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“The freaking pig in the freaking heels.”

zuzu

That’s what Rebecca Traister found herself sputtering when she went looking through Details’ website for an article about men who are frustrated with their stay-at-home wives and found this photo:

The story it illustrates?

“Why Fat Is Back In Hollywood.”

Yes, Details chose to illustrate a story about how Hollywood is moving away from the human lollipop look for actresses in favor of such lardasses as Kristin Davis and Gretchen Mol . . . with a photo of a pig. In heels.

That right there tells you all you need to know about how fucked up body image is here in America.

Read Rebecca’s whole piece.

43 thoughts on “The freaking pig in the freaking heels.”

  1. And after you read the article, read the comments section. The vast majority of them either castigate Traister for “obsessing” over men’s magazines in order to find someting offensive, or note that it’s patently obvious that men do NOT like fat chicks, so what the hell is she complaining about? I particularly enjoy the comment by Sheesh, who brings up the whole hip/waist ratio evolution thing that keeps getting batted around every couple of years.

  2. Oh gag me with a spoon. Yeah Catherine Zeta-Jones is a real pioneer for all us “curvy women” out there. Sheesh.

    The other day I was buying a bra at Nordstrom and saw a flyer for “Spanx” which are basically a modern day girdle, and there was a testimonial on there from Jessica Alba like, “I love Spanx, they smooth out all my lumps and bumps and makes me look really thin.”

    I busted out laughing and surprisingly had to explain myself to the cashier. Yeah Jessica, I feel bad for you and all your lumps and bumps.

    Okay and I know all that is beside the point. Way to go, Details. You’re so progressive and forward thinking talking about “fat” women in Hollywood, then you bust out with that graphic.

  3. I bet if you can see all of that picture, the pig is adorable. Why it’s the representation of gross is beyond me. (OK, I know the derivation of the imagery, but still.)

    Yes, I like talking about unimportant details.

  6. I didn’t read the Details article. All I needed was too see the high heels on the pig to realize that the root of the problem lies not in the women they profiled. The root of the problem is that the article is about women. No such article would ever be written about men even though there are fat men all over tv.

    I wish she hadn’t said “bigger is sexier.” Can’t she say “bigger is sexy”? “Sexy” implies sexy all on it’s own. “Sexier” implies better than something else. Can’t we encourage fat ladies to have good self image without disparaging skinny ladies?

    I assume you’ll be writing about this next.

  8. No such article would ever be written about men even though there are fat men all over tv.

    Because schlubs like Kevin James and Jim Belushi are entitled to skinny hot babes. If a female of equivalent size is allowed on TV, she’s the sexless sidekick to the skinny hot babe star.

  9. The linked Details article cites Mae West’s 38-24-38 proportions – which seem about as attainable as the Calista Flockhart look. Especially since 8 percent of women have hourglass figures. As for the rest of the examples, Rachel Weisz was pregnant when she won an Oscar and got a lot of press coverage and Liv Tyler actually had to lose weight for “The Lord of the Rings”, her most widely recognized role. Earlier this year Reclusive Leftist sounded off on some other “Kristin Davis fat” story.
    Furthermore, I sincerely hope that the very title “Why Fat Is Back in Hollywood” is only meant as an intriguing hook, because I doubt any of these women would even come close to being diagnosed medically overweight. Not to mention that most of them probably still have to diet and exercise to maintain their bodies and are probably not “plate lickers”.
    As for the disgusting pig graphic, now we know where assholes like Tucker Max get their ideas. Or vice versa.

  10. Can we say, “sexual politics of meat”? Jesus. And I’m not even talking about the damn pig.

    One could speculate that for those obsessed with not eating, even the boyfriend’s salami goes the way of the bread basket.

    I’m glad to know that not starving oneself is acceptable based on the fear that skinny chicks might be insufficiently enamored of the cock. So it’s okay to be “fat” (read “not anorexic”) because guys think it’s hot. Gee, that is just, like, so empowering.

    And forgive me for being an English major, but the article’s concluding phrase, “the shape of things to come,” immediately pissed me off. “Things.” Not “people” or “women” or “Hollywood actresses.” The cliche is no excuse. In case there was any doubt, the article is not praising women for breaking away from harmful, unrealistic standards of beauty; it’s merely assigning a greater value to a particular commodity, and that commodity is women’s bodies.

  11. Oh GAWD. For once, just once, I would like people to stop pushing a pre-packaged standard of beauty on my poor, exhausted little brain.

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  13. I’m almost exactly Mae West’s size and measurements, and I am slim. In what bizarro universe is Mae West considered even close to “fat”?

