In a previous post I mentioned Chloe Marshall, a size-16 contestant in the Miss England pageant. Of course, it was bound to happen–London’s Daily Mail (a tabloid-style newspaper) criticized Chloe as “fat, lazy and a poster girl for ill health.” (Click here for a link to the ABC News article Backlash Against Big Beauty Queen.)

OK, that’s to be expected. Of course, the Daily Mail doesn’t rail against Kate Moss as being the ”poster girl for ill health” as an extremely underweight drug abuser. But, again, anytime a woman who is even slightly larger than the acceptable media standard makes any effort at all to publicly claim her beauty, she’s attacked for promoting an unhealthy lifestyle (all of this ignoring the damaging effects to the body of yo-yo dieting and the stress associated with low self-esteem, among others).

But this is the bit that galls me. One female reader, who described herself as 5″ 8′ tall, size 10, who struggles to maintain her weight by running 5K each day and avoiding junk food, wrote in support of the vicious attack on Chloe by saying:

“It makes me mad when people like Chloe are allowed to glamorize obesity, and even worse, make it look like a mentally and physically healthier alternative to watching your weight.”

What gets me about this is two things:

1. “Glamorize obesity?” Really? Come on, now. This always seems to be the charge against any positive media coverage of size acceptance. One kind word about loving even a “normal” body and that’s glamorizing? Then what the hell do you call the media treatment of thinness? Idolizing thinness? Deifying thinness? Canonizing thinness? I don’t think we have a word in our vocabulary.
2. We, the average women of the world, we support, and in fact, enforce, the hatred against ourselves. I feel sorry for this woman–no doubt, she lives under constant pressure to maintain her weight. And that, is sheer torture.

So, I conclude with: Kudos, Chloe. Hang in there, you gorgeous girl.