I know that a lot of people like Meghan Trainor and she has plenty of fans who see her as a role model, but I could never be a Meghan Trainor fan. Trust me, I have plenty of reasons to switch radio stations when her songs come on.
Meghan Trainor is a skinny shamer.
I'm a little bias here as a size zero. When I first heard the song, "All About That Bass," my first thoughts were, Are you kidding me? This cannot become a hit. Apparently other people disagreed with me here, because as you all are probably aware, "All About That Bass," was nominated for, and won countless awards back in 2014. Pay attention to a few lines that really annoy me in this song though.
"Yeah it's pretty clear, I ain't no size two,
But I can shake it, shake it like I'm supposed to do."
This is the first example of skinny shaming in this song as she tries to make skinny girls feel like they aren't woman enough because they can't "shake it like they're supposed to."
"Yeah, my momma she told me don't worry about your size, She says, boys they like a little more booty to hold at night."
This quote implies that women are supposed to value their self worth based on whether their body is appealing to men. Wow... girl power... not. Apparently, this complaint has been brought to Trainor's attention because she has a response that doesn't help her case much.
Trainor says in interview with fuse, "I’ve got a lot of feminists tweeting me, ‘Why have you got to talk about boys?’ I don’t know, man! I just wrote a fun song about loving your booty and loving your body! I never had a problem getting boys, I still got ‘em, I still had fun. I don’t know. My mom never actually said those words, she’s a very shy person..."
What if someone doesn't have a booty? According to Trainor, boys don't like that. Overall, I just can't get behind this song at all. Not all "skinny bitches" choose to be skinny. Sidenote: After this song came out, she lost 30 pounds, so how about that for hypocrisy?
Meghan Trainor is ignorant and insensitive towards eating disorders.
Meghan Trainor has said a few cringe worthy things about eating disorders, and someone should have told her to shut up. It's a little too late now, but I'm telling Trainor to shut up. She says, "I tried to go anorexic for a good three hours. I ate ice and celery, but that's not even anorexic. And I quit. I was like, Ma, can you make me a sandwich, like immediately?"
Let's get this on the record. You don't "go anorexic." Anorexia nervosa is a mental illness, not a bragging right or the fast track to that bikini bod. The fact that she tried to make light of a seriously dark subject is offensive and frankly, she has no right to talk about it considering that she never struggled with an eating disorder.
Trainor also states, "I wasn't strong enough to have an eating disorder." Once again, what the actual heck? Eating disorders are not about strength at all, and as someone who has seriously struggled with this, I find it absolutely unacceptable for her to say.
As a public figure who tries to make herself out to be a role model, it is simply not alright for her to try to convey that eating disorders are any kind of accomplishment. A real accomplishment is recovery, so we're going to have someone in the spotlight talk about eating disorders, can it please be someone who actually knows what they are talking about?
Kudos to Demi Lovato for calling Trainor out on this. She tweeted, "Having an eating disorder doesn't show 'strength.' Strength is when are able to overcome your demons after being sick and tired for so long." She continued with a stream of many tweets that addressed Trainor's inappropriate comments and the stigma against eating disorders in general.
Just no, Meghan Trainor -- no, no, no.
One of her recent hits, "No," has also hit a nerve. I understand that maybe she was trying to dig herself out of that anti-feminism hole she put herself in with "All About That Bass" and "Dear Future Husband," but does she really need to be so rude about it. The song is basically about a guy trying to talk to her and relentlessly shutting him down.
I imagine it probably takes a lot of courage for a guy to go up and talk to a pretty girl, so why does she need to say no so many times? Was he being inappropriate? I didn't get that vibe from the song. It sounded more like he was just asking for her name and number. Really Meghan? If a guy walks up to you and says hi to you and asks you what your name is, are you going to just yell "No" in his face? Sorry, that's not nice. Her lyrics in this song contradict "All About That Bass" to the opposite extreme.
"If I want a man,
Then I'mma get a man,
But it's never my priority."
That's quite hypocritical as her past hit encouraged women to place their self worth in the approval of men and her music video for "Dear Future Husband" promoted sexist stereotypes.
I don't want to be you, Meghan Trainor
Maybe I just have so much built up resentment when it comes to Meghan Trainor, but when this song first came on the radio, like all her other songs, it annoyed me. It starts out with her singing about how she loves herself and her body, and that's great, however she starts singing about how I should want to be her too. I don't want to be her. Am I not as good as Meghan Trainor? Should I want to be her too? Also, how come I need to show her respect because she has gold on her neck? Shouldn't we respect people even if they aren't mega millionaires like Meghan Trainor? Once again, I cannot show her respect.
I could probably continue this rant for much longer, however I don't need to get mean, we already have Meghan Trainor being mean enough. I understand that a lot of girls look up to her as someone who promotes body confidence and self love, but I don't really think she's doing a great job at that. I'd rather listen to actual role models like Demi Lovato talk about confidence and overcoming struggles any day.