“Bikinis don’t look good on bigger girls,” is the statement she’s addressing here, and her response is perfect: “I’m going to have to disagree,” Lane notes.
Loey Lane has become one of the most influential plus size fashion vloggers on YouTube in the past two years. And there’s no doubt that Loey Lane swimsuit videos are among some of her most popular uploads via her channel, which — ICYMI — has 359,000+ subscribers to date.
Lane’s fashion and beauty repertoire on YouTube is quite extensive as she covers everything from skincare to makeup to shopping to fashion to, of course, outfit posts. Weaved within her videos is a body positive theme that’s hard to deny. Though the comment section on many of her videos is often littered with haters and people who try to discourage her outlook on her own body image, there is also a ton of solidarity — making it obvious that viewers the world over have found her encouraging viewpoints on being a curvier, fuller-figured woman enlightening.
Last month, Lane shared a video to address some of the grief she had been receiving for wearing swimsuits in photographs and videos. The four and a half minute reaction, entitled “Why Fat Girls Shouldn’t Wear Bikinis,” has come to media attention this week, leading to her thoughts on the so-called reasons that plus size women shouldn’t wear bikinis garnering over one million views.
Here are just seven body positive points Loey Lane makes in the video, all while wearing a killer bikini.
1. No one human or entity can decide what’s attractive or what’s not.
“Bikinis don’t look good on bigger girls,” is the statement she’s addressing here, and her response is perfect: “I’m going to have to disagree,” Lane notes.
She pokes fun at the fact that some people act like the general consensus from YouTube commenters is the “be all and end all” when it comes to a fashion verdict. But trolls’ words mean nothing, and they just never will.
2. No one can dictate what you put on your body
Even though the thought of seeing a bikini on a plus size woman might still make someone bigoted individuals uncomfortable, it doesn’t mean you have to live by their standards. Basically, Loey Lane reiterates that what you want to wear and what you feel comfortable in are no one’s choice but yours.
Lane also makes the point that most of the time, thinner women are never asked to not wear a bikini or revealing clothes, even if some people’s aesthetic preferences lean towards fuller figures. So why should plus women be treated any differently?
3. Wearing a bikini as a larger woman is not an effort to make people believe they should be bigger, too.
I love how Loey Lane puts this into perspective. In her video, she notes that it’s not like she’s laying out on the beach stuffing her face with junk food as a way of “promoting obesity,” (although it’d be her choice and her choice only to do so), as some critics suggest she and other plus women wearing a bikini are doing.
It’s as simple as this: Plus size women are only promoting self confidence regardless of size. That’s it.
4. Plus-size women are often misunderstood when they do “healthy” things.
Lane makes an excellent point here by reenacting a hypothetical scene of her with a bowl of fruit. A voice says in the background, “Look at her trying to pretend to be healthy. Go get on a treadmill.”
Plus women are criticized when they don’t “embrace a healthy lifestyle,” (“healthy” as defined by the mainstream, because there are many different ways of being/looking heathy, of course), but then they are equally criticized all the same when they share gym selfies or pictures of a banana. This type of standard is absurd and unnecessarily cruel.
5. Plus-size women in bikinis are NOT asking for your feedback.
Lane also addresses the idiocy behind the comment that “if a plus size woman wears anything revealing, she’s just asking for someone to shame her.”
Here’s the thing: Most people don’t actually want Internet trolls or IRL bullies to say negative things about them. And the way women dress is by no means an open call for others to vocalize their opinions. Loey Lane basically says that if you don’t have anything good to say, why say it at all?