![]() ![]() For example, eventually, plus-size would cease to exist as a concept, since the idea of “plus” relies on the concept of a single, constant, ideal size. Real change would look different from this: it would look like a different body shape every issue – it’s not as though there’s an exhaustible supply. However, in following issues, models will revert to the mean. The magazine parades this diversity with flourish and self-congratulation, as though it is making the world a more inclusive space for marginalised groups. Banks was its first cover star of colour in 1997 Valentina Sampaio the first transgender cover star in 2020 Yumi Nu the first plus-sized model of Asian descent in 2022 Martha Stewart, of course, the first 81-year-old. Since its inception, it has had complaints from the morality police, and post-#MeToo the woke army got involved – and as a card-carrying soldier in that, I can precis our complaint as “Dude, stop photographing us like food.”īut the question of representation has always been a little more subtle. The aesthetic is often skated to the edge of soft-porn with (some) clothes on a lot of artfully glistening body oil and suggestive poses, in a pretty frank appeal to the predominantly male readership. If this kind of media was, at least until social media took the mantle, the arbiter of female beauty, Sports Illustrated Swimwear Issue was its supreme court, creating the structures of Fordist perfectionism: any shape as long as it’s thin, with a biologically impossible rack. Partly by dint of its only annual appearance, the swimsuit issue became a bellwether for the next big thing in modelling, and has made or cemented countless reputations, from Elle Macpherson to Tyra Banks. Different times, and all that: let’s not waste indignation on the fact that men were lauded by Sports Illustrated for what they could do, while women were prized for what they looked like. Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue was conceived in the mid-1960s by the then editor André Laguerre, who wanted to find a way to fill a slow winter month, February, when there was not much sport. The next-oldest cover star of the magazine was Maye Musk, the insanely good-looking mother of Elon, who appeared in 2022 at the age of 74 and told Hollywood Insider at the time: “Women of all ages, we should walk on the beach and be happy with our bodies.” And all this is great: diversity, inclusion, representation, role modelling, how do we (older women) feel we belong in the world if we don’t see ourselves in the world?, etc.īut ladies (and gentlemen, you’re allowed a view, too), do you ever feel as though you’re being played? The very people who invented the unattainable standards of beauty and perpetual youth that have tyrannised women since the advent of magazine cover stars parade their inclusivity and anti-ageism, ventriloquising attitudes of can-do and self-love through the models, and we’re meant to be … what? Grateful? Happier with our bodies? Challenged to try new things? Come on.
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