I love how "every figure" is represented by 0-20. Because, you know, it's not a figure if it's smaller than a 0 or larger than a 20. Sorry, incredibly petite women, and women who are larger than a 20. You just kinda don't exist to Vogue.

Well, add that the the way Vogue gets it wrong with both The Black Issue and The Sports Issue.

This sort of massive multiple-personality syndrome might just cause Vogue to explode into several different 'zine lines: Vogue Ethnic (I love to hate that word), Vogue Plus (for not-thin-but-curvy women), Vogue Nip-Tuck (for not-thin-but-want-to-be women), Vogue Work-Out (sexy and athletic), Vogue Slimdown (for the weight-obsessed). I mean, why not? They can not only minimize the amount of strange juxtapositions in one issue, maximize the number of total readers (because of the Vogue label), and maximize the number of advertisers (because of the increased number of readers). It would also be great for sites like this, since it is likely that Vogue will continue to exploit negative body image, no matter how they choose to do a layout.

Even though Vogue is only trying to reach out to a new market (black women), lets crucify them. They aren't trying to relate to black women through a prominent figure, instead they are purposely trying to degrade women, especially black women, by stereotyping them throught this figure. They also have a diverse selection of articles not to reach out to as many potential buyers as possible, but to exploit negative body image (what ever that means...). Vogue may be playing to stereo types, but how else are they supposed to capture a new audience? and do you think Beyonce would have agreed to have her picture taken with that caption unless there was some truth to it? You would rather restrict Vogue's freedom of speech than have something that has the possibility of a negative perception. If Vogue was purposely degrading women, (which makes no sense to do because they are a magazine for women and to degrade your audience would be to lose them, and therefore go out of business (which vogue is by the way)) then there would be a problem. The fact is that Vogue is jut trying to market to a new audience, plain and simple.

"They also have a diverse selection of articles not to reach out to as many potential buyers as possible, but to exploit negative body image (what ever that means…)....If Vogue was purposely degrading women, (which makes no sense to do because they are a magazine for women and to degrade your audience would be to lose them, and therefore go out of business (which vogue is by the way)) then there would be a problem."

Fashion magazines intentionally try to make women feel insecure and anxious about themselves, because, in a consumerist culture, we have learned to attempt to resolve our anxiety through purchasing goods and services. This both increases the sales of the magazines themselves and the products ('solutions') advertised therein. It is this very exploitation of culturally induced insecurities which *keeps* such publications in business.

Also, Beyonce certainly would have not had much, if any, say about what headlines were associated with her image by Vogue. And I think you are confusing SI's media critique with 'restrict[ing] Vogue's freedom of speech.' As I have to incessantly explain to my own students, critique is the very opposite of censorship!

While I'm working under the presumption that every issue of Vogue is inherently sexist, it seems to me that the assertion of racism should be backed up with some sort of argument that these cover stories would not appear with a white woman on the cover. I'm not an expert on Vogue covers but if you substitute Angelina Jolie for Beyonce I can imagine everything else staying the same.

If it were the case that our consumer culture spent to resolve anxiety, then sales of everything would be through the roof right now because of the anxiety the recent economy has invoked. However, this is not the case. This is just a marketing ploy to attract new buyers because the sale of printed material continues to decline. Vogue is printing things that they think people want to read about. If their target audience is women and they are spending large sums of money to research what women want to read about, then stop yelling at Vogue and start yelling at the women who buy these magazines. Vogue is not the cause, it is the effect. It's bad business just trying to sell on the emotion of peoples insecurities because emotions are unreliable and unpredictable at best.

Unfortunately, Vidya, you are claiming that Beyonce doesn't own her image and that Vogue does. Yes she is on the cover, but she knew the strings attached, how much she was going to be paid, and what it was going to do to her image (that's what she pays her publicist for). It's a win-win for Vogue, Beyonce, and almost everyone else... Almost.

It’s bad business just trying to sell on the emotion of peoples insecurities because emotions are unreliable and unpredictable at best.

Nonsense; emotions can be quite predictable and reliable. Anxieties can be reliable and predictable.

If businesses don't sell on emotion, what do they sell on? Formal mathematical logic? Emotion is a massive part of the human experience and is not always irrational.

