There’s a women’s fashion store that specializes in yoga wear and gear called LuluLemon. Up until three months ago, I had never heard of this place as I am not a woman. Since my girlfriend is both a woman and a yoga freak, it was very subtlety brought to my attention, coincidentally, right before Christmas. Go figure.
This past week LuluLemon has been accused, again, of being in the business of body shaming, a phrase I am so tired of I want to slap the fat off of some of these peoples’ faces.
The newest story goes like this; woman walks in, employees make rude and hearable remarks about the woman’s size, woman posts on Facebook about the experience, and the world explodes.
Ok, fine, whatever. The woman has every right to share her experience with the world and, truth be told, that shouldn’t be the culture perpetuated at the store, but we don’t live in should-land. The way this system works is that woman never gives her money to that business. And guess what? LuluLemon doesn’t care.
This is not a new story, it turns out. In fact, such charges have been leveled as far back as 2013 when it was reported widely that Lululemon carries nothing larger than sizes 10-12 and carry very little of those sizes (no pun intended) and often bury them in the back of the store, which, is apparently, fat shaming.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/31/lululemon-plus-size_n_3675605.html
So, let me get this straight…LuluLemon MUST carry products that cater to people who are the least likely to shop at their stores because if they don’t they’re body shaming people? OK, fine…then as a 5’11 man who weighs 175 soaking wet, then all Big & Tall Stores are body shaming me and discriminating against me.
The reason LuluLemon doesn’t carry clothes beyond a size 12 is because they wouldn’t sell, at least not in quantities that warrant carrying said product. If they would sell, of course they would carry them, but there simply aren’t enough “larger” women doing yoga. And if you’re wanting to get started as a size 16 in yoga, there are other stores you can buy clothes at. It’s not fat shaming, body shaming or anything remotely similar. It’s good, smart business.
And as for this whole “body shaming” movement, again I say “boo-hoo.” I realize that we live in the snowflake’s world of political correctness which is defined as “you have the right to your opinion as long as you agree with me,” but I don’t really care. Guess what, America? Amy Shumer is plump. So is Lena Dunham. Does that make them bad people? Of course not. They might be bad people, great people, mediocre people, here’s what I know, they’re plump people. So is Kevin James, but some reason it’s not so shameful to shame men as it is to shame women.
Twist yourself into a pretzel creating a logical argument to any of that, but always remember the playground rules that matters most; everyone gets made fun of and that’s never going to change. We need to stop fighting this truth of nature and society and focus on self esteem, not bullying.
If Amy Shumer is truly proud of her body shape, then she should really stop reacting on social media to everyone that causes her fat or the like. If you are truly comfortable with who you are, then you don’t care what other people think of who you are. That should be the message, and it’s one that’s delivered by demonstrating such confidence, not chiding the people saying things as some sort of vocal villain.
If you don’t like the choices at LuluLemon, don’t shop there…it’s that simple. They don’t seem to want your business anyways, since they’re not stocking choices for you. There’s no law, legal, societal, or otherwise that demands they do so and suggesting they should be compelled is completely un-American. Grow up.
