Clear plastic bin offers reply to everyday sexism

THE trainer, a lovely curvy woman in tight lycra whom I have expressly picked out from a line up in the gym, because she looks normal rather than someone who exists on egg white omelette and kale, assumes I have engaged her because I want to be thinner.

I tell her that actually I just want to be a bit stronger and faster and fitter, and if that includes thinner, then fine, but really, thinner is not my primary purpose here. I am not here because of any self-loathing, self-inflicted hen pecking, or concerns relating to does my bum look big in this. Just to up my fitness levels.

The poor trainer looks a bit blank. “But you will be so much happier when you start fitting into smaller dress sizes,” she ventures. But I AM HAPPY, I want to scream, except screaming that you are happy could be taken as a sign of unhappiness, which at this moment would be accurate, but not for the reasons she thinks.

I am unhappy that she thinks I am unhappy because I am (a) female and (b) a size L rather than an S. Obviously she means well, and the gym is not the place to get existential about happiness and its sources, but GOD ALMIGHTY how can a number on a garment tag (the size, not the price) equate with happiness if you are a woman? How did we let this happen? Here are magazine headlines, gathered by Laura Bates in her book Everyday Sexism: Gemma’s SOS To Josie: Help Me Get Thin; Colleen’s Body Panic; “I’m Terrified Of Getting Fat Again!”; “Kieran Won’t Fancy Me If I Keep Bloating!”; Kelly Comfort Eats As Danny Fails To Commit; and my personal favourite, Supermodel Kate Eats Pizza Shocker.

In June 2012, two editions of Now magazine hit the news agents in the same week — the two editions were alongside each other in Laura Bates’ local shop. The first edition had a picture of the model Abbey Clancy, with the caption “Oh No! Scary Skinnies! Girls Starving To Be Like Her”, and suggested that Clancy had become a pin-up for online pro-anorexia sites. The second edition, alongside the first one, was the Now Celebrity Diet Special, promising ‘Bikini Body Secrets … The Stars’ Diet & Fitness Tricks Revealed.” The model on the front cover of this diet special? Abbey Clancy.

Diversity is a wonderful thing. The more diverse we are culturally, racially, sexually, politically, the more interesting we are as a society. There’s just one massive area of diversity that is completely missing – body diversity. Not in real life – as walking down any street anywhere will show – but in entertainment and the media. Here is a solution, as tweeted to the Everyday Sexism Project. A clear plastic bin, full of discarded women’s magazines, with the following sign: “Shed Your Weight Problems Here”.