Think for a second about that. Do you understand, with complete certainty, the depth and level of your emotional reaction to any given thing? Can you predict your own reactions to something before that something happens? How many times have you gotten or done something you thought was going to illicit one emotional reaction when instead you got the opposite? For example, you feel sad and you want to feel happy. When you have felt sad in the past, you know that running helps you to feel happy. So you run and yet, after running, you still feel sad. Was this predictable? Not even you yourself could predict what running, or whatever the action, would illicit in terms of an emotional response.

And business sell on something we will term demand. Emotion might be apart of that demand, but it is mainly based on what the market wants.

First, the emotion thing is a red herring. Can Vogue magazine predict how people will emotionally react to their covers? Are you really saying no, they have no idea, the covers are completely random and the professionals trying to sell more copies of the magazine are helpless? Note that businesses don't need to predict how each individual potential customer will react, just how customers in aggregate react.

Think for a second yourself. Other commenters here said that Vogue sells on insecurity, you say no, they sell on demand. But as there is no conflict between "demand" and "insecurity," you are not responding to the question of whether or not Vogue is sexist. All you are saying is that they are business.

So another way of restating your argument is that businesses cannot be sexist, because they are simply providing what their customers want. Of course the Vogue cover might still be sexist, but it would be the customers, and not the business, that would be to blame.

Is that correct? There's some truth to it but I think this rests on an overly strong view of individualism, where people simply choose their personal preferences from scratch, without any regard to the society they see around them. I'm not sure I have the time to expound on this view though.

Wait, you really think the beauty industry doesn't play on women's anxieties in order to sell products? Everything they sell is about fear and worry -- worry that we're too fat, we have bad skin, we have bad breath, we're too hairy, we're not wearing the right clothing, etc.

And claiming that our current economy somehow proves that fear doesn't sell is simply ridiculous. People can't buy anything when they don't have money. That's like claiming that "the free market" would somehow magically keep consumers safe because it's in a company's best interest to protect their potential clients. That worked so well when that jackass who owned the peanut company willfully allowed tainted food out of his factory and actually killed some of those very clients!

i was with you until you say beyonce is thin. what planet do you live on? that chick is a biscuit! look at those knees and ankles!

This is the first time ever have I heard the complaint that ALL women are told that they should push themselves to be the impossible.. .like a black woman, with all those curves. Black women do not represent the ideal. The young blond, size 2, model/actress thats usually graces the cover of Vogue, and every other fashion magazine, does. The idea that women are told to be like black women or curvy women is laughable. As I understand it, the shape issue usually celebrates a body type that isn't the ideal, once a year. Now I know vogue will never put a truely overweight woman on the cover, but in the shape issue they have had Drew Barrymore and Angelina Jolie(she was supposedly athletic), and both talked about their workout routine with Barrymore describing her recent weight loss.--I think when talking about the issue of the media 'allowing' black women to have curves while white women are pushed to be super thin, you have to look at the black standard of beauty. To be thick, curvy, phat, or with back is accepted and celebrated. Black men love Beyonce's thick thighs and Jaime Foxx has openly lusted for Serena's back. U see this black standard in black magazines and music. And u see black people describing women that MSM would call fat as sexy, think Jill Scott, Queen Latifah, Faith, and Beyonce. If black people accept these women, then the white media has to if they want to earn our dollars. Think, if Queen Latifah wasn't so loved by black people first, would Cover Girl ever given her an ad deal. Or think Ellen, her status in the GLBST community lead to her TV show then cover girl deal.

this is silly. 1st, Beyonce is neither skinny nor thin. 2nd, she is curvy. Relax. Everything isn't racist.

I have seen the Vouge issue featuring Beyonce and I think it is a good picture. Had she been featured wearing a red dress, I may be inclined to agree that it is racist. The aritcles are just titles to draw readers in, and it worked! The majority of the human race knows that not every African-American and Latino woman has big boobs and big behinds. I live in the southern part of the States and I could use the old cliche "We grow em big in the south". Honey, where I live, Caucasin, Asian, and Russian, females are well endowed at the top and the bottom! Vogue is trying to reach a larger audience, and when you take on a new direction, you try to reach everyone that will listen. Money and politics always seem to play a part when a new idea, or the change in tratition is introduced to the American public. We still seem to be playing the "Race Card". Stereotyping is another obstical we are working on. I commend Vogue for expanding it's horizons. We must continue to change our perception of women and companies need to be careful how they portray women. Everyone can't be pleased, but it does open up dialouge.

