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Sizing chaos

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Re: Sizing chaos

#91

Post by goodmythical »

apt-apt-apt-apt wrote: post #58
zamadatix wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the "THe VILLaIN aRC oF VANiTY SiZINg" section, vanity sizing is framed as marketing strategy which is successful because of the psychology around that - linking out to https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S10577... for more detail. It certainly wouldn't be the first time the most profitable marketing strategy is unrelated to aligning with what's optimal for the consumer.

Translating the confusing science speak, basically: Appearance self-esteem takes a hit when they don't fit in a size. They take it out on the clothes: "I hate their stuff, they suck." They buy more of other stuff to compensate for the hit, whether non-sized accessories (I am pretty) or book/tech (I am smart even if I don't fit). People confident in their appearance are immune to the effect, and simply think it's size…

I am genuinely curious as to which words in the cited are 'confusing science speak' in your view.

Having read the article, I can't venture a guess without feeling condescending...non-conforming? Compensatory?

Legitimately confused.

Re: Sizing chaos

#92

Post by coldtea »

fishtoaster wrote: post #14

This is a great use of data to make a compelling case that sizing sucks for women's clothing! I do wish it attempted to answer the question at the end, though: "Sizes are all made up anyway — why can’t we make them better?" Like, why doesn't the market solve for this? If the median woman can't buy clothing that fits in many brands, surely that's a huge marketing opportunity for any of the thousands of other clothing…

>Like, why doesn't the market solve for this? If the median woman can't buy clothing that fits in many brands, surely that's a huge marketing opportunity for any of the thousands of other clothing brands?

Because

- in reality it's not much of a problem. Billions of women manage to buy and wear clothes just fine. Some might fit slightly better or worse, but unless you have very special body shape (and even extreme thick/overweight/tall/short are covered by niche brands) you can get in any clothes store and get plenty of clothes to wear

- some random brand making something that fits better doesn't mean any sizeable consumer percentage is going to buy it. First because see above, and also because a lot of clothes purchases are about brand and fashion and status signalling, not mere fit.

- if some women absolutely can't find something in their size from a specific brand, that makes the brand even more exclusive, like it being "for fit people only". Obviously brands for thicker and even obese people also exist, but they're seen as a brand of need, not a brand you'd be proud having to wear

Re: Sizing chaos

#94

Post by altairprime »

magneticnorth wrote: post #56

"The average woman’s waistline today is nearly 4 inches wider than it was in the mid-1990s." I assume they mean circumference rather than diameter, but this is still a shocking increase in only 30 years. I knew the obesity epidemic was an ever-increasing problem, but this really puts it into perspective. I wonder if we'll ever fully understand the causes behind this rapid shift.

There are some theories. Most fresh food in a generic U.S. supermarket has something like 10-25% of the nutrients per pound than it used to a hundred years ago, thanks to soil depletion, so each generation has to consume more pounds of food to get the same amount of nutrients. There’s been long-standing corruption in the FDA “food pyramid” and “recommended daily allowance” systems to bias the U.S. population from recognizing that added sugar leads to obesity. And there’s the advent of chemical non-sugar sweeteners, which in recent decades are turning out to be just as harmful as sugar, only differently. Those may not fully explain obesity, but they certainly are known and understood explanations for obesity — and yet they remain wholly unaddressed.

I think the problem is not whether we’ll fully understand the causes, but more that every cause we have identified to date would require regulating corporations in profit-damaging ways to solve, and it is likely that any future causes we reveal will be the same. That’s anathema in the U.S.: profits are sacrosanct to the two primary political parties, discounting their occasional extremists who argue (correctly) that we should be regulating in favor of consumers, not profits. Typically, the desire for a ‘full’ explanation is used to delay or derail efforts to implement solutions to each single proven explanation, and so I tend to caution against pursuing a complete answer first, and instead recommend asking why we have not yet addressed the known causes while continuing to search for more.

