Melissa McCarthy is hoping to ban the ‘plus-size’ label for good
We are currently in the midst of a plus-size revolution. We love seeing more and more fashion world representation of women sizes 12 and up. In the midst of this revolution, however, there is hot debate regarding whether we should be even using the term plus-size. When you break it down, plus-size typically refers to sizes 12 and up. However, if the average American woman is a size 14, and more than 100 million American women fit the definition of “plus-size,” does the “plus” really make sense anymore? These women AREN’T larger than average, so it makes less and less sense that we use a term that insinuates that these women are not the norm.
Actress and comedian Melissa McCarthy, whose collection Melissa McCarthy Seven7, serving sizes 4-28 just launched, is done with the ‘plus-size’ label and she’s all about getting rid of separate sections for sizes 12 and up.
“I don’t like the segregated plus section,” McCarthy explained to Refinery29. ” You’re saying: ‘You don’t get what everybody else gets. You have to go shop up by the tire section.’ I have a couple of very big retailers that I think are going to help me chip away at that in a very meaningful way, and I’m really excited about it. I’m not ready to announce them yet, but they agreed to just put me on the floor. I said, ‘Run the sizes as I make them and let friends go shopping with their friends. Stop segregating women.’ And they said, ‘Okay.’”
FYI, Bustle announced just a few days ago that Nordstrom, Macy’s, and Lane Bryant will be featuring McCarthy’s line, so it sounds like they were some of the “very big retailers” McCarthy was talking about.
McCarthy goes on in the interview, to explain that she’s also gunning for the term ‘plus-size’ and wants to take the label out of our vocabularies permanently.
“Women come in all sizes. Seventy percent of women in the United States are a size 14 or above, and that’s technically ‘plus-size,’ so you’re taking your biggest category of people and telling them, ‘You’re not really worthy.’ I find that very strange.”
McCarthy is adamant that getting rid of the term ‘plus-size’ won’t just be good for women, it will also be good for retailers.
“I also find it very bad business. It doesn’t make a lot of sense numbers-wise. It’s like, if you open a restaurant and you say, ‘We’re primarily gonna serve people that don’t eat.’ It’s like, what? You would be nuts. Yet, people do it with clothing lines all the time, and no one seems to have a problem with it. I just don’t get why we always have to group everything into a good or bad, right or wrong category. I just think, if you’re going to make women’s clothing, make women’s clothing. Designers that put everyone in categories are over-complicating something that should be easy.”
We are so grateful to Melissa McCarthy for advocating for women and making the fashion world a more inclusive place for all sizes. And we’re so excited for Seven7 to come to a store near us later this month (and, of course, if you need your McCarthy retail fix stat, you can shop the collection online over at HSN).
Related:
Melissa McCarthy truth-bombs the reality of plus-size shopping
Is it time to retire the term plus-size?
(Images via HSN)