Truly good news does not sell.

There's a black woman on the cover of Vogue, but all anyone can do is try and find a way to spin it to a negative. I'm reminded of how instead of congratulating Ice Cube for putting out a crossover hit that showed black characters employed and working hard to feed their families, all anyone could do is blast for a sequence in which one character trash-talks Rosa Parks (and gets lambasted for it in the film, I hasten to add. A good thing happened - enjoy it for a moment.

Wow, Vogue talks about how to look pretty and thin! Call Ripley!

"Real Women Have Curves" was a film all about improving self-image and what were considered women's "proper roles" in the world. But somehow here it gets twisted into a way to further racism and keep blacks and latinas down by making them represent...what's attractive? huh?

Odds are they'd have done the same exact articles if they had anyone else on the cover. Heck, pick up any other issue (you know, all the ones that DIDN'T have a black woman on the cover) and see is the same kind of articles don't show up. And then explain how if they show up on the issue with Beyonce, they mgaically become racist.

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"If you only look for the evil in men, you will always find it" - Abraham Lincoln, according to the film Polyanna.

Q - How many feminists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
A - That's Not Funny!

I think there are several issues here. One is that everyone's perceptions of who is "thin" are different and also "thin" and "curvy" are not mutually exclusive. Not to mention the multiple pictures/depictions of Beyonce available via Google and the fact that she appears differently in many of them.

Second of all, you can critique something (a magazine) and also celebrate it. Framing critique like negative nancies are raining on your parade and missing the point is a strategy to ward off any criticism. Just because Vogue is doing something positive doesn't mean they get a free pass. I can celebrate lots of things about Dove's Real Beauty Campaign and at the same time object to what I understand to be the shortcomings of such a campaign.

And whether or not this is racist, social dimensions of race and weight intersect all over the place, and for a long time white beauty has relied on notions of black beauty. White women have greatly benefited from the fetishization of thick, curvy, phat Black and Latina women valued for their hips and asses. No doubt, the intricate and contradictory ways in which these social elements intersect might take us forever to parse out.

Finally, regardless of whether this is racist, the messages ARE sexist and sizist and add to the very contradictory messages women receive about their bodies on a daily basis. And the argument that this is Vogue's same ol' doesn't make it any less so.

As a black woman I think people are over reacting. Does Anna hate fatties?! YES Anna (Vogue's editor) never puts fat women on "her" cover unless she is trying to make a point.... ie JHud. Oprah said before Anna would put her on the cover she told Oprah she had to lose weight. And thats what Oprah did. Got her butt into the gym and worked off some weight. (Vogue also retouched Oprah's arms) And I believe she would have said that to any body white, black or other. Is she trying to be racist... IMO no! The money is in making women ALL women feel bad about themselves. Because if women were happy their would be no need for women to buy want Vogue sales.

YOU PEOPLE NEED TO SIMMER DOWN!!!!WHITE PEOPLE HAVE CURVES TOO! YOU ARE WAAAAAAY TO SENSITIVE RIGHT NOW! JUST BECAUSE YOU YOURSELF ARE NOT CURVEY DOESNT MEAN YOU NEED TO GET UPSET!!!!! GROW UP AND STOP TRYING TO MAKE DRAMA!

It's all about marketing. They get these see-thru supermodels who are loaded down with make up then air brushed to make woman feel bad about themselves. Then companies come up with diet pills, diet shakes, girdles, shapers, wrinkle cream, thighmasters, etc..... There is a lot of money to be made in the area of women's self esteem. We have to stop doing it to ourselves.

I think some people can make ANYTHING racist as was seen in the movie "Boomerang" with the example there being the game of pool. If you don't like the magazine cover buy "Real Simple" instead.

It seems more about size-ism than anything else.

I think you're kind of overdoing it with the criticism. I'm black and see nothing about this cover that is racist at all.

In this day in age the definition of "curvy" is between thin and fat. whether up top, in the middle, or down at the bottom.

1st I have 2 say that "thin is in" in thhe fashion world which breaks from reality. Vogue is not part of the real world so their are not going 2 put a real person on ther cover unless it feels fit.

