can we bin the phrase “real women”, city chic?

If the first rule of the internet is ‘Never read the comments; the second must surely be – ‘Once it’s out there, it’s out there. Ain’t no goin’ back.’

Recently, a friend of mine brought something icky to my attention. She was on the City Chic Facebook page when she noticed they’d put up one of those ‘inspirational’ quote things.

What did it say, you ask? I’ll tell you!

Real Men Go For Curves. Only Dogs Like Bones.

She and a few others objected to this shitty statement; City Chic deleted it and also deleted the negative comments.

Except, sorry guys — once it’s on the internet, it’s there forever. Someone got a screen cap:

(via Tumblr).

Without even going into the heteronormativity (and let me just say, there’s PLENTY) there is so much wrong with this statement.

It disguises itself as an empowering message by attempting to make plus sized women feel good about themselves and their curves, but it does so by putting down a very large proportion of the population in a really derogatory way.

As a side note, it’s derisive of heterosexual men. It … calls them dogs, essentially. Only driven by their baser instincts and only attracted to a woman for her body.

It equates slimmer and skinny women to bones, which are only good for a man to … chew on?

I get pretty freaking sick of people doing size acceptance wrong. Every size is just that – a size. Every body is a good body. Skinny, fat, in between, whatever gender identified. Every body.

I detest when women are placed in competition with each other, which I presume is what this quote is trying to do. We should be helping to build each other up, not conspiring to knock ourselves down. Because this is what following and saying statements like this does – it knocks us down as well. It places us on an incredibly high, strict pedestal which, if we slip once, we come crashing back down. The pressure is enormous.

Society already pits woman against woman. Look at any tabloid magazine when you’re at the newsagent or supermarket. They’re full of who has put on weight, who has lost weight, who looks good without make up, who looks like a dragon without.

I don’t expect City Chic to make a statement on this, or even understand why it was wrong to put it on their Facebook page in the first place. A person working for that company who deletes the negative messages calling out this dreck is probably not going to care about what I have to say on the topic. A company that even thinks that sort of quote to put on their social media page isn’t going to bother dealing with this article.

But this article can’t be deleted. It is out there and it is calling out City Chic for negatively pitting women against each other and attempting to create a divide that doesn’t need further support. A divide so many people are working tirelessly to bridge. Way to go, guys! Well done.

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