The size 0 myth

This was taken from dynamist.com


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THE SIZE 0 MYTH: I recently went shopping for a denim skirt. The last such skirt I owned was an A-line number that fit quite tightly at the waist. That was 20 years ago, when I was 15 pounds lighter and my waist was at least a half-inch smaller. That skirt was a size 8. On my recent shopping trip, I tried on three denim skirts at the Gap—all size 6, all at least three inches too big in the waist, and none particularly tight in the hips. The only one that didn't look like a small tent was constructed so it would be difficult to alter. I went home skirtless.

Why, you may ask, am I telling this? Because there is a myth out there in feminist popcultureland, the myth of "size 0." The claim is that fashion magazines, evil corporations, and Calista Flockhart are foisting an unreasonably skinny ideal on American women. This ideal is supposed to be historically unprecedented. Exhibit A is the spread of size 0 clothes. Exhibit B is Marilyn Monroe.

"In the l950's and 60's the archetypal femme fatale was Marilyn Monroe. Marilyn wore a size l2. She had a tummy, thighs, soft neck and arms. She was a far cry from the emaciated high fashion waif look created by designer Calvin Klein in the form of his favorite model Kate Moss who wore a size 0," opine psychologists Candace De Puy and Dana Dovitch on the Feminista.com site. "What happened to create this shift in female beauty? Why have women gone from accepting a curvaceous form to the familiar dieting, exercising, lipo-suctioning and obsessing over every wrinkle and gray hair?"

The Marilyn Monroe story is complete nonsense, though it's a staple of feel-good feminism. Marilyn's size 12 bore no resemblance to the size 12 you'll find in today's stores. According to the invaluable Urban Legends website (and other sources), Monroe's waist ranged from 22 to 23 inches and her hips were 35 to 36 inches. She was 5', 5 ½" tall. No, Marilyn wasn't as willowy as Kate Moss, nor was she as muscular as today's gym-toned ideal. She was shaped like a thin, wasp-waisted woman with breast implants. The only thing large about Monroe was her bustline. Nor was Marilyn alone. Peruse copies of Vogue from the 1950s, and you'll find models with slim hips and tiny waists worthy of Scarlett O'Hara. (Judging from my mother's wedding gown, rib cages were impossibly small in those days too.)

The myth of size 0 will probably endure, because it makes America's increasingly plump women feel better. "No matter who's buying this stuff, the mere presence of size zero and beyond plays havoc with the weight-conscious woman's psyche," writes Janet Colwell in an unusually rational discussion of the subject, published in the San Francisco Business Times. "There's just something about knowing that the slender size-eighter is four to five rungs up the size ladder and, in Bebe's and Gap's cases, above the mean. However, it's reassuring to find some explanation—other than an explosion of very thin people—for the influx of small sizes."

Her reporting says the reason is an expansion of choice in both directions. Mine says that size 0 is what used to be known as size 4 (or maybe size 6). On average, American women are getting fatter, and profit-maximizing companies know better than to confront their customers with the facts. Having put on a bit of weight since my college days, when I was not exactly svelte, I should be up to a 12 by now. Instead I'm buying size 6 clothes, and having a tailor take them in. But some women still need a "real" size 6 or a real size 2. Hence, the rise of size 0. Coming soon: negative numbers.

For an amusing look at zaftig America, check out Michael Kelly's column here. Mike Fumento's authoritative, if sometimes mean, book on the subject is Fat of the Land. My New York Times column here looked at an economic explanation for our increasing girth. [Posted 8/29.]