Jessica Simpson’s Size Issue: She’s No Beth Ditto

Jessica Simpson is a leggy singing sensation noted for bringing shame to classic gems by Berlin, Robbie Williams, and John Mellencamp. She was once married to this unfortunate bloke from a similarly unfortunate boyband. They even had MTV air reels of their honeymoon. However, like all young Americans tiring of the crushing monotony of marriage, they divorced! And then one day, she gained just enough weight to resemble an average-looking woman, but also made a poor fashion choice that involved mom jeans. Since then, she's been defending herself to cruel media crows mercilessly taunting, "Fatty Fatty two by four! Can't fit through the kitchen door, just fell through the foyer floor!"

And as much as I’d love to be the first of the murder to cry, “Omigod you guys, leave Jessica alone!” I’m just going to shrug my shoulders and sit this one out. Because she’s actually buying into the media myth of her girth, having let Graydon Carter cast her in the role of “Sorta Fatty” on the cover of the latest Vanity Fair. Worse is the teaser, which dauntingly asks us, “You call this fat?” And most of us refute, “No we don’t. So why do you ask us to, Graydon?” But perhaps we can all use this issue to explain why people no longer buy magazines. Because, really VF? You want us to view Jessica Simpson, who’s made her entire living on being a skinny, Southern belle bouncing around in slinky outfits, as a champion for size acceptance? She’s not even fat. Sigh. You’re adorable when inebriated, VF.

Choice soundbytes within the puff piece include not only an admission of curvaceousness, but contrived self-awareness and a fatalist’s attitude that would seem sunnier if Simpson were blathering on about her latest record, not her waistline. She yelps, “It comes with what I do ... and I know that every day the media’s going to challenge me, is going to want to bring me down But I feel like I’m at such a place that I own myself, and it’s authentic. I own that authentic part of myself, and none of those words are harsh enough to make me believe them.” In other words, she says, “Bitch, you don’t know me, I may be fat, but you ugly.” Most problematic: how the scribe colors Simpson as an underdog, jilted at the most inopportune moment, tortured when taken out of context. But counter to all efforts, all this undue indulgence makes us dislike Jessica Simpson further. You can’t ask America to fall more in love with the Backwoods Barbie they ushered into media prominence on the basis of her dreamy all-Americanness.

By contrast, there’s The Gossip frontwoman Beth Ditto, who has the right to play the underdog card—especially in an era when Americans have taken an unfounded liking towards underdogs. But she chooses not to. She finds ways to glamorously tear down the stigma around that three-letter word while keeping most talk primarily centered on her musical exploits and high fashion passions. Heck, Ditto even booked a Condé Nast cover, space usually reserved for her more twiggy counterparts.

While there are similarities, Ditto’s classy way of handling with the public’s body image issues highlights a huge flaw with the Simpson-VF collaboration. Ultimately, Simpson’s led to believe that by putting on a few pounds (not an unfortunate pair of mom jeans), she’s less the pop star she used to be. And therein lies an absurdity so heavy that it makes Kirstie Alley’s fat pants look like a neat pencil skirt.