Many of you have no doubt heard of the “backlash” against the ever-thinning crop of runway models, who have become so stick-thin and bobble-headed that the directors of Madrid’s Fashion Week banned all models under 125 lbs. For women who are at least 5’9″, that’s still quite thin, but it’s a step in the right direction, though it met with some resistance from designers like Karl Lagerfeld, who insisted that his preferred models aren’t underweight, they just have “thin bones.” Right.
My beloved gray auntie, the New York Times, devoted a lot of column inches to supporting this bold move against malnourished waifs a few weeks ago. Today I logged on to check out tomorrow’s style section and was greeted with this headline:
Woolly Mammoths
The accompanying story is about the sweater-coats available this season to make women “of all shapes and sizes” feel like “sweater girls.” And here’s a picture of these woolly mammoths:
Granted, the mammoths are probably the sweaters themselves, but at first glance, it seems like the Times is saying that (1) these are big girls in the photo and (2) “bigger” women should stay away from sleeker styles and instead hide under huge, bulky items of clothing. Take a little more care with the headline writing in the future, guys.
Always Double Back 
October 15, 2006 at 6:04 pm
A few years ago there was a movement to raise the weight limits for jockeys in Thoroughbred racing, but I don’t think anything came of it. Jockeys’ lives revolve around their weight, and many use a horrifying cocktail of drugs to control it. In one case, a leading jockey died because of the combination he routinely used, many of the meds illegal south-of-the-border snake oil.
October 16, 2006 at 2:01 pm
Same thing happens with wrestling (the real kind, not WWF). Wrestlers will often go a few days without food or drink before matches to maintain their weight class and then get all kinds of sick when they start to exert themselves.
October 17, 2006 at 6:16 pm
I think big women should wear tents. No? I’m sure i read that in the New York Times?
Woolly mammoths are of course extinct, so maybe not the best headline for an article on a cutting edge fashion phenomena. But then grandma’s knitted cardi’s aren’t that!
October 18, 2006 at 8:38 am
Heh. Good point re: extinction. Funny thing is, at least in New York, the trend this season is to bury oneself under tons of big, shaggy (yet artful and expensive) layers–a look that, of course, only works on the tall and willowy.