KATE MOSS once said “nothing tastes as good as skinny feels” and promptly became a jet-setting multimillionaire living off a diet of Diet Coke (capital C) and champagne.
Not once did she think “f*** it” and get stuck into daily buckets of KFC coated in Stork.
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With fame and fortune, came self-discipline and an iron will.
Yet here we are, 20 years on, with morbidly obese models as poster girls; size 30 women fetishised and celebrated for being fat and, most likely, deeply unhealthy all in the name of “diversity”.
For all the brilliant advances made when it comes to diversity and inclusion, it seems there is still one thing we can’t get right — women’s bodies.
Because, here we are, once again discussing them.
Last week the boss of online retailer Snag Tights said it received 100 complaints a day from people moaning its models are too fat.
Chief executive Brigitte Read says models of her size four to 38 clothing are frequently the target of “hateful” posts about their weight.
She was applauded for speaking out and championing “real women”.
Because in the age of body positivity, we must celebrate all shapes and sizes, even if it will kill them at the age of 50.
The reality, though, is that in the Age of Ozempic, NOBODY should be dangerously overweight.
Snag’s “revelation”, cunningly disguised as concern about fat prejudice, was a PR masterstroke.
Doubtless Google search numbers for Snag went through the roof last week. (Indeed, I did a cursory search for this article and was impressed to see the company, for all its questionable obesity romanticising, is an ethical brand promoting sustainability.)
No one deserves to be on the receiving end of vitriol or troll hatred. And being unrealistically skinny is unhealthy as is abject fatness.
Neither should be lauded, or craved. (And before the trolls launch at me, no, Mossy’s one-time diet shouldn’t be glamorised either — don’t do drugs, kids.)
But morbid obesity — I don’t just mean a little bit of chub here, rather impossible-to-fit-in-an-aeroplane-seat chub and difficult-to-get-up-the-stairs chub — is a very 21st-century epidemic. It is a literal killer.
Absolutely it is possible to be fit and fat.
But it is NOT possible to be dangerously 30-stone fat, and healthy. To suggest otherwise is ludicrous.
According to NHS stats, someone with severe and complex obesity will, on average, have their lifespan reduced by three to ten years.
Unhealthily thin
How many times do we have to hear that those with the highest levels of obesity have 12 times the risk of type 2 diabetes, 22 times the risk of sleep apnoea and triple the risk of heart failure before we, as a nation, stop cramming ultra-processed rubbish down our collective gullets?
And let’s not forget, obesity is the second biggest cause of cancer.
But “these plus-plus-sized models aren’t hurting anyone!” exclaim the woke warriors.
Oh but they are.
The NHS is already cripplingly overburdened by the overweight — precious resources splurged on bariatric units, and treating the assortment of health conditions outlined above.
Chronic obesity should be treated with empathy, no one chooses to be so fat they have to use an extender seat belt on a Boeing 747.
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It’s as much a mental illness as, say, anorexia. But it IS treatable.
Last month, a Next advert was banned for featuring an “unhealthily thin” model.
Yet the Advertising Standards Authority takes no issue with promoting unhealthy large models.
In other words, it’s socially irresponsible to be thin but not too fat.
Of course, what should really matter is how kind, how smart, or how good a friend these models are — not what they look like. But kindness doesn’t flog bikinis.
Where is the happy medium?
Normal bodies, bang-average faces . . . now THAT would be progressive.
JEZZA ON TOP MARX
THE man, the myth, the absolute legend that is Jeremy Corbyn*.
Diane Abbott, his unlikely ex, has revealed he once took her on a romantic minibreak. . . to visit Karl Marx’s grave.
Diane, who has raised herself a few notches in my estimation, gave a wonderfully wry interview to ITV News last year – which has been recirculating on social media – where she recalled their romantic years.
“We were boyfriend and girlfriend momentarily,” she says sweetly, as if the pair don’t have a combined age of 146.
“Jeremy is a great person but his life is 99 per cent politics and I was not prepared I don’t think to be the one per cent.
“I started to whine and complain that we never went out anywhere. So Jeremy, who’s a very kind person, thought about it. And then one day he said, ‘We’re going out’.
“And I thought ‘Wow!’ I got dressed, got in the car and he drove, and I thought ‘Ooh, maybe we’re going to go to a nice wine bar’.
“Actually, he took me to Highgate Cemetery, and showed me the tomb of Karl Marx. That was his idea of an outing.”
Say what you like about the man, but a champagne socialist he ain’t. And Diane Abbott – what an icon.
*His failures on rabid anti-semitism notwithstanding
Has Kate bottled it at staying sober?
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ENOUGH beating around the bush – Kate Moss is back on the booze, and reliving her wild youth.
Years after solemnly declaring herself sober, and launching a high-end wellness brand, Mossy – once admirably nicknamed ‘The Tank’ over her ability to withstand anything on a night out – has yet to publicly comment on whether she’s officially off the wagon again.
However, over the weekend she was pictured clutching a bottle of non-non alcoholic beer, and puffing on a fag.
Of course technically, she could have been holding said beer for someone else. (And doubtless, if she was gallantly keeping the beer warm, I shall be hearing from her lawyers. Yet I suspect I won’t be).
But in a world of pious, teetotal Gen-Zer’s, there’s something reassuringly fabulous about seeing this supermodel extraordinaire living like it’s 1999 again.
HOYLE HUSH
WHO knew Long-haul Lindsay was the most powerful man in politics?
The HOC Speaker, who’s been accused of swanning around the globe in first class at taxpayers’ expense, is seemingly untouchable.
While MPs would usually be foaming at the mouth in their condemnation of recent revelations, both sides of the House have remained eerily quiet.
Not only is there no formal mechanism in place to trigger an investigation into claims against Hoyle, but MPs are too scared to call him out in case they never get called to speak again.
A dangerous Catch-22.
THAT’S YOUR LOTTE
IT’S like Jeremy Kyle: The D List Celeb Edition.
In astonishing scenes last week, Conor Maynard – once (very) optimistically billed as the “British Justin Bieber” – took to Instagram to declare he wasn’t the father of Traitors’ star Charlotte Chilton’s baby following their one-night stand.
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Charlotte, who had announced last June that Conor was the father of her unborn “miracle” baby, after she suffered seven miscarriages undergoing IVF with her ex-wife. (Yes, “wife” – I told you, all v. Jeremy Kyle).
Anyway, she loudly proclaimed to anyone who’d listen, that Conor had ghosted her and was refusing to acknowledge baby Penelope as his own.
Cue singer Conor posting: “Earlier this week, I took a paternity test in the presence of her legal representative.
“Today I’ve received the test results which confirm that I am not Penelope’s father. I am glad that the speculation can finally be put to an end.”
Strangely, the once very vocal Ms Chilton appears to have lost her voice.
As well as her reputation.
IT’S not been a good week for Brand Dachshund.
First an inquest heard a dog lover, who tragically died at home, was partially eaten by her two miniature sausage dogs and 24 hours later it emerged an “aggressive” dachshund, in Siberia, had killed
a baby.
