“I’d just been on a trip to Minnesota, where I can only kindly describe most of the people I saw as little houses.”
I can’t recall when an outtake from an interview got as much attention as that Anna Wintour comment, which ended up on the 60 Minutes cutting room floor. The blogosphere was abuzz for about a week and so were people in real life, and from what I read and heard, younger women — those in their twenties — were most likely to see Wintour’s ivory tower BS for the fat hate it is and to excoriate her for it.
The Vogue editrix, while insulting an entire state, didn’t explain what kinds of little houses she meant — cottages, bungalows, brownstones? — but she helpfully spread her hands like that to show us she didn’t mean flatteringly voluptuous, à la the famous brick houses made even more famous by the Commodores in 1977.
She went on to say something equally obnoxious along the lines of, well sure we hear about the dangers of anorexia but what about fatties? Her point about obesity is indisputable but her way of making it offended many.
Click on her skinny self to go to the outtake on the CBS website.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
I rarely experience the desire to smack someone, but I’m experiencing it right now.
In the first place, to paint an entire state with such a broad (!) brush is just silly. I’ve been to Minnesota, too – a lot – and it has a variety of sizes and shapes of people, just like every other state. Despite her weasely phrase (”Most of the people I saw…”) she clearly was pitting beauty and sophistication against plodding, dowdy old Midwesterners.
Well. At least most of the Minnesotans I know will look you in the eye when talking to you, and not keep staring at the floor or over your shoulder like a dissembling child. (Smack!)
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Smack away! I feel the same way. Several outraged comments I read mentioned Minnesota was ranked at or near the top of a survey of the fittest states. I never saw the survey so I don’t know if it’s true, but regardless …
I liked Meryl Streep as her a heck of a lot more than I like her!