Re: Sizing chaos

#95

Post by [deleted] »

Animats wrote: post #52

You're not supposed to talk about this. Someone I used to know was fired from the New York Times for saying too much about it.[1][2] [1] https://fashionschooldaily.com/cintra-wilson-vs-jc-penney-th... [2] https://archive.is/md8qw

[deleted]

Re: Sizing chaos

#96

Post by bubblewand »

flumpcakes wrote: post #64
altairprime wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

0. All commercial premade adult women’s clothing is made exclusively for a small minority of women with hourglass body shapes. The number one thesis takeaway for me, that I didn’t realize as a woman even after years of dealing with sizing drama, is that clothing manufacturers exclusively market to hourglass body shape alone — which some might recognize better as “pinup model” proportions. As a non-hourglass along wit…

I think that must be fashion dependent though? I can think of plenty of women's clothes that are definitely not marketed for hourglass physiques.

Yeah I've shopped for clothes enough for my wife to know that even with an hourglass shape, you're guaranteed to find lots of pieces that're like "OK none of these sizes will work on you". Her particular problem is a small waist paired with an hourglass. Plenty of "ruler"-shaped cuts out there on the small end of waist size, that won't work for her.

I wouldn't be surprised if women of every body shape believe that clothes must be targeting some other shape, except the ones who luck into a sizing-region in which multiple body types have a lot of overlap.

Re: Sizing chaos

#97

Post by munificent »

diath wrote: post #89

The issue is not the sizes, the issue is the obesity epidemic. According to CDC [1] the average woman in the US is 5'3" weighing 172lbs. That's not just overweight but rather first degree of obesity. I guess you could argue that sizes should catch up to the demands when half of your population is straight up fat but I feel like a better angle would be educating people that 1500 kcal worth of Starbucks sugar for break…

> I feel like a better angle would be educating people that 1500 kcal worth of Starbucks sugar for breakfast is not healthy.

An even better angle is educating Starbucks to stop selling unhealthy garbage.

The idea that all blame rests on individuals and corporations are blame-free is crazy. They have way more agency over what we consume than individuals do.

Re: Sizing chaos

#98

Post by altairprime »

diath wrote: post #89

The issue is not the sizes, the issue is the obesity epidemic. According to CDC [1] the average woman in the US is 5'3" weighing 172lbs. That's not just overweight but rather first degree of obesity. I guess you could argue that sizes should catch up to the demands when half of your population is straight up fat but I feel like a better angle would be educating people that 1500 kcal worth of Starbucks sugar for break…

I do support addressing obesity (see my elsethreads), but duly noted that it’s not a cure-all panacea for the problems faced by women. Obesity does not address the nine different U.S. body shapes; one can be obese and rectangular, or obese and spoon, or obese and triangle. Resolving obesity is a worthy cause, but will only reduce or remove the impact of size inflation on ‘vanity’ sizing as a whole, without addressing the significant disparity of sizes between manufacturers or the near-total lack of products for the eight non-hourglass body shapes.

Re: Sizing chaos

#99

Post by kccqzy »

munificent wrote: post #97
diath wrote: post #89

The issue is not the sizes, the issue is the obesity epidemic. According to CDC [1] the average woman in the US is 5'3" weighing 172lbs. That's not just overweight but rather first degree of obesity. I guess you could argue that sizes should catch up to the demands when half of your population is straight up fat but I feel like a better angle would be educating people that 1500 kcal worth of Starbucks sugar for break…

> I feel like a better angle would be educating people that 1500 kcal worth of Starbucks sugar for breakfast is not healthy. An even better angle is educating Starbucks to stop selling unhealthy garbage. The idea that all blame rests on individuals and corporations are blame-free is crazy. They have way more agency over what we consume than individuals do.

That Starbucks probably saved my life after I made an unwise decision to bike 40 miles on an empty stomach. Bonking is real, and I’m glad they are allowed to sell the sugary beverages to prevent me from bonking.

Oh and I also fainted the first time I donated blood, because I did not know I should not donate blood while fasting. Again, sugary drinks helped.

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