14 DAY TRIAL // The size 0 controversy continues to rage on, with both pro and con sides bringing to the table seemingly irrefutable supporting arguments. While fashion designers insist that it’s their right to use size-0 models if they so desire, more and more celebrities are speaking out against the trend in order to help impressionable teens (and women in general) see that there should be a clear difference between fashion and real life. Among them is Rihanna as well, who, in a recent interview with the Daily Mail, reveals she refuses to diet.
Granted, she’s still young, some may say: at 22 years old, there’s hardly any reason for Rihanna to go on a restrictive diet. However, in showbiz, things are rarely – if ever – that simple, and there have been cases when much younger women had to limit their daily calorie intake because they were constantly told they needed to be a size or two or more thinner. Rihanna, though, remains deaf to such things, saying she’s long learned that, in order to be accepted and feel good about yourself, you simply have to be yourself.
“The singer’s flair for fashion is such that, according to her European stylists Damian and Avigail, ‘Rihanna is the magic word to designers.’ At our shoot she made the beautiful ballgowns her own by adding details such as a Nora Batty hairnet – pulled down below her eyes – that somehow, bafflingly, looked fabulous and edgy. Her fashion mantra is ‘be yourself’ and the people she admires – she mentions Gwen Stefani, Lady Gaga, Grace Jones and British singer La Roux – she likes because they dare ‘to be different from the rest.’ Her individualistic approach to clothes, her refusal to diet (although she admits to sometimes getting strict with herself if she gets ‘out of control’) and her shapely rather than skinny silhouette (she weighs nine and a half stone) make her a great role model for young girls, with a refreshing take on the insidious size zero obsession of the fashion industry,” the Mail writes.
“You shouldn’t be pressured into trying to be thin by the fashion industry, because they only want models that are like human mannequins. They know that if we see an outfit on a mannequin in a shop window we will love it and want to buy it whatever size we are. That’s why they have size zero models – they want to sell clothes. But you have to remember that it’s not practical or possible for an everyday woman to look like that. Being size zero is a career in itself so we shouldn’t try and be like them. It’s not realistic and it’s not healthy,” Rihanna explains for the British publication.
So, instead of giving in to what others might tell her about how she should look and dress, Rihanna has chosen to surround herself with a closely-knit group of people whom she counts on as friends first and foremost and only after that as business partners. As such, she’s able to see that, while fit and healthy, she can still wear couture and look fab without being a size 0 and starving herself.