People should be able to pay the same amount for clothing and not be taxed because the designer/company hates fat people or wants to exploit fat people's desperation to find literally any clothing that will fit to price gouge people. The idea that higher costs for larger sizes of clothing makes sense because "fabric"--is false. The fat tax is real, it's a product of anti-fat bias (which in the US is tied up in anti-Blackness and capitalism and ableism and in other places is tied up with like, Christian supremacist colonization stuff around defining indigenous and African bodies as "other" so it doesn't feel so bad to be absolutely brutal to people), and it's not true that it's "just" about the cost of materials. If the cost of clothing were just about materials and fabrication, extra small clothes would cost less, and so-called men's clothing would cost more. Instead men's clothing tends to be lower in cost and have more sensible standardized sizing and there's a significant increase in costs above a certain size (16 or 18/1x), and there sto ps being available clothing at all above another size (in a lot of women's clothing brands that's 22 or 24 and above, or 28 and above, with very few exceptions). There's a reeeeally long history of fashion houses run by rich old white
dudes and rich old white ladies who explicitly refused to make clothes or use models in average, much less plus sizes--and that's still true. Christian Siriano is one of the few high end designers who will even make a gown for a fat celebrity for a big high profile red carpet event and apparently he like tripled his business once he started making plus sizes--other companies not doing that is about perceived status/prestige and the idea that fat people "sully" the reputation of a brand, not even about costs of doing business or what would make them money. In the US and the UK and India, fat people experience more job discrimination, make less money, are promoted less, end up doing jobs that are a lot more physically demanding and low status than smaller people, pay more for clothes, furniture, travel, recreation, etc. and have fewer available choices for all of those things, and can't access healthcare both because of discrimination in the doctor's office and because outside of medical facilities specifically designed to amputate or permanently maim parts of people's healthy stomachs to try to make them thinner, hospitals and doctors offices don't bother to order blood pressure cuffs or compression garments or mobility aids or imaging equipment or gowns that fit fat people's bodies, all of which is a policy and practice choice. I have a bunch of friends in the fashion industry and they all have tales of factories refusing to work with them and merchandisers refusing to work with them and just absolutely wild behavior from other people in the industry that is about anti-fat bias (and, like, sexism). Here, have some articles because I'm a social worker/educator lol
https://www.glamour.com/story/fat-tax-is-about-more-than-money
https://www.businessinsider.com/fat-tax-examples-clothing-fashion-flying-bikes-furniture-coffin-2019...
https://www.vogue.in/fashion/content/why-many-indian-designers-are-choosing-to-take-a-stand-against-...
Charlotte Cooper is an academic who's written about fat activism and capitalism and media in Britain. Sabrina Springs wrote a really deep history of the ties between anti-fatness and the chattel slave trade. Da'Shaun Harrison wrote a book about anti-fatness and anti-Blackness. Rachel Kacenjar @theseamripper and @thefatfeminist on instagram talk about fashion industry stuff a bunch. There's a whole academic discipline that's international called Fat Studies. I wonder if any of the antidiscrimination laws that are slowly passing in the US will affect clothing pricing, since it's a kind of discrimination--there was just a law passed in New York City.
dudes and rich old white ladies who explicitly refused to make clothes or use models in average, much less plus sizes--and that's still true. Christian Siriano is one of the few high end designers who will even make a gown for a fat celebrity for a big high profile red carpet event and apparently he like tripled his business once he started making plus sizes--other companies not doing that is about perceived status/prestige and the idea that fat people "sully" the reputation of a brand, not even about costs of doing business or what would make them money. In the US and the UK and India, fat people experience more job discrimination, make less money, are promoted less, end up doing jobs that are a lot more physically demanding and low status than smaller people, pay more for clothes, furniture, travel, recreation, etc. and have fewer available choices for all of those things, and can't access healthcare both because of discrimination in the doctor's office and because outside of medical facilities specifically designed to amputate or permanently maim parts of people's healthy stomachs to try to make them thinner, hospitals and doctors offices don't bother to order blood pressure cuffs or compression garments or mobility aids or imaging equipment or gowns that fit fat people's bodies, all of which is a policy and practice choice. I have a bunch of friends in the fashion industry and they all have tales of factories refusing to work with them and merchandisers refusing to work with them and just absolutely wild behavior from other people in the industry that is about anti-fat bias (and, like, sexism). Here, have some articles because I'm a social worker/educator lol
https://www.glamour.com/story/fat-tax-is-about-more-than-money
https://www.businessinsider.com/fat-tax-examples-clothing-fashion-flying-bikes-furniture-coffin-2019...
https://www.vogue.in/fashion/content/why-many-indian-designers-are-choosing-to-take-a-stand-against-...
Charlotte Cooper is an academic who's written about fat activism and capitalism and media in Britain. Sabrina Springs wrote a really deep history of the ties between anti-fatness and the chattel slave trade. Da'Shaun Harrison wrote a book about anti-fatness and anti-Blackness. Rachel Kacenjar @theseamripper and @thefatfeminist on instagram talk about fashion industry stuff a bunch. There's a whole academic discipline that's international called Fat Studies. I wonder if any of the antidiscrimination laws that are slowly passing in the US will affect clothing pricing, since it's a kind of discrimination--there was just a law passed in New York City.
