When I saw this season’s swimsuits in the store, I dashed to the fringe-lined tops and bottoms in bright geometric patterns dangling from the racks. I grabbed a handful of bikinis, not really looking at sizes, and went to the changing room. I didn’t actually buy a swimsuit, partly because I grabbed the wrong sizes and partly because I am trying to save money, but it did get me thinking.

There may have been a variety of colors, patterns and styles — do the strings tie around the neck or loop over the shoulders; are the bottoms tied at the sides with string or connected by cutouts — but only for one specific body type. For anyone who has a medium-sized butt, A or B cup breasts and doesn’t mind exposing her stomach, there were plenty of options. The display rack of swimsuits catered to skinny girls and women with butts and breasts not too big and not too small, which to me sends a message that not only is this the right kind of body, it’s the only kind women and girls should have.

I know that there are other bathing suit options, but not many, and these certainly do not take front and center stage in clothing stores. Why are we not celebrating all kinds of bodies? If we were, all different kinds of bathing suits would be displayed. Society often tells us what is and isn’t appropriate, which is terrifying because if people aren’t actively looking for it, they don’t notice.

Of course, I wouldn’t judge anyone who wanted to wear a two-piece suit — fat, skinny, busty, flat chested — but like all clothing, certain styles fit different bodies in different ways. This makes sense. There are many swimsuits and clothes in general that simply don’t look good on me but look great on somebody else with a different body type.

With that being said, where are the swimsuits for the women who want to look sexy but need more than a triangle flap to cover their nipples and don’t want the elastic bottoms to cut their butt cheeks into crescent moons? Those bathing suits are buried in the back of the store and tucked deep into clothing racks because that type of body is ugly and shouldn’t be seen in a bathing suit — or at least that’s what society wants us to think.

I found an interesting article on Buzzfeed about an artist, Carey Fruth, who redefined what it means to be beautiful in her art exhibit, which is called “American Beauty.” She took pictures of women lying on a bed of purple flowers — each woman was completely naked except for a scattering of purple petals across her breasts and crotch.

All of the women were so completely different — women with lean limbs and round breasts; women with the edges of collar bones and ribs outlined; women with no hips and pinpoint breasts; women with breasts that spilled to the sides and thighs that smooshed together; women with fat rolling from their sides, stomachs, hips, legs — all were beautiful, none were the same.

So why does society try to streamline beauty into a one-size, fits-very-few swimsuit? If society is teaching that in order to be beautiful, everyone should have the same body, at what point do people become manufactured products rolling on a conveyer belt — the perfect ones packed in shiny plastic and the “damaged” ones put to the side?

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