Plus-sized model Tess Holliday features on the front cover of Cosmopolitan magazine this month, and the fitness world is losing it’s shit.
Are Cosmo “glorifying obesity”?
Is it “sending young women the wrong message” about a healthy lifestyle?
Honestly, my social media inbox caught fire with people asking for me to write this one, so strap yourself in, because both barrels are fully loaded – and pointed directly at the fitness industry itself!
In my opinion, Cosmopolitan have pulled off a master-stroke here.
The amount of attention this issue received, fuelled by the raging online debate it sparked, has helped it to become one of the highest selling issues in their history, and I have no doubt the boffins at head office laughed all the way to bank.
However, it did show a rather nasty side to people.
I found myself feeling a little disappointed in some of my fellow fitness professionals on this one, as I scrolled through several pages of awful insults claiming that Tess Holliday “shouldn’t be on the cover” and that “they’re glorifying being fat as fuck”.
So I have to ask my fellow fitness pros… why?
If Cosmo was a fitness magazine I could see where they’re coming from with the whole “glorifying obesity” thing, but it’s not, it’s a fashion magazine.
Are overweight people not allowed to be in magazines?
Should we hide them away under the stairs like fucking Sloth from The Goonies?
Women are forced to live in a world where they face unrealistic beauty standards and immense pressure to be ‘perfect’ all the time, and I hate that. Heck, only recently with the popularisation of social media are we now also seeing more men than ever before being diagnosed with mental health issues due to this same pressure.
Some of the comments I’ve seen directed at this lady are downright ugly.
So remember, part of your responsibility as a fully-grown adult is to not be a fucking nuclear bell-end.
👏👏👏 yes!!! So well put. Human beings can be so vile and it needs to stop. There’s enough to worry about in the world without being a total prick to a fellow human. So what if she’s a larger lady, she deserves that front cover as much as anyone else.