it’s time to address the “global fashion issue” of too-skinny models.

I know it looks like small steps, but the fact that Ms. “Head of the Council” Furstenberg took the time to address the issue sounds like there just might be a change in the wind.

Italy, Spain, Brazil and Israel all have policies on the table about underweight models. I think it’s a good start, even though I have my doubts about using BMI. BMI’s a rather flawed model in my opinion, but it’s better than the empty void that’s been going on all these years.

What saddens me is that all of this seems to be rolling into action because of models dying from being too thin. Considering that most of those models coming down the runway look so young, I’m sure that modeldeath is going to turn a few heads. Can’t have them dying, now can you?

It does feel almost a CYA operation as well, now that I think about it. As long as they weren’t dying, was it OK to have hyper-thin women wearing your fancy couture clothing? I mean, they were helping you make money. Now that Ana & Mia are in the spotlight after a few-too-many (yes, ONE death from eating disorders is already one too many) models are now in pine boxes when they didn’t need to be, now we’re getting people saying, “Hmm, maybe the skinny model thing is a bad idea.”

No matter the category, we all have our problems. I do think that plus size women are highly political in their own right, due to what we’re going up against. However, let’s never forget that in the long run, we’re all apart of the same clothes buying, model runway-walking, companies making dollars industry.

Our clothes are just bigger. The problems haven’t left the building.

Tags: body image, size, anorexia, ana, mia, social issues