I Am One Fat and Angry Woman
And I am sick to death of your poisoned fruit.
Today I read a story written by a young woman about why she doesn't support the body positivity movement... for fat people. After mentioning that she guessed some folks would be triggered, she went on to lay out "facts" to support her stance.
Of course, they were the usual facts. Statements like obesity kills and is never okay. Comments like obesity costs taxpayers too much money.
She even threw in comments about how it's silly for fat women to be upset with brands like Victoria's Secret for not "catering" to them. Cue the manifesto to say that body positivity matters... just not for the obese people because fatness is never acceptable.
Supposedly, we must quit "promoting obesity." Stop making it alright to be fat. And quit encouraging unhealthy lifestyles.
There is no safe place for a fat body.
Every time I read a story like that, I shake. I shake in rage, in pain, and anxiety. I shake in the ardent desire to escape my body once and for all.
I am angry, and I am triggered. I immediately go back to my suicidal days. All I can really think about is how much I don't want to live in a world like this.
It would be so damn easy to look at obesity like so many of these slim writers. So easy to see nothing but a lifestyle disease, disgrace, and selfishness. So very easy to paint obesity as a black and white issue with zero gray.
But here's the reality.
There is no safe place for fat bodies. We are there for your amusement, ridicule, or overlook at any given time or place. We aren't safe online, and we certainly aren't safe in real life.
You offer poisoned apples disguised as "help." But how could you help when you don't have any understanding of obesity at all?
You don't even KNOW if the obesity you see is a lifestyle disease.
Everybody who's worried about "promoting obesity" loves to talk about how obesity is simply a self-inflicted lifestyle disease. Except that an increasing number of experts disagree.
Clearly, obesity is a multifaceted issue with nuanced with economics, endocrinology, abuse, mental/emotional health, misinformation, and more.
When you treat obesity as a lifestyle disease, you imply it's an informed and conscious choice, but for most folks, that simply isn't true. There is more than enough information out there to explain why obesity isn't always a simple matter of gluttony and laziness.
What's really lazy is when slim folks refuse to listen to the data they don't like.
Frankly, you don't even know if a person is genuinely obese.
Hear me out on this one. I am one of 17 million women in the US with an adipose disease called lipedema. Lipedema is commonly seen in puberty, but most women aren't diagnosed until their thirties, and often after pregnancy. It's a physically and emotionally draining condition which causes a woman to gain abnormal fat cells in her legs, hips, and in later stages, the upper arms.
These are not "normal" fat cells. Diet and exercise don't burn lipedema fat cells. Poor eating doesn't cause lipedema. You can't bring it upon yourself.
Some women discover they have lipedema after getting weight loss surgery and their body shrinks everywhere but in their legs. These women are also at an increased risk for lymphedema after their surgery.
Lipedema is known as "painful fat syndrome." Experts on the condition say it's "the disease they call fat." That's because most doctors know nothing about lipedema, so they diagnose their patients with the condition as being obese or simply fat.
Just think--if doctors can misdiagnose obesity, how much easier can you as a slim writer misjudge a person with lipedema as simply obese? And it's not just lipedema that causes obesity.
Nobody even knows how much of the cost of obesity is related to shame and avoiding the doctor's office.
Whenever people start complaining about tax dollars and obesity, I can't help but roll my eyes. What a great way to shout the message that your life is more valuable than mine.
When we complain about how much it costs to treat a person in need of medical attention, we become the worst version of our collective self. We are literally arguing over dollars as if they are more important than human lives.
This attitude comes across clearly when folks with acceptable bodies treat us like we are little more than a waste of space.
But here's what I'd really like to know when it comes to the "cost" of obesity on the healthcare system. Have they factored in how many fat people get substandard treatment from their physicians which leads to a.) obese folks visiting the doctor less, or b.) complications due to being misdiagnosed or getting the brush off?
Fat bias is real, and it results in shitty medical care. Why wouldn't that factor into the cost of healthcare too?
Personally, I haven't been to a real doctor in a couple of years. The last time I saw my gynecologist I decided not to go back. At a cervical biopsy, he called my BMI "astounding," and told me to quit eating white foods.
When I explained my diet and that I wasn't eating white foods anyway, he shook his head in disbelief. Like I was lying. I then told him I have lipedema, and he just said, "I don't even know what that it but your BMI is off the charts. You'd better do something about it."
These days, I only go to urgent care a couple times a year with a sinus infection or pneumonia. They always make sure to include "weight loss" in my aftercare instructions. I always make sure to include PCOS and lipedema in my paperwork.
They never talk about that.
The medical community has long failed people of size.
Where's the outrage at our so-called experts? They took an oath to "do no harm," yet far too many of them refuse to even listen to their fat patients.
Dr. Jason Fung is one of the world's leading experts on obesity, and he has written extensively about what medical professionals get wrong when dealing with fat patients.
