V Magazine's "Size Issue" and the Greater Good: More Related Than Even They Would Think

The United States, like most other nations, is a land of infinite problems that endure stubbornly for centuries only to be ridden of after the forcible spilling of several thousand gallons of blood. What separates our nation from others, however, is the assertion that our many problems -- in addition to our grotesqueries, vulgarities and flat out mistakes -- are actually assets, the kind of assets that are expected to be flaunted by all citizens as a badge of perfection, lest they want to be assumed to be openly requesting an extended prision sentence for treason. One of these "assets," while not the most socially pressing, is undoubtedly the most annoying to any person of measured sensibility.

Like the War on Drugs, the War on Fat exists for no more complex a reason than to enable the vanity, hatred and sadism of a people who have appointed themselves the keepers of what is assumed to be an objective standard of physical appearence with little regard for people's specific body construction or ability to make individual choices, however stupid or unattractive. In essence, there are those who would be contented to have the poor die, as the result of neglected socio-economic matters, so long as their personal tastes are upheld as the ultimate tastes.

Bandying about the term "obesity," these people inflict a certain violence against those of a certain high amount of pounds in the name of public health while actually carrying with them a Straussian belief to meet utopian ends. These non-obese people have a view on body image that makes the grand assumption that their appearence is and always has been the standard by which people in all cultures and civilizations have held themselves in comparison to and lived by, with total disregard for historical record. (In pre- as well as post-Latinized South America, curved women were considered more desirable for their assumed fertility and ability to bare as many children as needed -- read: too many -- and that Europeans in centuries past considered anyone thin and tan -- i.e. underfed outdoor laborers -- to be undesirable peasents.) They take this view and, while feigning concern for "heffer health," seek to mold society into a certain appearence at which the most acceptable extreme extends no further than Kim Kardashian. Anyone with a Kelly Clarkson body type or heavier would be considered henceforth a malignancy on the new order. The allure of the attractive person has had the public consistently transfixed for some time, in league with so tyrannical a notion, and it seems as if it has been only recently that the public has been willing to hear reasoned dissent on the matter.

The "plus-size" model was something of novelty for as long as the concept has existed in this culture, seemingly doomed either to the perpetually frumpy world of big and tall bargain bins or the faux sensitive insipid rich kid irony of Generation X. They were elevated somewhat being displayed in undergarmet ads in upscale malls, however these had a very politically correct Lifetime Channel patronization to them -- the ones I saw in Short Hills some years ago included chubby women stricken with an uncontrollable elementary school giddiness, the fat female equviliant, it seems, of jolliness -- and they were only to be laughed at by their chief tyrants. Only recently has the plus-size model been given a more respectful and artful treatment, in our fashion magazines no less.

America's most popular fashion magazines are the arbiters of the tyranny of beauty, if Elle and Vogue are anything to go by, but their European counterparts, while no less entrenched in elitism, are far more expansive in their creativity and rather than having it rub off onto their American counterparts it has become more fitting for the more independent-minded fashion magazines of this nation to go in all manner of radical directions pioneered by the Euros. V magazine has a particularly indimidating presence on magazine racks, and they have made an effort to challenge more readers and passers-by with their recent spread composed entirely of plus-size models rendered in such a manner as to be indistinguishable from that of the cover of Roxy Music's Country Life.

Strange, ins't it, how there are no hints of the repulsive, the grotesque or the lumpy? Notice, too, how they come off as objects of style and sexuality as opposed to objects of derision and disgust. Some have voiced misgivings in regards to the approach to the spread, as this blogger has, insisting that the retouching reaches an unhappy medium between the plus-size aspect and model aspect. An astute observation, no doubt, about a dynamic that will need to be experimented with over time as attempts become more frequent, though it is my belief that the very use of retouching rings of equality. Though they are indeed fat, we should not forgot that they are still models who are as all too familiar with the rigors of their occupation as "normal" models are. The glamor treatment is, as Sen. John C. Calhoun would put it, a "positive good" for the fashion industry and for America, proving that there is nothing oxymoronic about a hot fatty and could very well lead to having the graceless term "plus-size" eviscerated from our lexicon entirely.

With the beautiful people's dreams of genocide averted, it would seem that Hell is also paved with snobby intentions as well as good intentions. For that we owe V no insignificant amount of thanks.