    It seems to me that the variance is more in body shape, not size. Anyone’s hips will look big when their waist is 14 inches smaller. So, woohoo for Hollywood: they’ve figured out again that there is actually a little bit of variance in women’s bodies. Somehow I’m disinclined to throw them a big fucking party.

  14. I’m just stunned they cited Evangeline Lilly as an example of a larger woman. Every time I see her on Lost I look at her little chicken-bone arms and worry for her.

  16. little cabbage – I hope I didn’t imply that there’s anything wrong with having a 38-24-38 figure. Picking out any one particular body type, whether it’s thin or curvy or whatever, is not usually attainable for most women, because we all have unique body types. Frankly, most of the women who are supposed to be “curvy” are very busty with the bodies that are still slender, but not particularly worked out or lean. And with Mae West, it was probably her “larger-than-life” personality that makes her seem bigger than she really was.

  19. You know what? I really want to know what the fuck your problem is. I don’t care if you don’t like fat chicks. But I’m guessing you’re pretty certain of your own attractions. Why is it that you pop up to tear down other men, who have different attractions than you? Why do you assume that they can’t possibly know what or who they are attracted to?

    You’ve pulled this shit on multiple blogs, most egregiously when you went after Chris Clarke on Pandagon, and his wife isn’t even fat (though you assumed she must be if he expressed the slightest attraction for fleshy bodies). What in the blue hell is your obsession with claiming that men who like fat chicks are either fetishists or liars just trying to get “liberal cred”?

  20. exangelena – oh, no, don’t worry! You didn’t offend me in the least. I know you weren’t implying that there’s anything wrong with having my figure – there’s nothing wrong with anyone having any figure, as long as they’re happy with themselves. I used to be somewhat bigger, and I was fine with it – my fairly recent weight loss is a byproduct of my desire to get into shape for ski season, not a goal in itself.

    It just seems that no matter what kind of figure we have, we women get crap about it from someone. My experience has been somewhat similar to Amanda’s at Pandagon: I’ve been called too fat and too skinny, each by more than one person, while at the exact same weight. What a screwed up society we live in where that’s par for the course.

  21. The few who do either brag about it for liberal cred or label themselves fetishists (or at least group themselves by that preference).

    Fuck yourself. I do none of those three things. I’ve had lovers from less than 100lbs to about 300; I have neither a preference for or against fat women; I am not a fetishist, and I don’t identify with any group defined by attraction to larger women’s bodies. File that crap under “bullshit assumptions and stupid theories that validate my prejudices,” along with Evo Psych and the Bell Curve.

  22. zuzu:

    I don’t care if you don’t like fat chicks.

    See? If I don’t come right out and say that my tastes are different from mainstream standards, I’m accused of being narrow-minded. Merely because I haven’t explicitly said “I don’t really consider a woman’s body her most important attribute” (which sounds really fucking pretentious, doesn’t it?) it’s assumed that not only do I see a woman’s weight first, but I’m an asshole about it.

    The most recent post on Pandagon has a plethora of men stating their largely unsolicited opinions of the bodies of women they see on the street, the women in the photos, their colleagues, and the mens own partners. Why did they give these usolicited opinions? Does it make the point they were ostensibly trying to make? Some of them don’t even overtly attempt to make a point. I’m sorry I don’t feel women exist for the benefit of men. I’m sorry I think women are entitled not to have their bodies judged at all.

    I don’t think having a preferred range that’s different from the range in the magazines is a bad thing. But I also don’t think it’s a good thing. I don’t think it puts a person on a higher plane or anything. I don’t feel compelled to say what my preferred range is, or what my preferences in anything are, because it doesn’t matter, because no one’s obliged to cater to my preferences or apologize for not, and because I don’t think my status as a liberal is tied to how ugly a scout from Maxim would think my girlfriend is.

    And I think if someone does have a preferred range that’s different from the range in the magazines, that’s not weird, or freaky, or pathetic, or even, really, worth mentioning except in immediately relevant contexts. I am genuinely puzzled by every man’s need to say “my partner’s even bigger than that!” when, really, no one asked.

    Thomas:

    “The few who do either brag about it for liberal cred or label themselves fetishists (or at least group themselves by that preference).”

    Fuck yourself. I do none of those three things. I’ve had lovers from less than 100lbs to about 300

    Wow, that was fast. Why are you telling me this, then?

    And I don’t know what the fuck everyone else’s problem is. I don’t see Natalia or exangelena for making substantially the same point.

  23. Someone explain to me the difference between “no fat chicks” and “fat chicks only.” There clearly is one, and I’m missing it.