When are we going to hold doctors accountable for crappy and conflicting advice? It's said that most women with lipedema have an eating disorder, essentially because they've been told their whole lives that eating less and moving more works--and nobody told them about lipedema.
So we've got experts more or less encouraging eating disorders, including orthorexia and a fixation on counting calories, but we're just gonna let that side?
Do no harm--yeah, right.
How many times do you need to hear psychologists explain that shame is ineffective at best and damaging at worst?
I can't wrap my mind around this one. Slim people (like the slim writer who led me to write this story) keep dismissing the experts who are advocating for body positivity and who are against the shaming language used in the vilification of fatness.
There's a reason why fat shaming and arguing against the notion that "all bodies are good bodies" is a problem. Feeling bad or ashamed is damaging to the psyche. Shame is an assault on the self that requires a healthy response to move past it.
Shame requires champions who would challenge the status quo and look at people (including the fat ones) as beautiful and worthy individuals.
Replace "fat" or "obesity" with mental illness or cancer and see how far it gets you.
As Dr. Jason Fung has pointed out, obesity is the only disease where we truly blame the patient. Society demands to know how fat folks get so fat, and they likewise demand to know what the fat person intends to do about it.
Looking back on the story I read today claiming that obesity is unacceptable?
Try subbing the keyword:
"Mental illness kills and is never okay."
"Cancer kills and is never okay."
Even with the stigma that can come with mental illness--it sounds stupid. We know better than to talk about health in moral terms. Unless we're referring to fat people. Obviously.
Nobody is promoting obesity through the body positivity movement.
Where are all the fat clubs pushing cookies and cake down our children's throats? Last time I checked, most cooking shows and junk food advertisements rely upon slim folks to market their products.
We all know that soda isn't good for us. Yet we all know a slim person who won't quit chugging the stuff. We all know naturally slim folks who never exercise. Yet somehow, you think it's just fat people serving up encouragement to eat poorly and sit around watching Netflix?
Get real.
When we say all bodies are good bodies, we mean it. And we mean that every body deserves to be loved and valued by its owner--wherever they are at. There is no secret meeting of fat people trying to recruit more fatties.
Treating fat people like valuable human beings takes literally nothing away from you. But your thin privilege routinely takes dignity away from those who have the audacity to be fat.
Fat people have the right to wear beautiful clothes.
Have you ever had to wear clothes that don't fit or flatter your figure just because that's all you have available? What if you had to do that day in and day out just because manufacturers don't want to clothe your type?
It's a legitimate problem and fat people have a right to be angry about it.
Privileged people love to say that if you don't like the way things are, then you should just lose weight. That's an easy statement that lacks any actual understanding of obesity at all.
It is harder to make healthy choices when you feel ugly, awkward, and monstrous in your own clothes. Believe it or not, fat women want to wear nice clothes, and they are not bitches or brats for telling retailers what they want.
There is an obvious hole in the beauty and fashion industries which blatantly exclude people of size. Once again, including fat people in normal human issues like clothing can't harm you at all.
The only way it could possibly harm your sensibilities is if you are unable to accept that fat people are every bit as valuable as you.
Fat people even have the right to be called beautiful just the way they are.
The writer who spurred this particular story had a rude comment about how she and most people don't even want to see "dad bods." So, she finds the body positivity movement hypocritical, since it's pushing businesses to show fat women in the media.
Weirdly enough, fat men and women exist. There won't suddenly be less of us just because you use the media to pretend that everyone is slim. Besides, if you don't want to see dad bods or bigger women in general, you are shallow AF. I genuinely pity you for being so blind.
"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder."
"Beauty is only skin deep."
Those phrases are timeless because they hold actual meaning.
Nobody likes to admit that when it comes to aesthetic preferences, we are usually way off-base. Who hasn't fallen for a conventionally attractive, super good-looking partner only to discover they were a.) a total jerk, or b.) completely incompatible with us?
Appearance can never reveal the full story. And yet, we have men and women who insist they're just not attracted to certain races, certain ethnicities, certain heights, certain hair colors, and certain body types. The list goes on and on about appearance as if it's no big deal.
Personally, I think it's all bullshit. Few folks want to admit that they have extremely limited, preconceived notions about attraction and the way they see other groups of people.
"Oh, I could never be attracted to somebody who doesn't take care of their body."
Except that usually isn't true. Most people who say that have no problem dating a sedentary person who eats mostly junk food... as long as they're slim. In fact, slim girls are often seen as cute(!) when they eat the same foods that get vilified when eaten by fat people.
If you can see the beauty in all people--that's not some fantasy or falsehood. It is a strength that takes skill and even practice to quit buying into stereotypes and start seeing a person for who they are past appearance.
I Am One Fat and Angry Woman
And I am sick to death of your poisoned fruit. I don't want to hear your excuses for fat shaming and fat phobia. They are shortsighted and cruel. If you cared so much about a stranger's health, you would care how your words impact them and their mental health.
You would care about the person.
As it stands, you only care about the fat.
And I pity you for being unable to treat human beings with some damn decency.