Gigi Hadid “Fights Beauty Standards” While Enforcing Them in Reebok Campaign
If you ask a young girl who they look up to, you will likely see that more supermodels and reality show stars fill that list than activists or business owners. These queens of airbrush set unrealistic expectations for their younger admirers and likely donate to the over 60% of young girls who are insecure about their bodies. Just this past week, Gigi Hadid, arguably the most popular supermodel of today, starred in an ad for the Reebok campaign “#PerfectNever,” created to combat beauty standards. The placement seems a bit odd, doesn’t it?
Many are questioning Reebok’s decision to include the Victoria’s Secret model in the campaign. In the past, the brand had released a video featuring Ronda Rousey, a professional fighter, with a similar message. There, the star of the video has a real purpose to be supporting the cause and to be an advocate for body positivity and acceptance. Rousey has been criticized for her body in the past and has faced backlash for being “too strong for a girl” and “manly”. Still, Hadid has received mostly praise for her body and it’s one that’s commonly walking runways. How are we supposed to see her as someone who’s breaking the very barriers she invented?
I’m not saying she shouldn’t be proud of her body. Of course everyone should be proud of their body and body type and every body type should be represented! Body positivity, though, wasn’t created for people like Hadid. The banana-like skinny body of Gigi Hadid and her fellow models is one we see all the time in modern culture is not commonly criticized. Turn on your tv and you’ll see it everywhere, from teen dramas to reality shows about people having dangerous surgeries in order to get that perfect look. Maybe you’ll even catch a fashion show she’s walked in alongside the other tall and skinny women with flowing hair. Flip a few channels down and you’ll see people starving themselves to get the very body Hadid has. Somewhere in there, you might even hear something about the hundreds dying because of a hurricane or poverty.
Women with disabilities, though? You’ll only find them on shows treating them like they’re just money making machines and not people. Women of color? Maybe they’re a token character and they likely do stereotypical things, like saying “oh no she didn’t,” “hold my earrings,” and “aye papi.” Overweight or obese women? They don’t exist, or at least not happily, on tv. Transgender women? They’re either a joke or a villain, they’re not humans with feelings. Muslim women? You’ll be lucky to find one, and if you do, it’s likely that their plot lines are either about people thinking they’re a terrorist or them being an actual terrorist. Welcome to the media.
(And I know what you’re thinking. “But Gigi is a woman of color!” Yes, you are right. Gigi Hadid is a half Palestinian woman, but the important fact here is that she is white passing, meaning that she looks white. She makes money off of the fact she looks white. She also benefits from colourism, where having lighter coloured skin is preferred traditionally and darker color lured skin is discriminated against within communities of colour. Maybe some may see this as being judgmental, but for this reason, we can’t call this a commercial for positivity towards women of color.)
Positivity campaigns are for those groups that don’t have representation elsewhere. Gigi Hadid’s skinny body, unrealistic for many, is not something bashed or shamed or forgotten about. Her body is the very type that is seen as the golden standard that many women dying trying to reach. Pictures of Gigi, before this, were more likely to be tagged “#perfect” than “#perfectnever.” And for that reason alone, she doesn’t belong in this campaign. Gigi Hadid and others with a similar body type, along with the media and fashion industry, have created a glass ceiling for the “non-ideals.” Now give us a chance to break it.
