Get Skinny or GTFO

It’s 2024, and just when you thought we’d left behind the haunting specter of the ‘90s body standard (you know, the Kate Moss / “Heroin Chic” days), guess what? It’s back, but now it’s showing up at your favorite bar with a new haircut and a side-eye that says, “I told you I’d be back.” The latest fashion trends have resurrected the ultra-skinny, almost-too-thin body ideal- and it’s all over Instagram, TikTok, and yes, even on the runways.

Are we really doing this again? Really?

Now, don’t get me wrong. I love a good trend. I’ve dabbled in the occasional obsession (hello, low-rise jeans, I see you), but the return of the “waif” thin ideal feels like a bad reboot of a show that was never that good in the first place. It’s like the fashion industry has collectively forgotten how much damage it did the first time around. And just like a bad diet, we’re back at square one, where a flat stomach and sharp cheekbones are once again the epitome of beauty.

But let’s take a step back, shall we? Because here’s the thing: We don’t need to look like that. And yet, we’re supposed to believe that it’s the only way to look ‘good'.’ Fashion week models? Check. Influencers? Check. The images we see every day on our feeds? Double check. But here’s a truth bomb for you… The pressure to look like that is not only unrealistic, it’s dangerous.

Let’s talk about the idea of beauty. The notion that a woman’s body is only valuable if it fits into a narrow, often unattainable standard is old, archaic. The whole “fashion industry standard” is rooted in a very specific kind of aesthetic that excludes so many body types, it is nearly laughable. And yet here we are, looking at a world where “getting city” means getting thin, or at least looking like you could be.

But wait, we’ve been here before. Remember the ‘90s? The grunge era, where everyone was too cool to care about anything, except maybe a little too much. Kate Moss was the It girl. Her widish frame, sunken eyes, and a look of perpetual mystery. No one talked about how she was the standard, and that what we all should aim for. Instead, we glorified it. We bought the magazines. We bought the clothes. We dieted, we over-exercised, and we wondered why we didn’t look like her. And for those who weren’t even born in the 90s, it was all over our Pinterest feed, along with the Victoria Secret models being everywhere up until 2016, at the earliest. I think.

But here’s the thing_ no one told us that those bodies weren’t natural. They weren’t attainable for most women. And they certainly weren’t healthy. Now, with this re-emergence of the ‘90s thin ideal, it’s easy to forget how far we’ve come. How much progress we’ve made in the body-positive movement. The rise of body diversity, the embrace of curves, the social media influencers who are unapologetically themselves- it’s been a glorious thing to watch.

And yet, with one swift swing of the fashion pendulum, we’re back to a place where young girls are being taught to value a certain body type above all else. And that’s terrifying.

How about we talk about the next generation for a moment. Imagine being a teenage girl right now. You’ve grown up with social media, you’ve seen a flood of body types in all shapes and sizes, and for once, you felt like the beauty standard wasn’t so impossible to attain. Maybe you saw Lizzo rocking a crop top and felt like you could do it too. Or you scrolled through instagram and saw all bodies being celebrated- all those beautiful difference. And for a second, you thought, maybe there was space for you to exist without feeling pressured to shrink yourself down to a certain size.

But then, out of nowhere, you’re told that the ‘90s look- thin and angular- is now “in” again. And suddenly, those diverse bodies don’t feel quite as celebrated anymore. Why? Because the underlying message hasn’t changed. It isn’t about being healthy or being you. It is all about fitting an image. And the image is dangerous and designed to make you feel small, literally and figuratively.

Here’s the kicker, we don’t need to look like the ‘90s ideal to be beautiful. We don’t need to shrink ourselves down to a size 00 to have value. We don’t need to kill ourselves to fit some mold. We most certainly don’t need to pass on that idea to the next generations.

So, what do we do? We celebrate all bodies, and not just the ones that fit the narrow ideal. We teach young girls that beauty comes in all forms. Hourglasses to apples. From short to tall. Curvy to lean. And when the world tries to tell you otherwise? You tell it, “Get city or GTFO!”

Because darling, the future of beauty is bigger, bolder, and way more inclusive than what the ‘90s made it out to be.