Melissa McCarthy joins the growing chorus of people who think it’s time we do away with the term “plus-size.” The actress and designer chatted with Refinery 29 about her forthcoming Melissa McCarthy Seven7 line and opened up about the limitations of a term that describes the bulk of the American population.
“Women come in all sizes. Seventy percent of women in the United States are a size 14 or above, and that’s technically ‘plus-size,’ so you’re taking your biggest category of people and telling them, ‘You’re not really worthy.’ I find that very strange,” McCarthy said. “I also find it very bad business. It doesn’t make a lot of sense numbers-wise. It’s like, if you open a restaurant and you say, ‘We’re primarily gonna serve people that don’t eat.’ It’s like, what? You would be nuts. Yet, people do it with clothing lines all the time, and no one seems to have a problem with it. I just don’t get why we always have to group everything into a good or bad, right or wrong category. I just think if you’re going to make women’s clothing, make women’s clothing.”
McCarthy also thinks that the way clothing for larger women is segregated in brick-and-mortar locations is alienating. It’s something she wishes to avoid with her own brand and there are several retailers who are just as eager to correct this issue. “I have a couple of very big retailers that I think are going to help me chip away at that in a very meaningful way, and I’m really excited about it. I’m not ready to announce them yet, but they agreed to just put me on the floor. I said, ‘Run the sizes as I make them and let friends go shopping with their friends. Stop segregating women.’ And they said, ‘Okay.’”
McCarthy’s collection is due to launch this month.
[vai Refinery 29]
