10 posts tagged “fat activism”

There's an interesting post on Big Fat Blog today about whether to congratulate people on weight loss or not. The author says he doesn't do it, that "Offering up a positive retort only serves to reinforce the idea, ultimately, that it is bad to be fat. The simple congratulations - even if stated in a meaningless fashion, even if you really don't care, even if it's awkward to say nothing - means that one supports the status quo."

I think this is a little simplistic. There are different kinds of weight loss. And I don't think it does the fat acceptance movement any good to deny that obesity can be bad for your health--it just makes us look simple-minded and self-deluded. If someone is tired of aching joints, or is at risk for a stroke from high blood pressure, or really needs to get their diabetes under control, who am I to tell them not to lose weight? My concern would be that they do it in a healthy way, not starving themselves or going on dangerous fad diets. If they did that, they would liikely just gain the weight back, possibly with extra.

Someone very close to me recently lost a lot of weight that was slowly (and not-so-slowly) killing him. I'm incredibly proud of him, and I'm glad he did it, so I will be able to enjoy his company for years to come. (Well, that's not to say he couldn't get hit by a train tomorrow. But still.) To me, that's like congratulating someone on their cancer going into remission. It's not like they're dieting to get closer to the stick-thin unrealistic ideal of beauty our society holds up, which is behavior that shouldn't be encouraged.

Where I don't congratulate is when people who are already healthy lose 20 pounds starving themselves on bullshit diets like Master Cleanse. If they fish for compliments, my stock answer is "I thought you looked fine already". And I absolutely refuse to take part in those bizarre, ritualistic self-loathing rounds that so many women indulge in. You know what I mean: someone says "Waaah, I need to lose X number of pounds! I really hate the size of my Y body part(s)!", someone else adds their bit of self-hatred to the pile, and everyone looks at you expectantly? I usually say "I'm perfectly healthy, and I think I look good, so I'm okay"

I've lost a noticable amount of weight in the past year, since selling my car and riding my bicycle/walking a lot more. It annoys me when people compliment me on my "weight loss". To me the more important aspect is how much better I feel--I'm still a size 18-20 and likely will never be smaller, nor do I have any burning desire to be so. However, the way I feel isn't really visible to others, so I try to take their remarks for the compliments they no doubt mean them to be.

Stop her before she destroys us all!

Actual headline from BBC News: Obese blamed for the world's ills. With the requisite ugly, hairy, stretchmarked disembodied stomach.

The gist: Climate change, rising gas prices, and the increase in the cost of food are all the fault of fatties. Yes, the world really is that simple. Why not just round them up and gas them? Along with tall people, people who exercise a lot or have fast metabolisms, poor people who can't afford a healthy diet, and the wealthiest 5% who suck up most of the world's resources, whatever their weight.

Man, I had no idea us fat people were so powerful. Sorry about all the cancer and terrorism that we've apparently been causing.

Sadly, this is par for the course for British publications. You think America has fat bigotry? The UK is 10 times worse, it's why Chloe Marshall (the size 16 contender for Miss England) is such huge news. It would be like a woman with 2 heads vying to be Miss America.

Bitch has a good article about eating disorders in the fat acceptance movement. A lot of people (mostly women) involved in the movement who suffer from "disordered eating" are afraid to admit it. They feel they would be labelled as self-loathing by trying to "blame" their weight on eating disorders, or accused of discrediting the movement by making it look like a bunch of people who want to glorify illness.

It is precisely because eating disorders are not openly discussed that many fat people who suffer from bulimia, binge-eating disorder, and pathorexia (defined as disordered appetite, and used to refer to an entire spectrum of disordered eating) feel they aren’t welcome in the fat acceptance movement. Eating disorders are the proverbial elephant in the room that most members of the fat acceptance community pretend not to see. Some of the hushed voices surrounding the issue may be due to the relative youth of the movement, which is still finding its footing and setting priorities. And yet it is precisely because this movement is just now gaining real momentum that the time is ripe for having these conversations. But because the otherwise-diverse movement is silent about eating disorders, it’s easy to see why these hot-button topics seem off-limits. The silence around them magnifies the shame of being both fat and eating disordered in a community that refuses to complicate itself. Quite simply, people with eating disorders are the Lavender Menace of the fat acceptance movement.

