Mo’Nique and her activities have not been the subject matter on Full Figure Plus for quite sometime now. I thought the sudden ending to Mo’Nique’s FAT Chance combined with the disappearance and re-appearance of the now slimmer Mo’Nique sent conflicting messages at a time when the curvy community could not face more problems from one of its own again. We all remember Star Jones don’t we?
Well the reason that I am writing about her today is even though she is not actively campaigning on the size acceptance side of the community anymore anything she does is still of interest. Being the reporter that I am I decided to look into my statistics to see how much influence she still has on the plus size community even though she has on the surface stepped away.
Below is a list of the top 10 keywords that people use that lead them to Full Figure Plus. As you can see in the top five spots three of them are related to Mo’nique even though I have reported on several occasions there IS NO CLOTHING LINE WITH Mo”Nique’s name on it out or for that matter will ever come out. If she did not do it when Phat Girlz was out it is never going to happen.
- monique clothing line
- urban plus size clothing
- monique’s clothing line
- monique plus size fashion line
- cacique bras
- mo’nique clothing
- plus size magazine
- plus size model casting call
- more to love casting call
- curvation
Another interesting note at least to me is that the searches that are related to Mo’Nique have people searching for a long time. Which means they start off looking for Mo’nique then end up reading about something else. This is both a blessing and a curse because the reader came here looking for one thing and ended up finding information on something else.
With her new talk show coming up and the photos and reports that she is still losing weight my answer to the question is no she does not represent the plus size community nor the plus size fashion community. I just hope that things do not end up like the Star Jones incident in which Mo’Nique admits to having weight loss surgery and the plus size community loses yet another voice to self loathing and hate. What are your thoughts about the once queen of size acceptance?
It’s great she made it through and became a celeb. However, now she has made it, has she been pressured in to loosing weight (how ever she did it) to continue her career?
If she has lost weight for personal reasons then good on her. If not, then her credibility has suffered.
I feel the same it is sad that if she is peaking in her career that the pressure is on to be smaller. It is the question as to the weight loss that has me wondering and thusly not writing about her much.
I think Mo’Nique rode the fat band wagon for too long! I’m not sure if she was ever really proud to be fat or if it was all a farse. I do think how ever that she is an icon for plus size women everywhere!! Many women relate to her … genuine or not!!
Its that very same ride or die mentality that makes me nervous. You can see by the search results that lots of ladies look up to her still regardless. It would be unfortunate if she turned out to be a closet fat basher.
Well my honest opinion, some plus size ladies joke about being plus size because they are insecure with themselves and then they say they lose weight to be healthy (which I think is a good thing) but I think she feel under the hollywood stigma, where you must be skinny before having this show and she chose the show! This is my personal opinion.
Hmm, I think we need to ease up on the whole “OMG, she lost weight, how dare she” attitude and the “we’ve lost a another role model” theme that seems to be going around. It’s the type of attitude that makes us look more like fat mongers than people trying to be accepted for who we are regardless of our size (whether it fluctuates or not). In my opinion, to say someone shouldn’t loose weight is just as bad as saying someone should loose weight. Now if she starts the who fat bashing and surgical touting or whatever that is another thing — I haven’t heard anything along those lines though. She still looks plus size to me.
Moe,
You make a good point. For me I think I am looking at it as starting one way and going another. Though I have written about her size I am more concerned with the message she started and built her career on and now just seemed to have walked away. True she is still plus size and I think that there will still be people coming to my blog looking for information on her and her activities.
On the Oprah show she said that her husband had expressed concern about her being around for the life of their relationship and that encouraged her to lose weight but she still embraced who she was as a plus size women this was in early 2009.
Im actually a friend of Monique’s and was in LA earlier this year and hooked up with Mo and she was very busy & didnt really have much time for a visit with me but she made time, so after a short visit she invited me to work out with her and her fabulous trainer. I was so very proud of Mo please know she was on top of her work out. Mo is not interested in being skinny she – she is actually eating better and working out to be healthy for her Family. She looks great lets stop hating and get off the couch and join her, I wish I would have started with her when she started talking to me about eating healthy and working out over a year ago and maybe I would be looking as good as she is now…HUMMMMMMM…. Lets stop hating
Claudia,
From my point of view its more about the 180 degree turn in her rhetoric that peeked my curiosity more than anything. If she did it the right way with diet and exercise then kudos to her. My wish was more that she would bring her loyal followers along on her journey instead of the spot speculation which leads to negative remarks from some.
I think her husband is the driving force behind everything she does. It seems his influence is making her a better person. We all go through different seasons hopefully it is all for the best.
Baker,
If his love for her has influenced her decision to respect his suggestions then she is doing the right thing period and nothing else anyone else says matters.
i would like to know what size she has gotten down to now, she looks great.
When I watched her talk show a few days ago I think that she has gotten down to a size 14 or 16.