  24. …Have you never read one of these discussions before, or what? You said that desire for larger women–not openly acknowledged desire, mind, or preference for them above any other body type–was very rare, and that men who do feel that way are all fetishists. So did the Salon article: it created a spectrum of female body types that ranged from “really skinny” to “slightly less skinny.” The natural reaction is defensiveness; the natural reaction is refuting that inaccuracy with information that disproves it.

    You said that men who like large women–of which Thomas is one–brag about their preference, label themselves fetishists, or self-identify as fat-lovers. In that context, Thomas saying, “Well, I’m one of those men, and I don’t do that,” doesn’t qualify as bragging about his preference. If someone came onto a thread about transsexuals and said, “All people who sleep with transsexuals either brag about it for liberal cred or label themselves fetishists (or at least group themselves by that preference),” I wouldn’t see anything transphobic or self-aggrandizing about a commenter who subsequently said, “Excuse me? I sleep with transpeople and I don’t describe myself as a fetishist or refer to myself as transsensual.”

    Natalia and exangelena might have said things similar to what you meant to say, but their comments weren’t remotely similar to yours.

  25. Natalia’s comment:

    Oh GAWD. For once, just once, I would like people to stop pushing a pre-packaged standard of beauty on my poor, exhausted little brain.

    Your’s:

    Men don’t like fat chicks, Blitzgal. The few who do either brag about it for liberal cred or label themselves fetishists (or at least group themselves by that preference).

    There is no comparison whatsoever.

  26. Merely because I haven’t explicitly said “I don’t really consider a woman’s body her most important attribute” (which sounds really fucking pretentious, doesn’t it?) it’s assumed that not only do I see a woman’s weight first, but I’m an asshole about it.

    Can’t imagine why I’d think you were an asshole about it when you say things like this:

    Men don’t like fat chicks, Blitzgal. The few who do either brag about it for liberal cred or label themselves fetishists (or at least group themselves by that preference).

    Sure looks like you think a woman’s weight is, in fact, so important that anything over some undefined norm means that NO man (because of course you can speak for ALL men) like them. Unless, of course, that man is some kind of freak or liar.

    I’m sorry I think women are entitled not to have their bodies judged at all.

    And yet you think any woman’s body that doesn’t conform to the norm is so repulsive that no man possibly finds that attractive. So how is that not judging their bodies?

    You also obviously do not grasp that while it would be a nice ideal if women were not judged by our bodies, as a matter of fact, we are. We’re also sexual beings, and we want to be desired. If the prevailing cultural messages tell us that only skeletal women need apply for being sexually attractive, or when women who are well under average weight are presented as pigs, that sends all kinds of dangerous messages that contribute to eating disorders.

    It’s actually helpful, then, when men we respect offer opinions that they are attracted to the kinds of bodies *we* have, and thus affirm that we’re not freaks, and that there’s nothing wrong with us.

    And then some asshole like you, imagining yourself a white knight rescuing us from objectification, says that yes, there IS something wrong with us, because no sane man really wants THAT.

  27. What the hell is “fat” anyway? As little cabbage said at #20, she’s been called too fat and too skinny, without gaining or dropping extreme amounts of weight. The same thing has happened to me and no doubt countless other people. Karen Elson, a runway model, has been told she’s too fat, although she’s much, much thinner than the average British woman and probably has half the BMI of a medically obese person.

  28. I should mention here that Mae West was actually quite short, maybe five feet tall if that. She wore big shoes and high hats.

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  32. What the hell is “fat” anyway? As little cabbage said at #20, she’s been called too fat and too skinny, without gaining or dropping extreme amounts of weight.

    I’ve been called a “fat pig” and a “skeletor” based on the same set of online photos. And I’m pretty much in the middle — neither notably fat nor notably skinny. It really is in the eye of the beholder.

  33. I don’t endorse using the tem “fetishist” or “fat admirer” to describe men who have one arbitrary standard as opposed to another one. I think it would be great if men liked fat chicks, and better still if men didn’t consider these arbitrary preferences important.

    If a magazine had a bunch of pictures of strawberry-haired celebrities and said “it’s okay to be a redhead! You don’t have to be blond!” and someone blogged about that, and in the comments a bunch of guys said “my wife/girlfriend has redder hair than that!” and another bunch said “all those women are blond!” I’d think all those commenters were missing the point too.

    you think any woman’s body that doesn’t conform to the norm is so repulsive that no man possibly finds that attractive.

    I think we as a society label men who do, if not mock them outright. I don’t approve of this.

