I was going to rant for a while on the general theme of “size acceptance”, but instead I’d like to make a few points that need to be made.

“Fat people are fat because they eat too much.”

Well, no. Actually, fat people are fat because they ate too much, past tense. Over a relatively long period of time, which may or may not include the present, they had a calorie surplus, which got turned into extra fat.

If I am in debt, it doesn’t necessarily follow that I am borrowing a lot of money or spending more than I can afford right now. It just means that I have done that in the past and haven’t paid it off yet.

Just “eating normally” is not enough to make someone return to a normal weight any more than simply returning to “normal spending habits” will make a debt go away. It will only make you maintain your current level of debt/weight. To actually make the debt/weight go away requires extra effort: you have to reduce your calorie intake/spending such that some of your energy requirements are coming from stored body fat/some of your income is going towards paying off the debt.

So, no, Virginia, unless you are so involved in my personal life that you know whether I am presently gaining weight/getting further into debt, you have no place making any assumptions about my eating/spending habits. If you were that involved, you wouldn’t need to make any assumptions because you would know. And if you’re not, then my personal matters are none of your business.

“If the fashion industry and Hollywood stopped using anorexic models and actresses, that would encourage people to be fat and unhealthy!!”

Sounds batshit insane, doesn’t it? That’s why it pisses me off that I hear it so much.

The underlying assumptions seem to be that if they don’t use skinny models, they will use faaaaat ones, and that portraying overweight people in the media as anything other than gross and ugly will give people “permission” to be fat.

I’m choosing to contrast skinny here with faaaaaat, not fat. Why? Because faaaaaat has no actual resemblance to the condition of actually being fat, that is, having extra weight. Faaaaaat, the body type everyone thinks is so horrible and disgusting, just means “not underweight”. Normal weight and above. You know, that thing where you have enough fat to actually cover all of your bones.

Ever notice how nearly all of the actresses that the media likes to call things like “curvy”, “full-figured”, and other euphemisms we all know just mean faaaaat… are actually just normal weight and wear what any sane, rational person would consider a normal, healthy dress size? America Ferrara, the faaaaat star of “Ugly Betty”, reportedly wears a size 6. SIX. OMG what a heifer she is!

And do you know what the skinny-philes say every time someone suggests that maybe models and actresses should look more like America Ferrara and less like Calista Flockhart? OMG it will make people think it’s okay to be faaaaaat!

Honestly. Besides the obvious fact that it is okay to be faaaat, since that just means “bigger than size zero” to the rest of us, this is bullshit in more ways than I can count. A little part of my brain tries to commit suicide every time I hear it.

Out here in reality-ville, I have my own theory. Shoving skeletons in our faces all the damn time and telling us “this is what it means to be attractive” encourages people to get fat. Not just faaaaat. FAT.

Most women will never, ever be a size 0, or 2, or even 4. Which means, according to the wonderful society we live in, most of us will never be considered “acceptable” by society. Well, if there’s absolutely no hope for me anyway, say all us normal-sized women, why shouldn’t I eat all the junk food I want? I may as well get some enjoyment out of life.

But, see, if we were “allowed” to feel sexy at 6 or 8, then there wouldn’t be any need for such self-destructive attitudes. In other words, if healthy were considered attractive, we would all have permission to get healthy, feel attractive, and not apologize for not disappearing when we turn sideways — because we would all have accepted our own natural and healthy size. THAT is what “size acceptance” means.

Which is not to say that society has to go along with this before people can accept themselves for who they are. But it sure would be nice, wouldn’t it? And in the mean time, anyone who decides to be happy at a weight that is normal and healthy for their body is going way against the grain. I’m sure that eventually the pendulum will have to swing the other way again, but I’m not at all confident that it will happen during my lifetime.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 9th, 2007 at 8:37 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.