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29 March 2024

Airbrushing ban likely for fashion industry

Mad Men has celebrated the full-figured woman. (SUPPLIED)

Published
By Staff

At last, hope for women struggling to stay thin.

If the British government has its way, the fashion industry will be forced to clamp down on airbrushed photographs in magazines and adverts and asked to stop promoting unrealistic body images.

Lynne Featherstone, the equalities minister, who has long campaigned against size-zero photoshoots, will convene a series of discussions this autumn with the fashion industry, including magazine editors and advertising executives, to discuss how to promote body confidence among young people, the UK’s Sunday Times said.

The first will focus on airbrushing, which Featherstone argues is contributing to "the dreadful pressure that young people, girls and women come under to conform to completely unachievable body stereotypes".

She will push for a  health warning on airbrushed photographs, warning viewers that they are not real.

"I am very keen that children and young women should be informed about airbrushing, so they don't fall victim to looking at an image and thinking that anyone can have a 12in waist. It is so not possible," she was quoted as saying by the Sunday Times.

She praised curvaceous role models such as the full-figured Christina Hendricks, who plays vivacious office manager Joan Holloway in “Mad Men”, the US TV series about the 1960s advertising industry.

"Christina Hendricks is absolutely fabulous. We need more of those role models," she said.

Hopefully, the law, when it comes into play, will not just impact the British industry but given the global nature of fashion, influence the industry elsewhere, too.

David Cameron was supposed to rescue the British economy, but he has now come to the rescue of women battling body image issues.

Featherstone's comments come a week after "plus-size" model Crystal Renn complained that she had been retouched to look several sizes smaller for an ad campaign.

Last year the Olay cosmetics firm was criticised by the advertising watchdog for retouching a photograph of Twiggy, removing wrinkles around her eyes in an ad for an under-eye cream.