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orbisvicis 2 hours ago

> Clothing brands detect this in their customer studies and respond appropriately.

Respond how?

> lots of different sub-groups of the female population to signal lots of different things

Signal what?

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roenxi 2 hours ago | parent [-]

> Respond how?

By destandardising sizes. It isn't that hard to standardise if an industry thinks it'll help them; the article suggests there is already a relevant standards body. These companies are probably doing it for a reason. My guess would be maybe someone doesn't want to be an XXL 18 at J Crew so they can go to Reformation where they are more of a Regular 14.

> Signal what?

Age, health and status for women. Group membership too although that is generally to a lesser extent.

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orbisvicis an hour ago | parent [-]

> By destandardising sizes

Oh. I thought there was an outside chance you intended a positive response. Ah well.

> Age, health and status

I can understand age. But wouldn't everyone want to signal good health and high status?

	▲	roenxi an hour ago \| parent \| next [-]
		> I can understand age. But wouldn't everyone want to signal good health and high status? Yeah, but generally not with fashion. Male fashion tends not to go to the same sort of lengths to showcase legs/torsos/arms/chest that women's fashion does. For men if they want to signal status they tend to buy a car they can't afford or something. And male health is one of those areas where it is very complicated. A fat, balding man who smells funny can make up for that with a high income. A fat balding woman who smells funny might be able to do the same thing but I can't help feel sceptical at the idea. Anyway, long story short, the people who aren't using fashion as signalling can just buy a shirt that fits and move on. It's a shirt. They aren't complicated.
	▲	Maxion an hour ago \| parent \| prev \| next [-]
		> But wouldn't everyone want to signal good health and high status? The thing with people is that they are all different. There are a lot of people who don't want to be of high status or signal it. There's lots of people who don't really care for health and value other things higher.
	▲	karambahh 38 minutes ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		Definition of "high status" vary by demographics. Some want to carry X sportswear with prominent branding, others take pride in high-price tag items without any explicit branding. The "I identify with this athlete", "I identify with this musician", "I dgaf what you think of me" groups probably don't intersect much, with brands and offering catering to these and multiple others...?