No one is saying overweight people are healthy role models. No one is saying there are no unhealthy consequences to being overweight. However, there is a leap between a model weighing 165 at 5’9" and the health consequences of obesity. Heaven forbid, if there is a model that wears a double digit size - that’s promoting unhealthy style? Ha, as if showing thousands of girls photoshopped to take even more inches off their thighs, arms and cheeks doesn’t have unhealthy consequences. I haven’t a clue how overweight or obese people see themselves - I’m not in the habit of asking “so do you think you’re overweight or are you just in denial?”
Looking at the SI model (because that is the topic), she looks healthy. Would I want to be a size 16? No, but maybe I would like to see women as they truly are instead of an idealized version. I’m always amazed when I see magazine covers from the 1970s and 1980s - the models actually do have flaws, little lumps, and a little sag; they have wrist bones, blood vessels, even spots. They aren’t perfect. Their clothes can be wrinkled (if not their faces). So, if having a plus-sized model gets society back to accepting flaws, I’m all for it.
(I’m on the thin side. 5’7", 120 lbs. I think I have that bean-pole tendency)