Fashion world is keeping stats on catwalk diversity, but what’s the real goal?

People want a lot from fashion models these days. Possibly too much.

During the recent autumn 2016 shows, critics wanted models who were plus-size, old, transgender, Latina, black, Asian, Body Mass Index-normal, beautiful, eccentric-looking and smiling. (Oh, by God, did men especially want them smiling, because a model who is not smiling is, by default, glaring or angry or maybe just too focused, and how dare these young women strutting about in velvet puffer coats and oversized blazers suggest they might have a serious thought floating around in their head.)

We’re hearing these demands because fashion has ceased being a niche interest and is now a fascination for a wide swathe of the population. Fashion is popular culture and big business. The expansion of fashion’s audience is good for the industry and good for the social conversation. People should be more invested in the global production of frocks; it impacts us all. And models are the public face – or body – of that industry.

While designers are increasingly becoming celebrities in their own right, it’s still mostly the models who are responsible for embodying the anonymous ideal of the brand – its notion of beauty and desirability. It’s the models who are expected to connect to consumers and welcome them into the fashion fold.

Diversity should be part of that equation. But how much? And what sort?

In the past few years, the conversation about diversity has focused on race. Influential members of the fashion industry, from activist Bethann Hardison to models Naomi Campbell and Iman, have spoken up about why racial diversity matters. Part of their activism included publicly chastising brands that mount runway shows without casting black models. That public shaming awakened a lot of designers to their subconscious prejudices, and they changed their ways.