Meghan Trainor’s video for Me Too was released Monday. The song is a testament to self-confidence with the bridge of the song declaring, “I thank God every day/That I woke up feelin’ this way/And I can’t help lovin’ myself/And I don’t need nobody else”. So imagine Meghan’s surprise when she saw images from the video being posted in which she had a noticeably slimmer waistline. When she realized that someone (or ones) had photoshopped her image in the video, she asked Vevo to take it down only hours after it had posted.
Meghan Trainor debuted the music video to her single “Me Too” on Monday, but the release was short-lived.
Claiming that she had been Photoshopped without her consent, the Grammy winner had the video pulled shortly after it went live. “My waist is not that teeny,” she said in a Snapchat video to her fans. “I had a bomb waist that night, I don’t know why they didn’t like my waist. But I didn’t approve that video and it went out to the world. So I’m embarrassed.”
So when Trainor visited Watch What Happens Live Monday night, Bravo host Andy Cohen was quick to ask the singer about what happened.
Standing up to model her body, Trainor, who wore a sleek and shiny black top and skirt, confidently said: “Bring the cameras back to this beautiful waist.”
She continued, “I was so upset because I thought the fans were doing it online and then I was like, ‘Oh my god, it’s my video.’ So I called the Gods of Vevo and they took it down.”
Meghan has spoken about not always feeling so proud of her body and “hiding” in sweatpants. She has since come to love her figure. It broke my heart when she said she thought her fans were the ones who edited her images, as if they had completely missed her message in the song. But last month, her fans very much proved they got it when they took to Twitter to express their dissatisfaction over what they perceived to be a photoshopped Meghan on the cover of Seventeen.
There has been much finger-pointing over who is responsible for the altered video. Fans blamed Meghan’s team but Meghan told E! that it, “was not my people, my people are great.” She puts the blame on post-production editors and said they are whom she texted to address the issue. No apologies have been made public yet. I like Meghan’s songs; my daughter and I belt out No whenever it’s on. I’m glad she kicked up some dust on this, I think she supported her message well.
Here are the side-by-side images Meghan posted to Instagram:
And this is the updated, Meghan-approved video:
Photo credit: WENN Photos and Instagram
Omg that photoshop is so bad she looks like a kardashian!!
That is cartoonish photoshop there – look at the insane difference between waist and arse!
It really didn’t need to be shopped at all, she looked great! And so backwards considering some lines in the song about loving herself. The end result was just comical and fake. Not a fan really but glad she got it changed!
She said she gave the “ok” on the final cut and even posted screen grabs as a “teaser”. She only noticed the photoshop after fans complained. I mean the altering is so obvious, how did she not notice it when she gave approval when shown the final cut?
She didn’t. She said that Vevo released the video without her approval.
She is also implying that the editors who are merely contracted for this one video posted the video to Vevo without either her or anybody in her team seeing it. Does this make any sense at all? If this happened, she needs to sack her entire team because this is mind blowing incompetence. She also needs to name the editor so that he doesn’t pull this on some other artist. But of course she will do neither of these things….because its a stunt.
Or I read it potentially as:
Her team approved the final video cuts editing, etc. THEN the photoshoppers came in and changed her body, and finally released video.
So her team did at one point approve of what they THOUGHT was the final video.
How about the fact she tweeted screen shots from the video as “teasers” for her fans? She didn’t “notice” the photoshop until her fans complained. I don’t know, but hey if the plan was to get pr, they sure got it ! Not to mention this is not her first video…why no photoshop in previous vids then? She’s actually lost some weight since her very first video. I don’t get it.
This screams publicity stunt to me
I don’t know why I didn’t think of that. Especially since she approved final cut.
I don’t think the song is good enough to rise without controversy, and she seems to use the platform for relevancy. Without her message she’s a B- popstar in my opinion. Her message puts her up with the more popular singers it seems.
My first thought as well. No doubt she did this to drum up interest in her vid.
So did she ask them to take down all her photoshop covers of Seventeen. Just wondering.
as much as I’d like to think not, I’m leaning that way, too.
It is so expensive to do live person video editing like that-there’s no way they did it without her knowing about it.
My friend works in non-linear video editing and the technology for this stuff has exploded recently more than you may realize. For such a short video segment and done so poorly- it’s not hard at all.
Ok I’ll stand with her on this but she body shames skinny girls so miss me with her faux-feminism.
Can’t believe this hack has a grammy. SMH
That’s why I hate that Bass song. It’s still verbalising “her you look like this and it’s not as good as that.”
Don’t care skinny or not, I don’t like hearing one type is “better” than the other and it pissed me off. I’m very much a “real” woman with absolutely no curve.