Sad. Because it's a young movement (comparable to the feminist movement in the early '60s), there isn't yet a single unifying agenda. Everyone who promotes fat acceptance has something different they want to get out if it. I mean, most of us probably want the same basic cultural shifts: To stop treating fat people like they have no right to exist and take part in society; to make fat-shaming and mocking (think Norbert or those horrible Anti-Gym commercials as unacceptable as blackface; to stop putting so much desire on a statistically impossible underweight body type that the vast majority of women absolutely loathe what they see in the mirror. But there are also many personal agendas.

Probably the thing I want to see accomplished most is to stop the automatic "fat = unhealthy" equation in our society. It's especially infuriating when you see medical professionals, who ought to fucking know better, make it. Not everyone who is fat is that way because they sit on their asses all day eating cupcakes. And not all fat people are in bad health. I'm a size 20, and I eat better and get more exercise (due to not having a car) than the average American. My blood pressure, blood sugar, heart rate, and cholesterol are all perfectly normal. I can sprint up a flight of stairs and barely be out of breath. And I totally resent having my overall health, to say nothing of my worth to society, judged soley by my waistline.

In somewhat related news, today is International No Diet Day!

they also 'shopped out my cokehead skin

Hips, thighs, arms, shoulders and boobs are all a little bigger; painfully jutting hip bones have been smoothed out. I'm sure it's no accident that she's even whiter and blonder in the "after" photo, too.

So, I'm sure we're all aware by now that models and actresses are Photoshopped within an inch of their life for magazines and movie posters, and almost always to make them look thinner. However, the use of Photoshopping to make them appear less deathly underweight is now on the rise.

Belinda Coleman, of the retouching agency The Shoemakers Elves, said there was a trend towards presenting less "extreme" images of thinness and of enhancing figures. "Where models are looking particularly gaunt, magazines are saying, 'We can't have that - fill out their chests,'?" she said.

Or you could, I don't know, hire models who don't look as if they just got released from a concentration camp.

This has got nothing to do with "promoting a healthy body type", or whatever retarded spin Condé Nast et al. are choosing to put on it. It's just another way to make women hate themselves and sell them stuff to combat it. You're too fat, you're too fat, you're too fat--now you're too skinny! You have to be skeletally thin, but without pancake boobs or visible ribs or a protruding collarbone! No one could ever actually attain this "ideal" body type. It's physically impossible.

Size -2

I can haz alfalfa sprout?

This week the French fashion industry signed a charter to promote "healthy body images". Unlike Spain, which bans models with a BMI of less than 18, or Britain, which which requires models to show medical proof that they don't suffer from eating disorders (or, if they do, that they are being treated for them), the guidelines in the Land of a Thousand Cheeses don't actually impose any restrictions. Instead they focus on "awareness raising" and "information sharing", and probably aren't going to do a damn thing to promote the use of healthy models. But at least when the next 18-year-old underweight model drops dead on the catwalk, everyone will be aware that anorexia stopped her heart!

None of these campaigns are addressing the root of the problem: Designers that essentially make clothes to fit human versions of wire hangers. Harangue the models all you want; but when every single big-name designer is continuing to make size 0 and under clothes, the problem isn't going to go away, because healthy models won't be able to fit into their clothes.

