If you spent any time in a car during the summer you were likely thoroughly harassed by Meghan Trainor’s hit “All About That Bass.” It probably got to the point where you were so sick of it, you were begging for treble.
I loved the song when I first heard it.
It was an upbeat tune that preached body positivity and self-acceptance with an easy, repetitive hook rivaled only by Rihanna’s “umbrella-ella-ella.”
I’m not the only one who fell under the song’s 1950s pop spell. As of Wednesday, “All About That Bass” sits at No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart. It’s at No. 3 on iTunes, and the music video has more than 149 million views on YouTube.
Alas, people developed some issues with the song. While some saw it as a positive message to love your body, some have accused Trainor of skinny-shaming.
The second verse to the song opens with the lines “I’m bringing booty back/ Go ahead and tell them skinny bitches that/ No I’m just playing.”
I get it. A song about body positivity probably shouldn’t call girls of a certain size “bitches.” I can see where they would draw the idea of skinny-shaming from.
But I find it nearly impossible to take the idea of skinny-shaming seriously.
It’s not a real issue to me. Thin girls whining about someone skinny-shaming them registers on my “give a crap” scale at about the same level as male ?oppression.
Are skinny girls made fun of? Yes. Do plus-sized girls make fun of skinny girls? Yes. Is it acceptable? Of course not. Bullying of any kind has consequences. And regardless of your size, you should never be made to feel uncomfortable about your body.
But at the end of the day, when the size-two girl and the size-16 girl split, the size two is greeted with a much warmer welcome. She is normal. She is right. She is pretty. She is acceptable.
People also took issue with the music video, in which a thin, model-type woman wrapped in plastic is teased by the dancers.
At the beginning of the video, the model is standoffish. She doesn’t interact with the dancers and turns her back to them.
But as the video progresses, she loosens up. She is booty-bumped, and by the end, she is dancing with the others.
The model is not an example of skinny-shaming. She is the physical representation of the ridiculous beauty standards Trainor is singing about.
We shouldn’t have to look like that to be happy or to feel loved or to love ourselves. And if we all let go of those standards, we would be a lot better off.
I think it’s also important to point out Trainor wrote this song from her experience as a plus-sized girl growing up with low self-confidence.
I can’t speak for Trainor, but I feel this song is specifically tailored toward bigger girls. It’s about making them feel good in a world constantly tearing them down. It might leave thin girls feeling left out but then think about how plus-sized girls feel in just about every other song on the radio.
“All About that Bass” might not be the perfect body anthem, but it’s a step in the right direction.
lnbanks@indiana.edu
