In a thread about the Henson debate in the article section, a OLOer suggested that some feminists "despise women's success in the fashion industry."

I love haute couture. I read European versions of Vogue and style.com. For me, it's art. I also love the streetware blogs that are popping up everywhere, like www.chictopia.com. I love dressing creatively, and I admire a lot of women (and men) in the fashion industry. Designer Vivienne Westwood. The late Lee Miller, photographer. The late Isabella Blow, eccentric. Enormously wealthy fashion adventuress Daphne Guinness.

In the earlier thread, I theorised that haute couture is about beauty rather than sex appeal. It's an industry of women and gay men, both of whom appear to value thinness more than straight men do.

But it's true that the relationship between feminism and fashion can be rancorous. Many believe the fashion industry is way too obsessed with thinness and encourages eating disorders. (Type "fashion industry eating disorders" into Google Scholar and you'll find an enormous amount of research papers.) Some recent shows have banned models with a BMI of under 18, but the fashion industry hasn't embraced this with much enthusiasm. In fact, models are apparently getting thinner — in the US, twenty years ago, the average model weighed 8 percent less than the average woman. Today, she weighs 23 percent less.

Then there's the beauty industry. I love sparkles and light-reflecting make-up and rouge noir nail polish, but I certainly think that the beauty industry works by encouraging women to feel anxious about their looks, then presenting them with clever solutions.

So what do you guys reckon? Aren't models supposed to be more beautiful than the rest of us? Haven't we always elevated beauty to virtue? Or should models look more like average women? Would women still be anxious about their looks if cosmetic companies weren't telling them that their tiny little lines are aging? How much are women programmed to preen? Why are we so obsessed with youth? Does the fashion industry give girls eating disorders?

I think anorexia gets an inordinate amount of attention when compared with obesity.

If plain old obesity in women, which is far greater health problem in our society, could somehow be made out to be caused by men, and hence taken on as an issue by feminists, it would get much more attention.

US: "I think anorexia gets an inordinate amount of attention when compared with obesity."

That's an excellent point. I couldn't find a direct statistical comparison, but around seven million Australians are now overweight or obese. Meanwhile, in Australia 2-3% of adolescent and adult females satisfy the DSM IV diagnostic criteria for anorexia and bulimia nervosa. It's hardly comparable.

Not only that, but fat people have political clout. In the US, people even fight for their right to be lard @rses by suing airlines for not having enormous seats etc. Anorexic girls only have those weird websites where the fight for the right to starve themselves. (They're called pro-an sites, I think.)

US: "If plain old obesity in women, which is far greater health problem in our society, could somehow be made out to be caused by men, and hence taken on as an issue by feminists, it would get much more attention."

But anorexia isn't "caused by men" and, as you point out, that gets plenty of attention.

Of course obesity is caused by men. Look at the average woman pre- and post-children... ;-)

Then there's this:
http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,24195718-23272,00.html

Veronika, the fashion industry exists for one reason: to sell fashion to women. You ask what we guys think of it but really its irrelevant. The industry doesn't care.

For what its worth, I'd say most men find the fashion industry bizarre. Really, some of the getups you see on catwalks get our attention only because they are so outlandish, or because they come close to being the emperors new clothes. The hope of seeing a few of the latter is the only reason most of us pay any attention at all.

As for whether the fashion industry encourages unhealthily attitudes in women - I don't have a clue. What I do know is that what you see in the fashion industry is just mildly exaggerated version of what todays woman would like to be. Fashion walks a tight rope. It has to new and different, yet still familiar enough to appeal. Like every consumer market it doesn't lead you in one direction - instead it offers every possible variation and the best seller wins. In the end it is you girls that have the final say on what direction fashion will take - not the industry. If the industry has impossibly thin models then it is because you buy clothes worn by thin models, but not the same clothes worn by fat ones.

I guess that is the thing I find most puzzling about this love / hate relationship most women seem to have with fashion. The industry is just a mirror for your own attitudes. You don't like what it shows you. The solution isn't smashing the mirror. Not that you could bring yourself to do it anyway.

Dear Veronika,

Clothing fashions are related to broader social
trends. There is a distinct relationship for example
between women's clothing and society's attitude
toward's sexuality.

During the highly restrictive
Victorian era, women's bodies were almost completely
concealed; during the permissive 1960s (and with the
rise of feminism) the miniskirt was the rage; and in
the more conservative sexual climate of today,
slightly longer and less revealing skirts have come
back into fashion.

Fashions change very rapidly, women's hemlines
rise and fall with the passage of the seasons.
One reason for the emphasis on fashion in modern
societies is that these societies are oriented
toward the future rather than the past. Novelty is
considered desirable rather than threatening.

A second reason is that powerful commercial
interests encourage changes in fashion because
they profit from the demand for new styles.

A further reason is that in a competitive,
status-conscious society, fashion is used to
indicate one's social characteristics to others.
People may wish to appear attractive, distinctive,
or affluent, and a new fashion enables them to
show-off, for a while at least.

Of course not all fashions are deliberately imposed
on the population, however, and people may resist
new fashions (feminism has helped women in this
area), even in the face of massive advertising
campaigns designed to influence public taste.
See through blouses for women, did not take off,
neither did the very, very, high chunky boots.

A new fashion is generally more likely to be
accepted if it does not differ too much from
existing fashions.

As for anorexia and obesity... Until a few decades
ago, people who deviated from the ideal physical
form by being overweight were held to have a personal
problem of eating too much or exercising too little.
Gradually, however, doctors have succeeded in defining
obesity as an illness to be cured. The same applies to
anorexia, as a serious eating disorder. Now despite
the fashion industry's emphasis on "thinness," anorexia
is slowly being voted out of existence as an "illness."