Recently, there has been a movement on social media trying to change the way plus sized models are viewed. #DropthePlus is to get the fashion industry and media to stop calling some models plus sized. It started with Australian model Stefania Ferrario who wanted to drop the term plus size. She made her proclamation on Instagram. In the caption she says that she is a model and does not feel empowered by the term “plus sized” model. The picture she posted that goes along with the caption is her naked. She has her hands over her breasts and nude colored underwear. On her stomach she has written “I AM A MODEL.”
Ferrario has join forces with Ajay Rochester, who is the host of Australia’s “Biggest Loser.” The point of this campaign is to not bring attention to women’s sizes. The motivation for starting the campaign was because Rochester felt making a distinction between the different sizes was dangerous. Buzzfeed quote’s Rochester’s blog saying that “Describing a beautiful, healthy, fit woman as ‘plus’ shows that [bigger women] are not fully accepted in the fashion industry and subconsciously tells these girls they will never be enough unless they shrink to fit the mold.”
The women bring up an issue that has been a part of the fashion industry that it has received some criticism., Marie Southard Ospina a plus-sized blogger told Buzzfeed “fails to account for the thousands of women who have been inspired and empowered by movements in size acceptance.” Though Ospina feel as though this campaign disregards ll the hard work to make plus-size accepted in the fashion world, this campaign could just be the next step. Now that “plus sized” models have been accepted in the fashion industry now there can be no distinction.
A lot of people have embraced this new movement on social media. With pictures or just tweets this seems to be picking up speed. Taking away the distinction between the models can make a whole generation of girls never knowing there was ever a difference between the two. When a little girl says she wants to be a model people won’t tell her that she would have to be skinny or become a “plus-sized” model. One isn’t lesser than the other and this campaign is just making it more equal for everyone.
This campaign along with the changes in fashion capitals about models’ weight will bring forth a whole new world of modeling. A fashion industry where there are no photoshopped pictures, no dangerously underweight models and models of varying shapes just being called models.
