Skinny bitch. Honestly, I would not even be writing this were it not for the phrase “skinny bitches” in Meghan Trainor’s hit song “All About That Bass.” The song is catchy, upbeat, fun—it gets stuck in my head and makes me want to dance! And yet, two words stuck out at me and made me question the whole thing. It’s a strange notion to me that with recent attitudes towards the word “bitch”—it seems to have been officially classified as an offensive, demeaning, sexist word—that to pair it with a word that judges women based on their appearance is still OK. It made me look up the lyrics to read more thoroughly; it made me look up the music video to watch with a wary eye; it made me write this.
Full disclosure: I’m skinny. I’m just being candid. Not freakishly thin, but ever since I was a kid I’ve been one of those lanky little gals—scrawny even. Although, perhaps not so little, because my slenderness has always been exacerbated by my being quite tall. I am here to tell you that skinny-shaming is not a myth. Do skinny girls have as much hardship as overweight girls? Probably not. But is every skinny girl purposely perpetuating the societal pressure on young women to be thin? No freaking way. Genetics have a lot to do with each unique girl’s physique—from slim to curvy. So why is it so acceptable to make the slim girls the enemy and the curvy girls the victim when slim girls can be victimized too?
I’ll ask Meghan Trainor if I ever get the chance. In the meantime, let me rant about her loaded lyrics.
Yeah, it’s pretty clear, I ain’t no size two
But I can shake it, shake it
Like I’m supposed to do
‘Cause I got that boom boom that all the boys chase
And all the right junk in all the right places
So if you happen to be a size 2, you cannot shake it, shake it? That’s a bummer, because even though I am in fact a pretty dorky dancer, I enjoy going dancing and really like to shake it, shake it. And boys won’t chase me if I don’t have that boom, boom? That’s also disappointing. Never mind the fact that we should be trying to move away from defining our self-worth based on the opinions of boys, but it’s pretty darn disheartening to be told I am not attractive to guys because of my body type.
Yeah, my mama she told me don’t worry about your size
She says, “Boys like a little more booty to hold at night.”
You know I won’t be no stick figure silicone Barbie doll
So if that’s what you’re into then go ahead and move along
You know it’s funny, because my mamma also told me not to worry about my size, though her message was a little different. My mom, who had a very similar string-bean figure to myself in her youth, told me how when she was in eighth grade the sex-ed teacher lady said on the first day “it is scientifically proven that men are more attracted to women with curves.” That jump-started Mom’s insecurities about her body, because I guess body image issues are like a rite of passage for girls? Like Trainor, this circa 1970’s teacher was trying to make most girls feel better for not being skinny. But what both of them wound up doing is being mean to girls who actually happen to be thin. My mom told me this one day when I was in ninth grade and I was complaining about snarky comments I’d receive about my body.—because, yeah, I got teased quite a bit growing up. Trainor should have chilled with my mama—she’s pretty cool—because then her lyrics might have turned out something like:
Yeah my mama she told me “don’t worry about your size
There’s all different boys who like all different body types.”
Not as cheeky, but a bit more PC.
I’m bringing booty back
Go ahead and tell them skinny bitches that
No I’m just playing. I know you think you’re fat.
First thing’s first I’m the realest. Just kidding. Not that booty needed bringing back as if people have been walking around without observing the existence of butts for the last decade, but if anybody I would say that Iggy and Nicki “brought booty back,” not Trainor (who needs to hire a bunch of bootylicious backup dancers to do her twerking for her). And then…that dreaded line. The thing is: the line with the actual B-word in it is blown out of the water by how awful the succeeding line is! Trainor says to the skinny bitches, “I know you think you’re fat.” Hey guess what, not all skinny girls suffer from body dysmorphia. I don’t think I’m fat. I’ve never thought I was fat—I know I’m lucky to be able to say that, but seriously, seriously? Body dysmorphia is a serious mental condition often linked to eating disorders. So guess what else: not all skinny girls have eating disorders! Plenty of girls are naturally thin.
For instance, I’m inclined to believe that the “skinny bitch” in the music video is probably thin by nature. And yet they feel the need to demonize her for it. Not only that, they want to change her. A mixed message appears for only an instant in the video, and it took some strategic clicking and pausing for me to look at it. There’s a bit in the song calling out photo shop in magazines, then it flashes a before and after of the “skinny bitch.”
Notice anything funny? Oh, it’s ironic because usually magazines photoshop models to look skinnier, and they’ve turned that practice on its head, ahahaha. Well I don’t see it as ironic; I think it’s hypocritical. The evil fashion industry has been making curvy girls feel bad by photoshopping models to be thin, and Trainor thinks it best to instead photoshop a girl who actually is thin to be fat? This is how she wants to convey the message of how wrong it is to photoshop a girl to look like something she’s not? It’s a swing and a miss if you ask me.
Part of what is so disappointing about this song is: I thought we had already covered this skinny-shaming thing? I say this because I read a pretty concise little blog post almost a whole year ago where a gal totally called out skinny-shaming. She was speaking out against all the haters that flooded the internet the morning after the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show. Does the VSSFS perpetuate a high standard of stereotypical female beauty? Well, sure. But does that make it okay to call the models “gross” or “sickly”? No way José. The VS Angels are a carefully curated collection of some of the most beautiful women on the planet—no amount of anorexia could have given them their stunning faces and long legs. This blogger summed up the idea of getting womankind on the same team with an image I immediately pinned to my Pinterest:
Like I said, this happened a year ago, and I remember seeing some other bits and pieces on the internet with a similar message around that time, which is why I was surprised to see such a blatant skinny-shaming happening now.
Around the time that this song came out, my roommates and I one night somehow found ourselves having a conversation about how much middle school sucks. I said that I got teased a lot for being skinny. One of my roommates looked at me and said in a genuinely astonished tone, “Really? For being thin?” I get that it’s not as rampant an issue as fat-shaming, but I was surprised that she was surprised. I want people to stop being surprised.
Let me leave you with what I consider to be a perfect example of positive body image for young women in the media. It comes from Disney Channel circa 2003.
Y’all remember this? It’s the episode of That’s So Raven where Ray is in a designing contest and wants to model her dress, is told she can’t, but ends up modeling it anyway and telling off the magazine editor. The highlight is Raven and the model strutting and dancing and having grand ‘ol time on the runway together as the magazine editor looks on in horror. What strikes me about this scene now is that Raven and the model are on the same team! The model admires Raven for doing her thang and agrees that it’s unfair to expect everyone to be skinny. The model is even standing up for herself in the process. Miss Model holds her ground when the editor snaps, “I don’t pay you to think,” which is a super quick comment on the issue of people treating pretty girls like they have no intelligence, because pretty, thin people have problems too. Then she helps Raven push the editor down. Hooray! You go girls!
It’s perfection. A little cheesy, yeah, but Trainor should be ashamed. One, for being a twenty year old American girl who apparently didn’t watch That’s So Raven; and two, for being less inspired than a 2003 Disney sitcom.