France normally like their models between a UK size 4 and a size 6 especially for couture, Japan are pretty much the same so i was told from someone in the industry, anything over a size 6 is slated to hell, its hysterical when you see a model with breasts because you can usually work out pretty easily its been a boob job as it doesnt take a genius to work out its extremely rare for a girl whos a size 4 or 6 to have breasts.
The BMI thing wouldnt affect the modelling agencies/fashion industries at all.
They dont care, its basically an art to them and you cant really penalise designers for having a preference even though it does send out the wrong message to certain groups. I will also add not all girls who are a size 6 or are skinny have an eating disorder or are unhealthy even if some of them do happen to be underweight on the BMI scale, ive also encountered girls who are extremely thin but shockingly had the correct BMI, my knowledge and experience of the BMI system is that doesnt really count for much in the scale of things as it doesnt take enough factors into account even though it helps in some areas, and ive also found it to be a cause of misery for alot of people who have been made to feel like shit or whatever because they dont fit on the correct place, even when they have been healthy, happy and the like.
As for the modelling agencies alot of their attitudes do disgust me, even some of the ones that have said in their defense in girls mags that they dont really hire the anorexic looking girls, yet i personally have encountered the same agencies who have said that girls who were a size 8 looked fat (which appauled me as id seen some of these so called fat girls and they looked like pretty thin size 8s to me) apparently they were looking for thinner girls. Hypocritical PR bs, saying one thing to please people debating about eating disorders, bad body image etc, then going doing and saying the opposite behind the scenes.
I had some experiences a while back with modelling agency scouts for well known agencies who had approached me themselves whilst out trying to get me to go to castings etc, and it was a rather degrading experience even talking to them without going to a casting etc and im a comfortable person when it comes to my body size etc, they analyse every inch of you. They basically wanted me because of my tiny frame (im not the correct BMI may i add) and i made it clear that as much as i was into fashion and the easy money did sound great, i wasnt that desperate since the modelling side of things did not interest me one bit and gave my reasons why, one of which being i found it extremely shallow, id rather do something more worthwhile with my life and i didnt want to be wrongly associated with having an eating disorder and encouraging that in other young girls (as too many thin girls wrongly get the blame of that), especially since so many people wrongly class all thin girls the same without realising theres a difference between natural and unnatural and that its not really their faults that they are naturally thin and that others have insecurities or their own issues.
Even though three of those agencies offered me opportunities one of them also said i may have needed to loose a few inches off my hips, i was a size 6 fucksake, the smallest size you can get in the UK even then the size 6s here sometimes arent proper size 6s which is why i shop in designer stores and i made it quite clear what i thought of that suggestion. So as much as i prefer thin models on the catwalk etc that doesnt mean i agree with or condone the way these girls are scrutinised and chosen, and it doesnt mean that im happy with the fact that there are alot of girls in the industry who are not naturally thin due to already having body image issues/eating disorders or who are made that way by force via the pressures of the industry which then has them blamed for sending out the wrong messages when in reality they are just doing a job which they get payed bloody well for.
The fashion industry can be grotesque, i admit the unfortunate fact is thin models do wear the clothes better, they are indeed better clothes horses and sell the clothes to the right buyers/stores etc. However i will always maintain theres natural or healthy looking thin, then there is unnatural or gaunt, emaciated, unhealthy thin, then you could also take the lifestyle and state of the mind of the individual to take into account. There needs to be more emphasis on the difference between healthy and unhealthy, natural and unnatural in relation to thin girls.
Ive found its usually the actual weight itself that confuses and fucks up girls more than the actual dress size when it comes to a body image eating disorder, ie how heavy they are more than how thin they are even though the two can corelate. (from my experience working with girls/patients with eatingdisorders anyways) they dont understand that you can be thin without weighing 4 stone and that you can be what is considered an average size and not be very heavy or look fat. (marilyn monroe is a good example of that, since some would consider her fat, i think i even read somewhere she would have been considered overweight for her BMI however eitherway she pulled her figure off well)
May i also add that from my experience from doing work in a clinic for eating disorders and doing my other counselling work, a big proportion of eating disorders arent really related to the thin/fat, body image issue that alot of people wrongly assume anyways, even though with the surge of celebrity mags in the last few years i have seen the cases rise in relation to body image eating disorders/issues. However it may surprise you but more with typical celeb news magazines rather than high fashion magazines. I never completely understood why until my mum started buying those mags a while back and i had a look for myself, where as fashion mags dont debate size they just show clothes, adds, makeup tips etc, fashion tips for various sizes etc, these celebrity mags have page after page of whos thin, whos fat, whos hot, whos not, then one week you have an anorexic looking celeb who is considered vile and too thin (some of these mags actually have a rating factor or a stamp for hot or not), then next week the same celeb is considered the perfect body, an icon and fabulous, then in another sister mag theyre considered vile again, and someone else who was consider vile is now hot. They go back and forth about weither a person is thin or fat that particular week or pretty or ugly, well dressed or not etc etc.
So i have found myself agreeing with the consensus that the celebrity world/celeb mags are to blame more than the fashion world/fashion mags even though they have left their mark and i can see why.
Some of the women here may have read the type of magazines im referring to, in the style of reveal, new, closer etc, who change their opinions views on whats fat or thin etc like the weather.
Someone mentioned smokers who have sued/sue for smoking related illnesses, gosh thats one thing that makes me puke, these sad bastards that cant take responsibility for their own actions. Sometimes we need to realise that when we do certain things, we choose to do them, some are more aware of all the consequences than others, but its still our decision weither we do it or not, so blaming other people and suing them is tedious. Especially if you end up with cancer etc because you decided to puff 40 a day. Ha fucking ha i say, actions have consequences, if you choose to do something thats your choice but dont blame other people for it because things caught up with you or you made a mistake. There are people who have died or are dying with illnesses no fault of their own who dont whinge or look for someone to blame when they would be more entitled too.
