Women have been told that we should aspire to thinness

I was pleasantly surprised to see Tess Holliday on the cover of the October issue of Cosmopolitan.

Holliday, who is a size 26, has become an important voice in the fat acceptance movement, especially with her #EffYourBeautyStandards hashtag on Instagram. Holliday is not the first plus-size woman to be featured on the cover of a mainstream magazine, but having worked in fashion myself, I am familiar with the not-so-subtle decisions to choose ‘beauty shots’ when it comes to a final cover image; the focus being on a woman’s face rather than her body.

That is what makes Cosmo’s cover so revolutionary. Tess is in an emerald green swimsuit, inviting all of us to join with her in her obvious enjoyment of a body type that is all too often ridiculed.