Coco Rocha challenges the modeling industry

Getty Images
Getty Images

Over the past few years, Coco Rocha has become one of the biggest working models out of a new batch of young talent in the industry. This past week she walked in fashion shows for famous designers like Diane von Furstenberg and Zac Posen, but the New York Times and the New York Daily News reported that, "Coco Rocha is too fat for the runway." Now Rocha has taken to her blog, Oh So Coco, to set the record straight.

Rocha describes herself as, "a 21 year old model, 6 inches taller and 10 sizes smaller than the average American woman." What is confusing about this, is that as stated in recent press about Rocha, she is sometimes considered too big for the modeling industry. Rocha says that while she has been privileged to work with editors, stylists, photographers, and agents who treat her with respect, not all of her peers have been so lucky. "Surely, we all see how morally wrong it is for an adult to convince an already thin 15 year old that she is actually too fat," writes Rocha. (Clearly some do not.) "It is unforgivable that an adult should demand that the girl unnaturally lose the weight vital to keep her body functioning properly. How can any person justify an aesthetic that reduces a woman or child to an emaciated skeleton?"

We-and we're sure her fellow models-appreciate Rocha addressing the issue, as she is an identifiable industry name who will get this issue some attention. We're sure it's not easy to challenge your potential employers, but we love Rocha for speaking her mind, and quite articulately. She says her hope is that "young models will one day be spared the humiliation, the risky weight loss, the depression that comes along with anorexia and the misery of abandonment by an industry ashamed to see them turn into actual women." Amen. [Oh So Coco]