Fat Girls Wear Sweatpants Too

I don't know if anyone else has paid much attention to this, but seems like lately some media chatter has surfaced about clothiers getting picky about who wears their clothes.

Abercrombie & Fitch was in hot water earlier this year and I don't even have the energy to link to the articles or interviews.  They make me throw up in my mouth.  Essentially the head honcho stands behind their brand's desire to only have skinny, attractive, "certain looking", people wearing their clothes.  They've been under fire for years over hiring practices, and to be honest, I've NEVER SHOPPED their brand.  I accidentally bought a pair of stirrup pants (!) of theirs about 18 years ago at Goodwill.

I think the only good PR move they've made was offering to pay that Jersey Shore hooligan to STOP wearing their clothes.

I don't want to seem like I'm singling them out.  I have never been much of a label junkie, refusing to advertise for free, which is in stark contrast with my other half, who prefers to dress like a 17 year old boy.  The two of us in a store together rarely happens, is painful when it does, and contains conversations typically heard between mothers and their teenage sons, i.e. "you're NOT getting that, isn't that a GANG thing??  It smells like marijuana in here.  Let's GO."

More recently a high end workout/yoga/athletic line that I can't pronounce got blasted too, for not carrying "plus size" clothing (size 12 is rare in stores and gets pushed in piles to the back).  Their defense: bigger clothes take more fabric to make and thus cut into their profit margin.

Uh. No.  This is a company who is charging an ABSURD amount of money for YOGA PANTS.  Although, to be fair, they may be very good quality yoga pants, and I may be jealous and I'd like a pair but I think that $90 is a lot for a pair of sweatpants.  I kvetched for MONTHS before spending $80 on a pair of jeans which did turn out to be the best pants investment ever.

But here's the real reason I think companies, and not just THIS company aren't offering extended sizes: their designers don't possess the talent.  MOST designers have been trained to dress a mannequin and models that do not represent the average sizing of women.  When they attempt to translate their designs to the bigger sizes, something gets lost.  The original designs are not suited for bigger sizes and they end up looking bad and fitting horribly.  These designers don't know how to dress anything with a curve.  So they just DON'T.  It's easier.

I think instead of demanding that these companies produce or cater to large sizes, women should seek out and support those designers and companies who bother to make quality designs that flatter and support them.

And before anyone gets sassy with me and says I'm not fat enough to have a dog in this fight (because I've heard that before), I've struggled plenty just not having things fit right.  I have a weird shape.  I know that I'm not the only person who doesn't really find shopping to be fun, but rather daunting and depressing, a hunting trip that turns out to be a waste of time almost every time.  And yet my poor closet yearns for some new additions.

What I really need is some Stacey London and that $5,000 Visa where you KNOW they're having someone do all the alterations on those clothes before their reveal.  But what I don't need is that creepy two weeks worth of spy-footage that comes before it.  Nothankyou.

I just think that gals of all shapes and sizes ought to have options available that don't make them feel bad about themselves, that don't tell them "you have to be at least THIS skinny to wear our yoga pants" or "you have to be at least THIS pretty to wear our shirt from the catalog where our models wear no shirts at all".

I'm just sorry that the people we're buying our clothes from are treating us like a shitty boyfriend who tells us we're fat and ugly and nobody's going to love us, and we keep going back for more because we just want so badly for them to like us and to fit in with the popular kids.....