Now, I don't really like Abercrombie & Fitch clothing. I mean, plain t shirts, jumpers and jogger bottoms aren't really my thing no matter what words you put on them. But I know plenty of people who don't like my clothes, who wouldn't wet them but if they should change their mind or their tastes change, they should be able to fit into them. This is where we get to Abercrombie & Fitch outright refusing to make clothes for bigger women.
Now lets get into what A&F think that a 'bigger woman' is because this article in Business Insider states that they are refusing to make clothes that are XL or XXL. Lets go past the fact that they make XS and XXS because tiny people need clothes too, A&F catering to smaller sized people is just as important as them making clothes for larger sized people - its the fact that they DON'T that is the issue. So if we take the standard sizes S, M, & L which in A&F is 8, 10, 12. So my initial anger at a size 12 being a FUCKING LARGE aside this is quite obviously a squewiff in terms of what actual sizes are, most brands are at least up one and the national average is that Small is 8-10, Medium is 12-14 and Large is 16-18. So not only are they not 'making clothes for fat people' they don't actually seem to know what fat people look like.
Individually it gets worse, they only go unto a size 10 in jeans. That means that they literally can't imagine a world where a woman over a size 10 (75% of all women by the way) could possibly want a pair of their jeans. Or, more realistically, that they don't want a girl over the size of 10 to wear their jeans.
When you are auditioned to be a 'model' in their store, a term they have to use because it is illegal to hire anyone based on their looks for any other purpose, there are a series of smiley fasces ranging from very happy to very sad and this is classed as 'attitude' when what it actually means is 'appearance'. You are scouted to be a Abercrombie 'model' because apparently running a business is absolutely to do with being able to see someone's entire clavicle.
In all honesty its not them making tiny tiny clothes that really bothers me, its the quote from Mike Jeffries the CEO of A&F (and Hollister) who has said that he doesn't think that you can be cool if you are fat and also…
“Candidly, we go after the cool kids. We go after the attractive all-American kid with a great attitude and a lot of friends. A lot of people don’t belong [in our clothes], and they can’t belong. Are we exclusionary? Absolutely."
Because you have to be thin to have a great attitude, to have a lot of friends and to belong. To be completely fair though this man also looks like this.
By perpetuating the myth that you have to be thin to be cool, a myth that quite frankly is about 5 year out of date, he is not only making life worse for the people who can't wear the clothes but also for the people that are more likely to wear his clothing - by people I of course mean children. There are no adults who are OBSESSED with A&F like a girl under the age of 17 is, they will buy something tiny just so they can carry the bag around with them. They are beyond all doubt the most impressionable by his opinion of what s call and in turn the most damaged by it. By spreading his view of the world (one that should be severely questioned both by him and his plastic surgeon) he is encouraging a section of the population already plagued by bodydismorphia to fuel their own insecurity because if you don't fit into those clothes you can't be cool, you can't have friends and you don't belong.
Honourable mention to Hannah Boyle who I can always rely on posting stuff to make me rage.
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