2nd White women are curvy..........Scarlet Johanssen, Kate Winslet, and at the moment Jessica Simpsonor putting beyonce on their cover.

Well, Beyoncé should be thinner, There is no possible way to find good fashion for people bigger than size 6, and I cant even imagine why someone would need to "conquer their diet demons" they should just NOT eat fatty food, and not be huge. There is no such thing as being fat because of genetics, a woman should be thin and waif like Gisele Bundchen or Adriana Lima....etc.

People who do not see anything wrong with this cover page or who are defending it should not be on this website at all and have no brains. Get the fuck out.

Yolanda: Curvy is defined, in our society, as being thin but having that hourglass shape too. But you cannot be plump and curvy nope, because that is just fat (to society, which is wrong).

Gio: You are a fucking asshole, get the hell out of here.

I stand by what I said, Beyoncé is much too large for the cover of Vogue. I applaud the attempt by Anna Wintour to open the gates and accept everyone, but thats not Fashion. Beyoncé at her current size will never be Haute Couture, she will never be high fashion, shes much too large. I really don't care if anyone gets their feelings hurt, its not about feelings, its not any sort of world togetherness rally, its not about accepting those who choose to be obese and blame it on every and anything but them self, its about fashion, and women aspiring to be thin and healthy, and attractive cause that is what separates the fashion world from the common world. Obesity is a choice, its not a lifestyle, its not an ethnicity, its not something that should be accepted in normal life, but that battle is not mine to fight, I just know that she was too big for the cover. I don't like the cover period.

Gio, you are a misogynist bastard. You are the fucking scum of the earth and you are the reason that there is this fucking idiocy going around that there is this "natural" beauty that people have to aspire to. No, obesity is not good. But if you think that Beyonce is obese, then you have a fucking complex. Don't shit your problems onto everyone else just because you have fucking issues. There is NOTHING wrong with people who are not anorexic or bone-ass thin. There IS something wrong when it is affecting your health, but you are obviously just concerned with your vanity bullshit and not health at all. I hope you rot in hell you assshole.

Yes my darling I am a vanity inspired person, I believe vanity is art, almost like hedonism which I aspire to. Obviously I see u didn't read my comment its unfortunate that you have this chip on your shoulder and u think that everything u said was meant to hurt me but I welcome being vain, I really do not care about your feelings getting hurt. Beyoncé is a wonderful artist and entertainer however she is still TOO BIG for Vogue period, its not a music magazine its a fashion magazine, and she was and still is too large. I don't like it.

Gio, you seem to have this fixation with me attempting to "hurt your feelings" which says something about how insecure you really are. You are a fool, and fucking idiot. I do not say these things to make you go "oh sniffle, shame on me" I say them because they are facts about you and you are just a very ugly thing; not even a human being, but a nobody. Fuck you, fuck your obsession with vanity, and I cannot wait for people like you to die off. You make this world a horrible place.

Awe. Well that was a very cute monologue, but please spare me your dramatics. I honestly do not care about your opinion it means absolutely nothing to me, I am who I am and that is not up for debate, what is open for debate is the fact that I think that Beyoncé is much too large for Vogue magazine, I see the attempt that Anna Wintour was trying to make to reach out to people like yourself who believe that everything should be accepted, and everything is fair. Life is not fair, and Beyoncé is still too large for Vogue. There are plenty of waif and thin supermodels who are immensely more deserving of such a prestige as to be on the cover of the worlds most recognized fashion magazine. You my darling seem like an embittered, overweight feminist in my personal opinion but never once have I attacked you for what you come off as, because I do not argue with fools, and I wish you nothing but the best and over abundant blessings in your life, but what I do know is that it is horribly unfair for Beyoncé and other artists that are not models and are NOT thin to press into the fashion world when they are not thin. Size 6 and under.

BTW-I'm not a misogynist, I am actually the exact opposite. I just do not like large women in fashion. Its disgusting.

"what is open for debate is the fact that I think that Beyoncé is much too large for Vogue magazine"

You do not even have any valid reasons to back up your claims except that it makes you cringe to see a HEALTHY looking woman on the cover of a magazine...no, actually, i take that back because i do not know her current health condition. Hell, she could be striving for that anorexic, thin look because people like you tell her that she needs to.

"There are plenty of waif and thin supermodels who are immensely more deserving of such a prestige as to be on the cover of the worlds most recognized fashion magazine."