    You keep bringing up my alleged preferences, which I haven’t said anything about because they’re, well, mine, and I don’t have the final say in which women are attractive and which aren’t other than to me. If I did, I assure you men’s magazines would look different. I can’t tell men to stop preferring thin, sometimes preternaturally thin women or to stop having unrealistic ideas about what women should look like.

    I don’t doubt the sincerity of men who say “my girlfriend is bigger than Kristin Davis” — I’m sure she is. I don’t know how it’s relevant to the issue at hand*, and so I can only conclude he’s trying to impress me with how indifferent to a woman’s size he is. If so, it doesn’t work.

    *That being that we as a society need to stop equating “beautiful” with “thin” or, really, any other size.

  34. I don’t endorse using the tem “fetishist” or “fat admirer” to describe men who have one arbitrary standard as opposed to another one. I think it would be great if men liked fat chicks, and better still if men didn’t consider these arbitrary preferences important.

    And yet you’re calling men who like fat chicks fetishists. And also not-men, because you’ve stated quite flatly that men don’t like fat chicks.

    Why don’t you stick to what you know and not try to speak for all men?

  36. NOOO! And I’d like to bitch about hydrocut commericals. At 110 I looked like the before bikini model. That’s just wrong! Why? Because I wasn’t really fat! (I lost some weight but I wasn’t fat at my slightly larger size) But like I felt insecure seeing that, so it was like omg, wtf. Ok, this post doesn’t make any sense, but try to pretend it does.

  37. How is it that we live so close and read so many of the same blogs have such wildly divergent observations of the people around us? You really don’t see the notion of “fat fetishism” anywhere but in my comments? you really don’t see men disdaining women larger than a size 6 and the men who find them attractive?

    You really don’t see men (other than, ostensibly, me) taking it upon themselves to determine which women are the right weight and which are not?

  38. Amber, I saw that last night, and I was like, “WTF?”

    My husband asked what “zaftig” meant, and I told him, and he was like, “WTF?” Fucking lame. Just lame.

  39. I don’t endorse using the tem “fetishist” or “fat admirer” to describe men who have one arbitrary standard as opposed to another one. I think it would be great if men liked fat chicks, and better still if men didn’t consider these arbitrary preferences important.

    You (a) need to start using more careful language to distinguish between fetishization, specific preference, and inclusive preference and (b) need to stop talking about these things as though they’re not controversial.

    How is it that we live so close and read so many of the same blogs have such wildly divergent observations of the people around us? You really don’t see the notion of “fat fetishism” anywhere but in my comments? you really don’t see men disdaining women larger than a size 6 and the men who find them attractive?

    You really don’t see men (other than, ostensibly, me) taking it upon themselves to determine which women are the right weight and which are not?

    Absolutely. But that’s not what you said.

  40. Hershele, I’ve experienced fat fetishism up close and personal. As in, I’ve been pursued by them.

    And you clearly don’t understand the distinction between a guy who likes a little meat on a woman’s bones and a fat fetishist.

    Also, if you think that size 6 is fat, you really have a problem.

    You really don’t see men (other than, ostensibly, me) taking it upon themselves to determine which women are the right weight and which are not?

    Your problem is that you are stating flatly that men who say that they like fat women are either sick fucks or liars. Because you are purporting to know what other men find attractive. Do you not get that this is extremely offensive? Do you not get that this is the very same thing as saying that some women are the right weight (and therefore, men who desire them are not sick fucks or liars) and some are not (and therefore the men who desire them ARE sick fucks and liars).

  41. How is it that we live so close and read so many of the same blogs have such wildly divergent observations of the people around us?

    I dunno. Do you just never get out of the white parts of Brooklyn?

  42. “Hershele” pushed pretty much the same line on Pandagon a few months back, except with the “older than 22 equals ugly” notion tacked on.

    I see he hasn’t gotten any less stupid.

  43. If a magazine had a bunch of pictures of strawberry-haired celebrities and said “it’s okay to be a redhead! You don’t have to be blond!” and someone blogged about that, and in the comments a bunch of guys said “my wife/girlfriend has redder hair than that!” and another bunch said “all those women are blond!” I’d think all those commenters were missing the point too.

    Wait, where the fuck has anyone done that? I haven’t seen anyone on here falling over themselves for a bit of “my girlfriend’s ass is bigger than that, so there” one upmanship. I have seen guys on here state flatly that this article doesn’t square with their desire, and the range of size and shapes of women they find attractive. As zuzu’s explained, that’s useful and valuable.

    I honestly don’t know what you’re on about. Your defensive ramblings tend to contradict your first comments, which you still haven’t explained.

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