Tag Archives: body positivity

Body Positive Lingerie Brands That Embrace All Women

Not even Victoria’s Secret models look like Victoria’s Secret models in real life. Think of the dehydration and diets that happen before fashion shows. Then, you have hours of painstaking Photoshop that go into every catalog image. It all creates an illusion not even the models themselves can live up to. So, when an actual woman tries on the all-new Very Sexy Pushup and the image in the mirror isn’t quite airbrushed perfection, she can feel very un-sexy. Lingerie isn’t always our best friend.

Thankfully, several lingerie brands are taking a stand against the perpetuation of unrealistic beauty standards. They’re creating new products, more realistic advertising, and an underlying belief that all bodies are beautiful just as they are. Now, that’s Very Sexy.

Lonely Lingerie

“For women who wear lingerie as a love letter to themselves” is Lonely Lingerie’s one-sentence manifesto about body positivity. You won’t find any padding, push-up, or pretending in their line, nor airbrushing or unreality in their advertising. Earlier this year, they launched The Lonely Girls Project, a campaign featuring customers and unconventional models wearing their designs in natural environments. Even Lena Dunham joined the movement. She shared a photo of herself sporting a lime green Lonely bra and panty set on Instagram along with a message about loving your body just as it is.

 

Naomi and Georgia - Lonely Lingerie
Photo by: Naomi and Georgia, NYC via www.lonelylabel.com

Me and You

If you’ve been looking for granny panties with the word “feminist” written across them, then look no further than Me and You. It was founded by two best friends, Mayan Toledano and Julia Baylis. The up-and-coming lingerie brand has gotten the attention of young women who are embracing feminism and femininity on their own terms. The playful and subversive line of t-shirts, panties, and dresses looks a little like a psychedelic collaboration between Lisa Frank and Gloria Steinem. Cool girl photographer Petra Collins shot her best friend, Tavi Gevinson, for one of their look books. That’s a lot of feminist street cred.

 

Me and You - Best Friends
Photo by: Best Friends via Me and You

Neon Moon Lingerie

Frustrated with the way mainstream lingerie objectifies and sexualizes women, UK-based Hayat Rachi decided to take matters into her own hands. By making her own line of lingerie that fit her better both physically and philosophically. Her Kickstarter campaign for Neon Moon became fully backed earlier this year. She’s calling it a “feminist lingerie brand that’s empowering women in all phases of womanhood!”

 

Neon Moon lingerie
Photo by: Backless, Orange bof! via www.newmoon.co

These Two Body-Positive Women Are the Inspiration We Need

Fairytale princesses have long been under the spotlight not just for their beauty, but for how they represent women. And those discussions aren’t always pleasant. They’ve been named by many as a bad influence for always representing such a narrow (and largely unattainable) range of personalities and traits — very thin, fair-skinned, quiet, vulnerable. So many of us grew up loving the princesses in our favorite animated movies, but realized as adults that we needed something more. We’ve got an answer, thanks to body-positive champions Michelle Elman and Amy Wooldridge.

Elman and Wooldridge teamed up to dress as the kind of princesses I think we’d all like to see a bit more of. Elman specifically bares scars on her torso and head from 15 surgeries she had earlier in life. The Lion King left a lasting impact on her thanks to Scar, the villian. “So many villains have scars but never the princess,” she says, according to Cosmo. Add to that the weight gain she experienced due to being bedridden, and she couldn’t have felt more excluded. Wooldridge had similar experiences, feeling scared that by not being the thin princess, she wouldn’t get her own happy ending.

Since they weren’t able to find the princesses they can relate to in the movies, they decided to become them. For a series of photos, Elman dressed as Snow White, and Wooldridge dressed as Rapunzel. If you ask me, the results are pretty darn gorgeous.

I’m not saying you should boycott children’s movies and their many beautiful princesses. I’m saying there’s a serious lack of diversity of representation. Assigning the word “beauty” with one definition means that most of us will never feel worthy. Only once we understand that all women are beautiful can we truly accept each other and spread kindness wherever we go.

My hat’s off to these two young ladies! And, reader, in case anyone hasn’t told you today, you’re beautiful.

Main image: Michelle Elman/Facebook

5 Bold Commercials that Made a Statement

If you’ve ever gotten a jingle stuck in your head or found yourself asking someone “where’s the beef?” you understand how influential TV commercials can be on culture. Commercials are created to sell products. There’s no getting around it. But if they’re a necessary evil, some companies are doing good at the same time. They’re using their marketing dollars to spread love, awareness and acceptance and showing a full spectrum of gender identity, ethnicity, sexual orientation and ability in their spots.

Here are five commercials that took risks for the sake of doing right.

 

“Like a Girl,” Always

https://youtu.be/XjJQBjWYDTs

 

It’s the iconic TV commercial for Always that changed the way millions of people think about a common phrase. Acclaimed documentary filmmaker, Lauren Greenfield, gathered girls and boys of various ages and prompted them to do things “like a girl” on a camera. Through their candid responses, we clearly see how this simple phrase has become an insult and we need to change how we use it. The positive message struck a chord. The extended commercial has 60 million views on YouTube and the followup spot has nearly 40 million.

 


 

“Not Sorry,” Pantene

https://youtu.be/rzL-vdQ3ObA

 

Here’s another commercial that challenges us to think about the power of language. Pantene illuminates the way that women are socialized to apologize even when they’re not at fault in situations at work, at home and even while waiting at the doctor’s office. Pantene wants women to be aware that they might unconsciously be putting themselves in subservient positions by saying “sorry” much more often than men do. Messages of women empowerment in advertising pay off big, too. In a survey conducted by SheKnows, 52% of women said they bought a product specifically because of the way women were portrayed in its advertising.

 


 

“Good For Your Heart,” Cheerios

 

When a cute little girl discovers that Cheerios is good for heart health, she shows her dad how much she loves him by pouring an entire box on his chest while he naps on the sofa. It’s a charming moment of innocence and caring that ended up causing a lot of controversy when it came out a couple years ago. Why? Because the little girl’s mom is white and her dad is African-American. But Cheerios refused to give in to the hateful comments that filled its YouTube page. Instead, they brought the family back for a sequel commercial that aired during the Super Bowl and sent a powerful message of support to millions of interracial families around the world.

 


 

“Made of More,” Guinness

https://youtu.be/hbA6U3OeRRs

 

Beer commercials don’t have to be filled with bros and bikinis. In this moving spot put out by Guinness, a group of friends in wheelchairs gets together to play a grueling game of basketball. But there’s a twist. The commercial’s message of acceptance, love and dignity for people living with disabilities is important. Outside of Artie Abrams on Glee, there are few images in mainstream media of people in wheelchairs, so it’s a big deal that Guinness decided to dedicate an entire commercial to celebrating them. It’s true that “the choices we make reveal the true nature of our character.” And sometimes a commercial can reveal the true nature of a company.

 


 

“This is Wholesome,” Honey Maid

 

Honey Maid could easily have cast traditional families in this commercial selling crackers, but instead, they chose to show families of all kinds, including a single parent, two dads, and an interracial family enjoying their products. Sadly, Honey Maid’s message of love being at the core of a family was hard for some people to accept. Commenters on YouTube left hateful messages. But Honey Maid fought back and created a beautiful rebuttal commercial called simply, “Love,” in which the nasty comments were turned into a work of art.