THE LARGER ISSUE

To toss or keep? No, this isn’t about an outfit or a trend, but a rather deceptive label that isn’t in fashion anymore—plus size. Ruman Baig asks industry insiders to weigh in

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My aversion towards the term began when I read a fashion feature that categorized three models with visibly different body types under the umbrella term ‘plus size’. Even the metric for who qualifies as plus size is different in different countries—in India it begins at size 16, in the UK at size 12, and size 18 in the US. A few years ago when the world had just started warming up to the idea of body positivity, the label was viewed as an accurate adjective to describe bigger, fuller women. As we started to unpack what it really stands for, the realization that it’s not only divisive but also possibly humiliating has become increasingly clear.