An article I wrote for Base Magazine issue 4 !! I am so grateful for the opportunity to write for such a rad magazine. What Makes a Real Woman? What we’re supposed to think when we see Dove present us with yet another image of able-bodied, symmetrical and curvy women is this: “Wow! This company totally gets me . I’m a real woman and real women have curves!” Without critical assessment these images seem to reassure us ladies with stretch-marks and pudgy bellies that we are worthy of love and adoration. But the message is not so simple or clear-cut. Dove’s advertisements and others like them have added fuel to a fiery battle between women of different sizes to be named a “Real Woman”. As if that title grants you leverage over the rest of the people who have been claiming womanhood (gasp! but they aren’t nearly curvy enough!). Ok, maybe women don’t actually think that the size of their thighs determine their status on the gender-scale, but this phrase has been used to mercilessly b...