Elle magazine pulls article on Iowa State Fair fashion
Elle magazine says it pulled off its website an essay critiquing fashion at the Iowa State Fair after Iowans complained.
The piece, "Fear and Clothing at the Iowa State Fair" by New York author Cintra Wilson, draws a contrast between slim New Yorkers and heavier Midwesterners. At the fair, Wilson noticed "way too many people driving Rascals and surly women around 30 who had been savaged by love and taken to expressing their rage through softball and tattoos."
"Upon further review, we determined that its content wasn't in the spirit of Elle. We never want to offend our readers and felt the best course of action was to remove the article from our site," Holly F. Whidden, a spokeswoman for the magazine, said today. The piece was published Aug. 17 on Elle.com.
The uproar was unintentional, Wilson told the Register today.
"I am frankly mystified by the fact that people think I was viewing [the state fair] and Iowans negatively," Wilson wrote in an email. "I wasn't judging Iowa fashion...I'm just looking at regional differences, not with a jaundiced eye."
Regional differences are the staple of Wilson's fourth book, the upcoming "Fear and Clothing: Unbuckling America's Fashion Destiny" (W.W. Norton, 2012). In it, she will report on the differing approaches to fashion and regional style throughout America's many "belts" - corn, rust, gun and more.
"The book is about personal authenticity in fashion and how it is sometimes regionally flavored by the political economy," Wilson said. "Truth of the matter is, I am staunchly opposed to all capitalist brainwashing that suggests that women need to look a certain 98-pound, 17-year-old way."
Wilson did write glowingly of Iowa's natural beauty, and her piece lauded Iowans for their "pervasive kindness," political acuity and proclivity for long marital bliss.
An Iowan living in New York said Wilson came off as "condescending."
"New York City is so different from any other place in the U.S. ... You just can't compare fashion here to fashion in Iowa," said Des Moines native Ashley Baccam, who lives in Brooklyn.
By the time the article was removed, more than 30 commenters had posted largely negative replies to Wilson's article - yet one defended the piece.
"Is there an Iowan reading this article that hasn't made fun of the fashion at the Iowa State Fair?" wrote Ryan Looysen on Des Moines clothing company Raygun's blog. With a master's degree in consumer style and years spent working in the fashion world, Looysen largely defended the "Fear and Clothing" article as accurate if not courteous.
This isn't the first time Wilson has faced a public backlash about her work - in August of 2009, her New York Times "Critical Shopper" column maligning JCPenney was so ill-received, the Times apologized.
For her part, Wilson says her article was meant to present Iowans in a positive light, regardless of how readers in Iowa perceived their own stylistic impression.
"I thought Iowa was beautiful, and Iowans were amazing, lovely people," said Wilson. "Iowa, mi amor."