And in somewhat related news, remember Chloe Marshall, the size 16 contender for the title of Miss England? That birdcage-bottom rag The Daily Mail (which previously ran an interview in which the columnist could barely contain her outraged disgust at Chloe's body) ran an article written by a former Miss England judge, Monica Grenfell, in which she spewed venomous hatred all over Chloe Marshall for refusing to hate her body so much that she becomes a shut-in:

Feted and fawned over for her courage in daring to break the mould, Chloe boasts she wants to be an 'ambassador for curves'. Who does she think she's kidding? What she's demonstrating isn't bravery but a shocking lack of self-control. Instead of flaunting her figure, Chloe ought to own up to the truth. She is fat and she got that way by over-eating. It would send an appalling — and very dangerous — message to other young women that it's OK to be fat. Chloe is a stark reminder that obesity is now virtually normal in our society — and we should all be hanging our heads in shame.

What bothers me here is not so much the accusation of fat (although Chloe isn't obese, according to Carla Wolper of the Obesity Research Center at St. Luke's Hospital in New York City), but the indication that fat people don't deserve to feel happy, to aspire to the same things as skinny people, to take part in society. Monica Grenfell sounds like she's one enraged tic away from suggesting that Chloe ought to be locked in a cage and put on display so everyone can throw rotten tomatoes at her. And she's by no means a lone voice in the crowd, I see this attitude almost on a daily basis.

Chloe marshall

Chloe Marshall, England's Miss Surrey and the first size 16 to run for the title of Miss England is interviewed by the Daily Mail's Jenny Johnston, who cops a typical passive-aggressive, condescending, "It's so refreshing that you're comfortable with being a big fat pig, dearie" attitude.

Frankly, I feel a bit faint just thinking about what awaits her. It's the sort of scenario that would have most of us, of whatever size, running shrieking from the room.

But then Chloe, at 5ft 10in and 38DD, is not most of us, and perhaps we should thank God for that.

Because the planet's crust couldn't possibly hold up all the weight, and we'd all plummet to a fiery death in the earth's molten core? Or are you just projecting your own childish habit of trying to make yourself feel better about your own poor self-image by harping on what you perceive as other people's physical shortcomings onto everyone else?

I think I'm gonna go with what's behind Door #2 here.

The Daily Mail: Another reason to celebrate the 4th of July.

Bratz doll sez: okay, even *i* think this is crass

There's a new online game craze among the tween set in England and France. It's called "Miss Bimbo", and it's exactly as progressive and delightful as it sounds. Basically, it's like Tamagotchi, except with vapid sluts instead of kawaii little digital animals. According to the website, some of the goals of the game are:

• Shop for the latest fashions and become the trendsetting bimbo in town!
• Become a socialite and skyrocket to the top of fame and popularity!
• Date that famous hottie you've had your eye on and show the Bimbo world the social starlet you are!
• Even resort to meds or plastic surgery. Stop at nothing to become the reigning bimbo!

Nicolas Jacquart, the game's creator, responding to the predictably furious uproar from every single self-respecting woman in the world, exudes the smug hiptard charm of so many of his fellow Frenchmen (along with the odor of cigarettes and moldy cheese):

The game is structured in such a way that it simply mirrors real life in a tongue-in-cheek way. It is not a bad influence for young children. The missions and goals for the bimbos are morally sound and teach children about the real world.

Right, the "real world", where 9-year-old girls understand irony and get boob jobs!

Via Feministing comes the news that 2 of my most-hated organizations, PETA and Suicide Girls, are teaming up to try to shame me into not wearing the comfy, comfy warm skins of dead animals.

My hatred of PETA probably doesn't need to be explained, and even if you don't get it, if you're reading this you can find out all about their campaign of misinformation and their exploitation of starlets too stupid to know better yourself.

My problem with the Suicide Girls is not prudery, I've got nothing against chicks gettin' nekkid. What I hate about them is the stupid "Grrrl Power!" empowerment message they tout, while basically saying the best thing you can do to get attention is to take your clothes off.

