Amy Schumer doesn’t want to be in what many are calling Glamour Magazine’s ‘plus size issue’ because she doesn’t think her US size 6 frame fits the bill.
The comedienne says she didn’t know she was going to be featured in the mag and has taken issue with being associated as ‘plus size’ – but she is plus size, and she might not understand this for some rather complicated reasons I’m about to explain.
Schmuer is a cover line on this month’s US Glamour’s ‘Chic At Any Size’ issue, which features the curvalicious Ashley Graham on its cover, but says she wears a US sizes 6-8 and suggests it’s not healthy for young girls to see her in this particular issue of the magazine.
Earlier this week The Trainwreck star took to Twitter and Instagram to call her inclusion in the groundbreaking glossy “not cool”.
She wrote:
I think there’s nothing wrong with being plus size. Beautiful healthy women. Plus size is considered size 16 in America. I go between a size 6 and an 8.@glamourmag put me in their plus size only issue without asking or letting me know and it doesn’t feel right to me. Young girls seeing my body type thinking that is plus size? What are your thoughts? Mine are not cool glamour not glamourous.
But Glamour, who awarded the 34-year-old with its Trailblazer of the Year award in June 2015 and featured her on the cover that same year, said it did not label her as plus size.
Glamour issued an apology to the star on Tuesday, saying: “We love Amy, and our readers do too… the issue did not describe her as plus-size” and featured her only as an inspiring woman.
This explanation still didn’t seem to clear things up for the actress and she turned to the interwebs for help saying: “Hey Twitter! I’d love your thoughts?”
Well since Amy asked, here are mine…
I am not a big fan of the term ‘plus-size’ for reasons Amy just highlighted. As a journalist who also moonlights as a “plus size model”, the terms of my job used to be fairly well defined.
Schumer wrote that, “Plus size is considered size 16 in America”, well actually that’s not quite true.
‘Plus size’ was a term initially invented to differentiate my shape and others like me – curvy, buxom, rounded, fleshy, whatever else you want to call it – from the thin, waifish figures that have long dominated the modelling world.
If you were a client and you were looking for a thin model you would call an agency and say, ‘send me a straight size model’. But if you were a client and you wanted a thicker model with a bigger bust or bottom to fill your garments you would call an agency and say, ‘send me a plus size model’. It was the system and it worked – anything above an Australian size 8, or a US 0, = plus size. Conversation over.
Then the internet happened.
Bloggers with social media handles like ‘CholeM_PlusSizeModel’ or ‘CurvyGina_PlusSizeModel’ started gaining huge traction with thousands of followers. But most hadn’t actually worked in the industry (despite claiming the title) and were a good deal larger than what had previously been expected of a working plus-size model. That’s when the terms and conditions of what ‘plus size’ actually means got kind of muddled.
No longer an industry word, it became a blanket term for non-models – even obese women – to brand and empower themselves with. And good for them, but their use of the term created some sense of confusion.
Suddenly the fit, healthy, curvy professional models identifying with this term every day at work didn’t fit the bill, hence the misperceptions and cue Amy’s rage.
But, for reasons stated above – Amy is plus size. She wears a US 6 and so by fashion industry standards, that’s plus size.
But I hear your offence Aims, and I totally get it.
You see, in the real world, where human women live and not just models, the term ‘plus size’ doesn’t have best connotations anymore. It can sometimes be used interchangeably with ‘fat’ or ‘obese’ – which is not always empowering for everyone. And just generally, being boxed into any category because of your body isn’t nice – especially for young girls who struggle with being defined like this.
Generally fashion companies and magazines tend to operate on the old industry definition of plus size – while social media and the real world operate on the newer definition. And Amy’s beef with Glamour is an exact example of what a sh-t fight the term and its differing meanings can create.
This makes me think that the real issue here isn’t size, it’s the trend of labelling women based on their size. So wouldn’t it just be best for everyone if we ditch the labels entirely?
Well Melissa McCarthy, who is also featured in the same Glamour issue alongside Amy as an example of an inspirational woman, seems to think so.
The funny woman thinks body type labels aren’t good for some very legit reasons.
“Women come in all sizes,” McCarthy previously told Refinary29 in 2015. “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.”
The Ghostbusters star, who launched a clothing range for curves last year, also added: “I just don’t get why we always have to group everything into a good or bad, right or wrong category.
“I just think, if you’re going to make women’s clothing, make women’s clothing. Designers that put everyone in categories are over-complicating something that should be easy.”
When someone who is rational considers those points they’re usually like, ‘Ummmmm, well, duh, just stop saying plus size to describe women y’all!’
Well thankfully that change does look like it’s coming.
Slowly but surely we’re seeing models like Tara Lynn, Robyn Lawley, Ashley Graham and Candice Huffine all model in the mainstream for some gigantic brands – they have been braking barriers for years (and if you don’t know who they are you haven’t been paying attention).
Even 2015’s Pirelli calendar which featured many amazing women with different body types, including a semi-nude Schumer, was a sure fire sign that times are a changin’.
And thank god! Because this will get us closer to the real body revolution. When the world can acknowledge that bodies come in all sorts of shapes and sizes – some of them model sized, some of them not. And when that time comes we will surely welcome diversity in every issue of every magazine – not just one, once a year.
Note: Actual cyber handles aren’t used but are inspired by existing names.
