The new normal

On August 7, 2007, Science Daily captioned an article, Fat is the new normal. The article led with the statement, According to a new study, American women have gained weight as it has become more socially acceptable to carry a few extra pounds. The article explains that as more people carry more weight, our perception of normal changes and we begin to carry more weight as well. They locate an earlier study that reported that 87 percent of Americans, including 48 percent of obese Americans, believe their body weight falls in the socially acceptable rank.

In 1994, the average woman said she weighed 147 pounds but wanted to weigh 132 pounds; in 2002 the average woman weighed 153 pounds but wanted the scale to register 135 pounds. That even women’s desired weight has increased suggests that there is less social pressure to lose weight. Today, the average woman weighs 163. No figures are currently available for the average. wanted weight of women in the last five years.

There could be a slimy cycle effect starting or already in progress, with each new belt notch being accepted by the masses giving unspoken go-ahead for those who take the profit to keep on winning, and so they least feel the need to resist joining.

According to data from the 2001-2004 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 33.2 percent of American women over the age of twenty are classified as obese. That’s more than one in three women. How can this not affect what we consider normal?

Obesity, once defined as twenty percent above normal weight, has been redefined as thirty percent overweight. The sizes of the dresses get bigger but the numbers stay the same. If you used to wear a size 12 and have gained 15 to 20 pounds, the new 12 is likely to still fit; If you used to wear a size 12 and have not gained weight, you may be delighted to go to the department store and find that you are now buying a size 8 or 10. Mannequins are getting bigger, and mannequins are no longer. they are more A rarity. For the first time in the history of its creation, junior clothing is now available in plus sizes.

Overweight actors and reporters, who were once a kind of media oxymoron, are now common. In fact, there is a new television show this year that focuses on a family whose members are almost all obese, if not morbidly obese.

Clothing stores have a variety of sizes, but stock the sizes that are most common for your particular area. When I was wearing a size 18, I could never buy clearance sales as my size had always disappeared, except for the most disastrous shopper mistakes and ugly or poorly cut items. I will never forget that I was never able to order from the Spiegel catalog, because its large size was a 10-12. Even plus size stores operate this way: if you wear an 18/20 or a 26-28, you’re often out of luck soon after the new lines come in.

The stores are now over 18 years old, and most stores are up to 20 in size in their regular misses size areas. Increasingly, I find that non-specialty clothing stores have plus-size departments (now more often called Women’s sizes). All of this supports the notion that fat is moving toward the norm.

According to a recent study by research firm Mintel, nearly $ 32 billion was spent on plus size clothing in 2005. Growth in the plus size clothing market in the past five years has exceeded 50 percent.

Anyone who was obese thirty years ago can claim that plus size clothing used to be black, navy, dark gray or brown pants and nasty stripes, polka dots or floral tops. You can now find almost any style in 20-36, even those that probably should never be worn by anyone over a size 10.

The obese have screamed fashion discrimination for thirty years. It is not that the industry has suddenly decided to try to rectify this situation out of compassion for those of us who had no choice but to go to work as wallpaper and curtains; it is simply a matter of meeting the needs of the new normal and doing it with an extra size gain.

Contains excerpts from The Big, Bad, O: the Brutality of Obesity by Francine Hemway © 2007

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