This woman used six photos to make a powerful point about body image

A woman from Wichita, Kansas has pointed out the wild variations of measurements one can find in a pair of trousers.

Deena Shoemaker, was looking in her closet when she began considering how her jeans were all different sizes, despite them all fitting her comfortably.

Shoemaker, a counselor for teen and pre-teen girls since 2010, railed against this ridiculous system, and its psychological side effects.

She took a series of photos of her donning the jeans, and posted their sizes to accompany each image on Facebook.

It showed how retailers thought her waist ranged from 5 to 12 in US sizes.

Captioning the image, Shoemaker wrote:

"No I'm not selling my pants; I've just got a bone to pick.

I've worked with teen & pre-teen girls as a leader and counselor in various places for the last 6 years. I've listened to countless girls tell me about their new diets and weight loss fads. I've have girls sob in my arms and ask me, 'if I were skinnier, would he have stayed?' I've counseled girls who were skipping meals. I've caught some throwing up everything they've just eaten.

But as I was going through my clothes tonight I started to notice how dramatically different the size of all my pants were. And I have a real problem with the fact that my size 5 pants fit me THE EXACT SAME WAY that my size 12 pants do."

Shocked by this, Shoemaker let rip on the companies engaging in this near conspiracy.

"Let me explain why I'm not happy, America. You photoshop models and actresses and slap them on the front of beauty magazines. At this point it's a pretty universally known truth that you're lying to us and those aren't accurate portrayals of the human body. I can prove it to girls pretty easily by simply showing them how photoshop works.

But when you resize a girl's pants from a 9 to a 16 and label it 'plus size,' how am I supposed to fight that? Photo manipulation is one thing but how do you expect me to convince her that the number printed inside her clothes is a lie too? How do you expect me to convince her that she doesn't need to skip dinner for the next month because her pant size didn't *actually* go up by seven digits?" 

To put it simply:

"STOP telling my girls that a size 4 is the 'ideal body size' and the 'epitome of beauty' if you're going to change a size 4 into an 8 or a 12 or whatever number you feel like on any given day."

And Shoemaker's message to women everywhere:

"And to you; my dear beautiful girls, my size 2 girls or my size 18 girls, your size doesn't determine your beauty; your life does. The size printed inside your clothes is subjective to the fashion industry's personal taste and it fluctuates rapidly. Stop believing the social normatives about who and what you should be.

You are lovely and you are loved." 

HT Huffington Post

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