I was infuriated last night watching the finale of Project Runway. In my fury, I went online to see if others felt what I felt. While reading others' posts and feeling better that I wasn't alone in how I felt, I stumbled across something else that has been happening at Marie Claire magazine. I admit I am not always up on current events, so this may be old news, but when I read it, it blew my mind!
Here's the link to the original post on Marie Claire by Maura Kelly:
http://www.marieclaire.com/sex-love/dating-blog/overweight-couples-on-television
As someone who has struggled with my own body issues my whole life, I cannot believe the non-apologetic apology and the staff at Marie Claire standing by the post! I'm not going to reiterate the outrage that most others have already expressed, nor am I going to write my own editorial of the post since I think Josh Shahryar did it better here:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/josh-shahryar/dear-marie-claire-and-med_b_775159.html
I really don't understand why the folks at Marie Claire think it is okay to hurt the feelings of their readers when they are supposed to help them feel better. Certainly, one can argue that fashion magazines don't actually make women feel better, but their glossy pages always pretend that they are for the benefit of women rather than to their detriment. What was posted is just so blatantly mean and unapologetically damaging that any pretense of being for the benefit or entertainment of women is lost.
Yes, they have the freedom to post such speech. However, as good human beings, there needs to be an eye towards publishing responsible speech. It is most disturbing that neither the author nor Marie Claire is expressing any indication that they truly understand why the original post is so offensive. Is this just another indication that people are losing their ability to empathize, or even pretend to empathize?
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