What the Return of the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show Revealed About Me, Us, and Feminine Beauty
My personal vendetta, power, protection, and the Miracle bra (also: Voldemort)
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When I heard the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show was back, I had the exact reaction the Minister of Magic had when he saw Voldemort ↓
I’ve got a bit of a personal history with Victoria and her secrets …
First, like many teens who probably masturbated to their mothers’ underwear catalogs, my high school boyfriend held the Victoria’s Secret Angels up as the pinnacle of feminine beauty.
Second, like any vengeful, justice-oriented teen girl entirely motivated by spite, after he cheated on me (twice) I resolved to become a model so that I could rub it in his face embody that whatever magical power the Angels had that (I imagined) made them impervious to abuse, abandonment and ridicule.
(WOW, that went deep. I know; I’ve done a lot of therapy).
I DID become a model … but I did NOT become a Victoria’s Secret Angel.
I DID develop an eating disorder to cope with emotional abuse and trauma … but I did NOT become impervious to abuse, abandonment or ridicule.
Third, I DID work at Victoria’s Secret after college … but I did NOT enjoy it, and it gave me extra motivation to get my masters degree so I could escape ever, ever selling bras and thongs while being hit on by married men.
Post-masters degree, the beauty standard of the Victoria’s Secret Angel remained, and I measured myself against that yardstick of impossible, spray-tanned beauty.
Even after a baby.
Even after a hysterectomy.
Even as a radical feminist and women’s health advocate.
Even (I am ashamed to admit) still, sometimes.
How? Why? The hyper-thin, white-or-racially-ambiguous, aspirational, unattainable, male-gaze-y Angel standard is SO STICKY.
Victoria’s Secret did what it set out to with its 90s-00s fashion show: It set the feminine beauty standard for more than a generation with the Angels (and, to a lesser extent, its lingerie).
The fashion show set standards for a generation of men and women
I have walked in on two of my ex boyfriends (not together; years apart) watching the Victoria’s Secret fashion show with friends like it was the Super Bowl. It was an event. It was a group text. It was a thing, and, like all important American cultural events, it was broadcast on primetime.
The sexualization and the idealized beauty — and its mainstream appeal — made the VS Show a FANTASY that hetero men could enjoy (together? alone?) and feel good about, maybe. Women were objects of desire, and that was okay, because, look, they’re on a runway on TV.
And, look, they’re wearing wings! They’re not real women, so we don’t have to respect them 🙃
“All about women?”
Victoria’s Secret pulled the plug on its annual fashion show six years ago after coming under fire for bullying and ageism accusations as, in a post-#MeToo world, a brand out-of-touch with “what women want.”
In the 00s, when VS was at its height of commercializing and objectifying women’s bodies, it was also making peak profits and dominating the lingerie industry. But, as customers started to age and began to question the conventional definition of beauty, the hyper-sexual brand image failed to hold up.
But — hold on! — this time, Victoria’s Secret vowed to make its return show ALL ABOUT WOMEN.
Did it make good on its promise?
The Victoria’s Secret 2024 show featured only women musical artists and, in addition to its standard super-thin white supermodels, there were models of color, including a few with natural hairstyles, and older and plus-sized models.
Tyra Banks, the brand’s first Black model, closed the show, and plus-sized model Ashley Graham, walked the runway. Despite (or because of?) its past controversies regarding trans models, trans folk walked, too.
But was it ALL ABOUT WOMEN?
I don’t think so.
The effects remain:
Unrealistic body standards. Many viewers didn’t want to see diverse bodies on the runway. The mystique of the VS Angels was that their bodies were unattainable and left us hating ourselves! Toxic online comment sections say: Give us back the old VS Show.
Lack of diversity. The average American woman was still not well-represented on the runway or by the VS products that were made shoppable in real time on Amazon (it aired on Amazon Prime)
Objectification and sexualization. The entire brand/show/experience is predicated on viewing women’s bodies via the male gaze.
Why This Matters
I’m a child of the 1990s, the decade when Victoria’s Secret became THE lingerie brand.
I was in high school at the height of the VS empire, when the cool girls walked around with “PINK” on the ass of their sweatpants.
In my twenties, as a VS employee, I bought pushup bras with my employee discount and sold countless ones to women I measured with my pink measuring tape.
Now that body positivity (if not body neutrality) is a mainstream concept, Victoria’s Secret has been forced to be slightly more thoughtful in its brand choices, and I — a 33-year-old mother recovering from an eating disorder and in surgical menopause — reject the beauty ethos of my childhood and tween years.
I gotta be honest, though:
As much as I wanna say that, in an age when people are more likely to flock to their niche corners of the internet than to tune into primetime TV, I’m not sure the VS runway show has the sway over us it used to …. I STILL FOUND MYSELF ENTIRELY SUCKED IN.
And not just because Cher performed in the show.
I think inside me there still lives a belief that looking like a Victoria’s Secret Angel would have protected me in some way. Like adhering to that impossible beauty standard would have given me power and control in a world where I was victimized. I thought it would have insulated me from abuse and abandonment.
Because who could hate or leave someone who looked like that?
That’s the warped belief the Victoria’s Secret Angels taught me. Not just that I should wear a Miracle bra, but that physical beauty was my pathway to power and protection.
I really want better than that for the next generation.
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This content is so on point. Thank you for sharing!