Queen latifah

<----- Actual "alternative" beauty

Also--and this is the majority of the reason why I don't like and certainly don't respect them--they promote themselves as "alternative beauty". Alternative to what? Go to the site, or just image Google them, and what do you see? A skinny white skank in her 20s, a skinny white skank in her 20s... oh, look! It's yet another skinny white skank in her 20s. Having women of other races (besides the occasional token "Hawt Azian!"), women older than 24, and/or women bigger than a size 2 would truly be "alternative". Hell, even having a single woman who doesn't sport a full-body wax would be revolutionary.

daddy didn't pay me enough attention during my formative years

Only "alternative" in the outskirts of Des Moines, Iowa, circa 1981 ----->

I find the idea that I'm supposed to find them edgy and shocking because they have dyed hair, tattoos, and piercings rather quaint. Did these women travel here from Eisenhower-era Topeka, Kansas in a time machine? Who exactly is still shocked by green hair or nipple rings??

I get that barely-legal, hairless, and dangerously underweight white chicks probably brings in the most money. But don't try to pretend like you're making some brave statement about female beauty when all it is the same tired old bullshit dressed up with some mall kiosk piercings and hair dye.

I guess that in a world where people pay to see other people eating feces or women wearing high heels squashing kittens, paying to see naked women who look like your co-worker or best friend's sister is truly perverse.

Hooray for pointless nudity! Don't violate chickens and cows, but go right ahead and treat human females like slabs of meat. And how ironic that Alicia Silverstone's career tanked because she was considered to have gotten "too fat".

You know what this ad conveys to me? "Don't eat meat, and you too can become anemic and so malnourished that you don't have the energy to dress yourself!"

Brit brit

Okay, confession: I never watch any awards shows. Not the Oscars, not the Golden Globes, not the Daytime Technical Spanish-Language Emmies, and certainly not the MTV VMAs. They're the most ridiculous, contentless, bloated parade of back-slapping celebrity of them all. And MTV has a lot of nerve handing out awards for music videos, when they haven't actually played a music video in a decade.

But that doesn't stop me from having an opinion, damn it!

So I guess everyone is talking about how awful Britney Spears' performance was. Bad lyp-synching, half-hearted dancing, glassy-eyed boredom (or possibly drunkeness--would anyone be shocked at this point?). And of course, most media outlets are getting a dig in at her physical appearance. "Bad weave" and "stripperware" I can agree with. (Although does anyone expect Britney Spears to perform in a burqa?) But "fat"? Come on, people. She is not fat by any definition.

Feministing brings up a good point:

I hear one more person comment on how "fat" she was, I'm gonna lose it. Whether it's a news story saying she has a "paunch" or a cable news dude calling her chunky and fat--it's fucking gross and wrong. When was the last frigging time a male musician's beer belly made news? Assholes.

But here's the thing: While I agree that calling her fat is stupid (simply on the grounds that it isn't correct), I'm not sure I agree with this analogy. Britney Spears isn't a "real" musician/singer. She's a sexy image that her record label uses as a mouthpiece for whatever manufactured pop trend is popular. She's practically a cardboard cutout. She's nothing but image, so isn't snarking on that image a valid form of criticism?

I'm getting a little tired of the Kick Britney While She's Down bandwagon, but she helped contribute to the atmosphere in the music industry where style matters more than substance, so isn't this just desserts? However, the case can be made that since she was so young when she started (and probably was pushed by family members/unscrupulous music executives, and frankly seems too unintelligent to fully grasp what was being done), the fault lies more with the music industry in general and her handlers in particular.

I don't know. The whole thing makes me feel a little queasy, but I'm not sure it isn't warranted. What do you think?

In other somewhat feminist-related news, what is this bullshit about nude photos of Vanessa Hudgens being leaked? And she's apologizing for it?? What is she apologizing for, exactly? Being a healthy young woman with a normal libido who plays vanilla sex games like sending nude photos to her boyfriend? Having untrustworthy, unscrupulous friends who would intercept and leak such photos? Wasting her energy trying to entice her obviously gay "boyfriend"?