The bigger the figure...

If you are evil to black people, you’re racist, if you’re nasty to women then, your sexist, if your against lesbians your homophobic, heck, if you mistreat the aged, you are ageist; so why is "fattism" seen by many as an acceptable prejudice? I was going to write this post yesterday, but my brain was like mush by the time I got home from work, therefore the idiot box (as a good friend of mine would call it) triumphed over my rather ready soap box.

You may have heard or read in the media yesterday Karl Lagerfeld’s comment about Adele. The whole statement was “I prefer Adele and Florence Welch. But as a modern singer she is not bad. The thing at the moment is Adele. She is a little too fat, but she has a beautiful face and a divine voice. Lana del Rey is not bad at all. She looks very much like a modern-time singer. In her photos she is beautiful. Is she a construct with all her implants? She's not alone with implants”. So was the headline ‘Lagerfield approves of Lana’s implants’? Hell no. The headlines were ‘Adele is a little too fat’. *drags soapbox into centre of room, picks up laptop and steps up*

When I initially heard the headline, I went through two thought processes

1)      Who the hell is Karl Lagerfeld?

2)      What right does this Karl Lagerfeld have to make such a statement?

I was outraged at yet another fashion-faux-pas, where the catwalk condemns the curve once again. I mean, why did he even feel the need to point out her figure? Which by the way is lovely. If he is her biggest admirer, then why make such a callous comment in the first place? Especially as his latest statement admitted ‘I know how it feels when the press is mean to you in regards to your appearance’. In his apology he was quoted to say ‘She is my favourite singer and I am a great admirer of her. Adele is a beautiful girl. She is the best. And I can't wait for her next CD’. So why the hell, didn’t he just say that in the first place? If he had said that initially, he could have sounded like he actually meant it, rather than is saying it to save face.

I have had another train of thought since hearing that headline over 24 hours ago. Yes, he was stupid, insensitive and callous for making such a comment in the first place, and all who know me, know that normally that is reason alone for castration, however, it was not him, who plastered the insult over the radiowaves, newspapers and internet. No, that was the media, because for some reason, known only to the members of the press, they felt it perfectly acceptable to hurt someone further for the sake of selling their story.

Why do people believe it is ok to make fun of fat people? If you Google the words ‘fat’ and ‘funny’, Google finds 538,000,000 results. It brings up ‘funny’ fat people pictures, youtube videos that contain atleast three minutes of ‘funny fat people’ photo’s, and endless jokes about fat kids and fat momma’s, and yet, that type of prejudice is socially acceptable.

During my school days, I was a fat kid. I had people laugh about my size. After a while, I began to think that I had nothing to offer the world, because I carried extra padding... but, you know what? That’s b******s (yes eloquently put I know). During my teenage years, I became Nu. I was confident in my curves, I had far more male attention (for the right reasons) than my skinny friends and I began to realise that actually, I liked who I was. I was proud to be myself. This is why, today, I was pleased to read Adele’s response, when the headline retort was 'I represent the majority of women and I'm very proud of that'.

Adele is talented, funny and beautiful, like many other curvy women of the world. You see, people who do not fit the social acceptance mould, are forced to evolve their personalities, because, they can’t just smile and twiddle their hair as they gain free entry into a nightclub, they don’t have men rushing to help them with their suitcase on the tube, they have to hold their own in a world of more beautiful people, and regularly have to justify their position in the world. Adele was quoted to say ‘I’d rather weigh a ton and make an amazing album then look like Nicole Richie and do a shit album. My aim in life is never to be skinny.” As much as I love her for saying this, part of me feels like she is saying it, because she has to justify her shape. She is gorgeous. No justification required.

Ok, look at these two women - One woman is slated in the media, the other one is paid a fortune to reinforce a negative body connotation.

If you had these two woman in the street, you could say that both women had beautiful faces, but you must admit that one body would cause more commotion, one body would provide teenagers with a reason to smirk, and allow shop assistants the opportunity to look up and down smugly, at the clearly disillusioned individual who believes she could ever wear their clothing.  

I , like Adele, have a curve to me, and I love it. I love my bust line, I love my hips, I love my silhouette on a Friday night. I am good at my day job, and if someone wants to say I’m doing a good job, I wouldn’t expect it to be barbed with a comment about my figure, so Mr Lagerfeld, think it through next time, that will save you being a villain, it will save Adele having to justify herself, and it will allow me to return to the idiot box.

...But hey, I guess he is a man after all.

P.S Not sexist, ironic!