Dont forget the part where we should base our feelings of self on what the boys like. She is a stupid woman.
Ugh yes Naya…god I forgot about that sh*t too. She sucks.
Yep exactly. I have curves but many women do not. And they are fine and gorgeous in their own right. She’s not a feminist and the fact that she won best new artist (2 years later) KILLS me
@Naya — yep, exactly. I love body positivity, we need more of it, but that song is not.
But in the next line she says “I’m just playing, I know you think you’re fat” which I always thought meant that even skinny women think they’re fat, or have insecurities? No?
Yes this so much. It’s why I cannot stand her.
So many hacks have Grammys and the Best New Artist award is usually the career kiss of death.
Won’t someone please think of the skinny women? One line in a song has totally ruined their self-image!
I don’t know where you got the idea that women of any size in our culture feel okay about how they look. (Tumblr possibly?) They usually don’t. And pitting women against each other for male attention is exactly the opposite of feminism.
How was she not a one hit wonder? I’m so confused.
I always thought singers saw the final cut of their videos before it was posted online, so it’s sad that they photoshopped her body behind her back.. And she looked good in the original video too.
I would be very shocked if it was posted without her seeing the final cut. But lets say that was the case, there is NO WAY it was posted by the contracted editors. Her team obviously viewed it. Thats how I know this is PR stunting; if she acknowledged that somebody on her team authorised it then she would have to publicly sack that person. So she is placing this on the lap of editors who are independent contractors and making sure not to name their firm lest they fight back.
Plus the silence coming from the post-production editors speaks VOLUMES. They were in on the contrived scandal.
Word that it definitely was just a publicity stunt.
She admitted that kiss with Charlie Puth on stage was for publicity…so I wouldn’t put it past her that this too is for publicity. Especially since she conveniently didn’t notice the insane photoshopping until fans pointed it out. I mean come on. She had say on the final cut like all artists do. She didn’t notice it then?
This song is catchy AF.
minor pet peeve-it’s not photoshop as it’s not a photo. It’s video editing.
That said, there’s no way she didn’t know about this and it screams publicity stunt. It’s a terrible song and how many people would have watched it otherwise?
Publicity stunt. Can’t stand this woman. She has a voice like a squirrel on helium.
Genuine question here: Regardless of who is to blame and whether this is a publicity stunt, ON WHAT PLANET does she look normal in those altered images??
I like her. And even if it is a stunt (which I highly doubt) the message is a good one.
I’m going to get a lot of bs for this, but i’m going to say it. I don’t see why we should congratulate her for not being skinny. Just like we shouldn’t with skinny people.
The fact that she isn’t fit,can be seen to some as, her using it for gimmick.
MT Is rich. She could hire personal trainers and Chefs. She’s not like me doing crunches on the living room floor.
I’m curvy. I have big hips and a big butt so I understand the struggle.
If I was given the opportunity to get healthy and lose weight with professional help. No doubt I would take it.
In my opinion MT,isn’t even fat.
I just find it kind of ugggh, that her whole thing is she isn’t a Hollywood standard beauty, but she can sing sort of good. I understand that its not easy to do but…whats her message?
“I’m not skinny, I’m curvy so celebrate me?”
I don’t want to sound evil or whatever, but I just don’t understand it.
How about different people have different body types. No one is better then anyone.
It’s not about congratulating anyone for being skinny, or fat, or whatever other body shape/size in between (we should all be aiming for healthy, not to fit into the label of “skinny”). In this one instance, I applaud her for calling out in the typical industry manipulation of (female) bodies to fit into a certain ideal or popular body type and continuously projecting an unrealistic beauty standard.
Besides, it wasn’t just her waist size that was photoshopped. Her hair and height look manipulated too.
PR stunt?
Update: Looks like several other people drew that conclusion before me.
I cannot stand her. I wish she’d remove herself from my presence.
I don’t like her and I don’t trust her. I think she’s a plagiarist. Look up the song by K-pop band Koyote, “Happy Mode.” Which by the way has a better message too. Not “I’m better than other girls because boys find me more sexually attractive.” (I cannot believe anyone thought that was a woman-positive message, ffs.) Rather, that life is sometimes really hard and you can’t always trust people, but life is still worth living and happiness can still be achieved.
Okay, I officially love the Meghan-approved video (and song!), and yeah, I’d be choked if I’d seen that obvious and mutated-looking photoshop job in it instead. She looked great!
I can’t stand Meghan Trainor’s music but I can’t sh!t on her for this. Assuming this wasn’t a publicity stunt (it might be, bc the photo shop was so obvious).