Posted by Lou. The time is 1.55pm here in London, UK.
Recently in the UK there have been public outcries over things perceived as being bigoted: a dancer on Strictly Come Dancing received accusations of racism after (in jest) calling his dance partner a "paki", and Danni Minogue found herself at the centre of (incorrect) homophobia accusations after a badly made attempt at repartee with a contestant on X Factor. To a certain extent this is great - there should be an outcry when comments/ attitudes deemed unacceptable by society are broadcast or made by public figures.
So I was left rather surprised when X Factor host Dermot made a blatantly fattist comment to a contestant, leaving me and my flatmate with our mouths literally hanging open in shock, but without even prompting a trickle of controversy. In fact, people seemed to take his "you used to be quite big but now you look really cool" as a perfectly okay thing to say (because people who are even slightly fat are ugly). It once again demonstrated the total double-standard in society that says it's okay to position fat as ugly/ lazy/ bad, whilst frowning upon other forms of bigotry.
Anyway, really I just wanted to highlight this excellent piece about it on BBC today.
Yikes. That's pretty insidious.
I read an interesting post yesterday on this Melbourne woman's blog:
Fatshion: I talk plus size fashion on TV!.
She is cracking into the industry, working as a stylist and doesn't often directly address issues of size - but it is always interesting when she does.
(Also, there are some gorgeous underwater fashion editorial shots of plus size model Crystal Renn, who has managed to 'stay cool' despite her curves! Who would have thought!)