Things That Piss Me Off, Part The Third.

False Advertising

It's a new season. I like to look at clothes and pretty pretty underwear. Because I like wearing things that are pretty. So I go to Evans Online, Evans being about the only store I can walk into and everything in it I can wear (whether or not I would wear it is a whole other ballgame)... or at least it used to be that everything in it I could wear because, apparently, they've decided they're not stocking pretty bras in my size anymore.

But it's worse than that because of how they advertise their bras on their website:



I've marked on the picture what my problem is. In the top right hand corner of the picture that leads you into the different sections of bras it says "Bras available in sizes 38-50, cups B-H" which fills you (or at least me) with happiness because at least two of the bras they've chosen to showcase here I kinda like. But, here's the thing, none of those bras there actually go up to the 50H size. The multiway goes up to a 46E, the babydoll 46F (the matching bra in the range also only goes up to this size), the basque is either a 42G or a 48E in sizes, while the plain old boring white one goes up to a 40F. These sizes are based on what their own website says they go up to. And not one of them would fit me.

Going into the matching set section because, and I repeat, I like pretty things and I especially like pretty things that have matching other pretty things, there are nine bras with matching knickers and one bra (the one I've mentioned already) that has a matching babydoll, knickers and suspender belt. I really like that last set, but, as I said, can't have. Of these ten sets there are two that I can have there is the Black bra with gorgeous silver floral embroidery. and Beautiful black co-ord bra with teal embroidered detail. The teal one's alright I guess but it's not the black one with sparkly bits or the pink sparkly one or the other black sparkly one. (I know that's not all of them but I don't like the other ones.)

The thing that really gets me, however, is that a couple of months ago I could buy any of the bras on Evans website- not the basques or the babydolls or the corsets but the bras I could have- but now, a couple of months later, they've decided that I'm not to be catered for. I have bought matching sets from them before. I have bought matching sets with suspender belts before. I've tried on a multiway bra that actually fit but now I need to loose 2 inches off my back and go down 2 cup sizes to be able to even try on the multiway bra... and that's not even taking into account that I had to go up one backsize and a cupsize to get the old multiway to fit. But now, apparently, I'm not allowed the option to buy one.

Evans has been, for me, the only place I could get clothes that weren't hideous either in style of price. It has been the only place I could get underwear and sleep wear that wasn't boring and unattractive. I felt betrayed when they started stocking smaller sizes but I let it go because they still stocked clothes in my size. I felt annoyed when the clothes became less well made, when manufacturing flaws became the norm and when the clothes started falling apart quicker because they have been fine with exchanges up to this point. But now they're taking away products that before I was allowed, and that just makes me furious.

But, you know what, I have to keep shopping there. Because there's nowhere else.
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Things That Piss Me Off, Part The Second

The Pictures That Are Used To Illustrate Obesity News Stories.

We've all seen them, the unflattering pictures of fat people with their heads chopped off and that end mid thigh. If heads are visible the person is invariably miserable, or eating, or both.


[Image is of fat woman sitting down with no head and no legs below the knee. I assume they are pictured sitting down in order to remind people how lazy fat people are.]

I typed "obesity" and "uk" into Google new search and saved the pictures of people that came up (I didn't save the ones that were of boxes of pills). The majority of these pictures relate to the anti-obesity drug that was pulled by the EMEA last week after it was linked to a number of suicides and to depression. I'm sure, from the pictures being used to illustrate this story, the chemical effect of the drug wasn't the only thing helping to make these fat people depressed- the way they (or obese people in general) are shown in the media really doesn't help.

Below the cut is the rest of the pictures that I pulled from the net and links to where I got them from.





The BBC in particular seem determined to remind us that we should be monitoring ourselves, but that we're greedy (and not worth faces apparently, backs of heads only!)



And talking of self monitoring:

(Is it just me that wants to caption that first picture: "Measuring: You're Doing It Wrong!"?)

There are just two more images that I pulled from the search. The first is actually of a face that doesn't look particularly happy or unhappy to me but who I have no idea who it is of. The fact that it has a face on it makes me think it can't be just a random person:



While the second is a cartoon of a fat man dropping a pill into his mouth which looks like it is going to go into the mouth of the smaller, thinner man inside him. Because, as we all know, inside every fat person is a thin person dying to get out, or, alternatively, that a fat person isn't actually a person, the fat is, what, a mask? That a fat person can't be considered an actual person until they are no longer fat? FTBS.



And the links:[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12]
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Things That Piss Me Off, Part The First.

Quotation marks round words designed to undermine women's stories.

Like in this picture here:


The heading of note here is "Woman beheads 'attacker'".

Now, ok, beheading people is generally not a good thing. And parading the head around the marketplace, which, according to the full article, she did, is also probably not the wisest of choices. Other people may not take it very well and, indeed, didn't since they called the police. But, putting quotation marks around the word attacker automatically implies that the woman is lying.

For the record, in the article the woman says that the man came up behind her while she was cutting grass and attacked her and she cut his head off, presumably in self defense, although the article says it was to preserve her dignity. And in relation to being attacked she had bite marks on her neck and cheek. She also told police that the man had been harassing her for 3 months. The woman in question is in northern India and I know nothing about norther India or the culture of northern India. I presume the 'dignity' comment means that she thought she was going to be raped. So we have an attempted rape victim who fought back being labeled a liar by MSN. Par for the course right.

If she were a man and she beheaded another man because he attacked her- and there were actual physical marks that indicated that there had been some form of violence (bite marks)- would MSN have put quotations around the word attacker? Do victims of muggings who are out walking at night get blamed for being mugged the same way rape victims often are? No. This is the same thing.

On a related note, this is in "today's picks". It is along side the news that Beckham may be returning to football in England, Angelia wants to adopt again (why is this a shock?) and one of the pussycat dolls doesn't think that she is sexy because men don't hit on her. So a woman being attacked and retaliating is on par with not very news-worthy celebrity news?

The world sucks. Click Here to Read More..