Who are YOU to decide that? You obviously think you are some kind of high and mighty god or something, who has the jurisdiction to judge a person's worth based on their appearance. Well, I have news for you buddy; your opinion is worth just as much as mine and mine is close to NOTHING as you probably feel. You can live just as easily as I can and you can die just as easily. You are not worth as much as you would like to believe, and neither are your opinions.

"You my darling seem like an embittered, overweight feminist in my personal opinion but never once have I attacked you for what you come off as, because I do not argue with fools"

Thanks for judging me just because I believe in respect - except for scum like you that has no respect for anyone but yourself; not even those super thin models you talk so much about. You only care about yourself, and this is painfully obvious.

And you have been arguing with me this entire time! Don't try and pretend you are better than me because you are also having an argument over the internet with someone you don't know, otherwise you would just have ignored me and my comments.

"I wish you nothing but the best and over abundant blessings in your life"

Oh spare me.

"what I do know is that it is horribly unfair for Beyoncé and other artists that are not models and are NOT thin to press into the fashion world when they are not thin. Size 6 and under."

All I can say again is that you have no right to judge that and you disgust me.

"BTW-I’m not a misogynist, I am actually the exact opposite. I just do not like large women in fashion. Its disgusting."

Only loving thin women does not make you respectful towards women; it makes you a stupid, ignorant product of your society. If we were say, in the 16th century during the time of the Renaissance, then you would find more rotund women to be the epitome of beauty. You only think that bony, skinny women are attractive because of the standards of beauty set by society, and if you cannot see that beauty is subjective, then you are truly an idiot. This is a sociological thread, so leave if you cannot even use your mind correctly.

"BTW-I’m not a misogynist, I am actually the exact opposite. I just do not like large women in fashion. Its disgusting."

Lolz. I'm not a misandrist, I just think any man with a BMI over 18 is a fucking fat pig. (Oh, is that almost all of them? Oops.)

Ha ha! that was amazingly amusing darling. I still stand by what I say, I am judging according to the fact that in fashion you cannot be fat. Thats that. Beyoncé is too fat for the cover. I care nothing about your other opinions and you being hurt by what is said but its the truth. I don't care about what you think of me, you can keep that to yourself.

BTW- my BMI is 16.7 thank you for asking!

Hah, "the truth" you say...the truth is nothing more than YOUR IDIOTIC OPINION, get it? You obviously have issues with your own view of yourself and that is why you feel the need to attack people who are HEALTHY LOOKING and not anorexic sticks. I don't care if you don't want to hear what I am saying because I will not stop just because you whine about how you want fashion to be. SHE WAS ON THE COVER AND THERE IS NOTHING YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT FUCKER :D So just go crawl back into the hole you came out of and learn that you are a fool and brain-washed by your society; your lack of an actual argument to my points is proof of that.

Wow, so not only are you a sizeist Gio, your little "darling" comment actually proves you are misogynist! Could you have trotted out an older method? "Shame the woman by talking down to her like a child" good one there! Keep going you have your wonderful captive audiance to spit your vitrol filled hate speech regarding women who wear something greater then a size 6.

Don't feed the troll, people... please...

Great write-up by the OP. The comments, however, are a mixed-bag and I wonder why some of the commentators are even on this site to begin with...

LMAO! Exactly. Completely unattainable because there's no way for the consumer to reach any other conclusion than to have cognitive dissonance and pay Vogue money as a worried and confused consumer to whom they're offering the services of their tips and secrets to be more desirable and look at other women you probably don't resemble nor have enough money to get the surgeries they've had done.

I'd hardly describe Beyonce as 'extremely thin'. I mean, I'm not saying everyone should be a size six, but don't get carried away with what's a normal shape. Beyonce's just normal, not thin, not large. It's just as ridiculous to start saying size 16 is normal as to say size 6 is. It might be the most common, but it's not a normal, healthy weight.

This is dumb.. No wonder unemployment is so high there are a lot of idiots in the world and all of them see a point in this article.

As a Black woman, I don't see the racism here. It's definitely sexist, but that's all. That's problematic and par for the course for Vogue are in fashion industry publication. That should be the focus in this particular case. I don't think Beyonce's extremely thin, thinner than she was, yes, but she's not a waif.