Women and Fat-Shaming

[polimicks]

While I have had the occasional man yell something at me like "Fat Cow!" or "Fat Bitch!" generally speaking, I get the most static about my weight from other women.

It comes in the form of backhanded compliments like, "I wish I was strong enough to not care what I looked like." Or questions like "Should you really be eating that?" Or, and this one comes mostly from women my mother's age or older, "You'd be such a pretty girl if you lost the weight." And I do sometimes get just outright nasty comments like, "You're too fat to wear that," but most of the criticism of my fat body from other women comes in the form of "concern."

Ah yes, concern... "I don't really hate fat people, I'm just concerned for your health..." That's a lovely little conscience salve, isn't it? It lets you say some truly horrible shit while reassuring yourself that it isn't that bad, because you CARE. You're just letting someone you CARE about know that they're in danger from themselves.

I have news for you, sweetheart. Fat people know they're fat. Really. Seriously, we do. We aren't blithely tripping along seeing ourselves as size sixes having a bad day. We know we're fat. And we'd have to be living in a cave to not be constantly bombarded with the message that "OMG! TEH FAT IS GOING TO KILLZ0RZ US!!!!" So, your salving concern, is just that. It is designed to insulate you from the knowledge that you're being hateful. So just stop it and be fucking honest with yourself.

And as for "I wish I could be brave enough to not care..." What in the world makes you think I don't care how I look? Is my hair unwashed and unstyled? are my clothes dirty and ill-fitting? No. No, they aren't. I dress very well and stylishly, as far as my budget will allow. I wear skirts and tights, my clothing fits and flatters my figure. I keep my hair in an A-line bob. Granted, I don't wear make up often unless it's a special occasion, but I don't need to.

And as for being a pretty girl if I lost the weight, I'm already a beautiful woman WITH the weight. Ask my husband, who, quite frankly, is the only person whose opinion really matters. Ask the guys who hit on me while I'm bartending.

Now, the question is, why do women give other women so much static about their weight?

Again, I have a theory. (Who's surprised? Hands?)

When women who work hard to conform see women they view as not "trying hard enough," they resent it. I've known women who have spent their entire lives, decades, dieting, denying themselves enough calories to really support good health, and when I say, "You know, I decided that I'm done with the dieting bullshit," they get really hostile.

And part of me understands why. The fact that I'm not dieting and my husband loves me anyway means I have just discounted their life's work. They have spent their lives depriving themselves because society told them that they wouldn't be good enough or deserve love if they didn't. Women, particularly in American culture, spend so much time, energy and money trying to conform to a beauty standard that is impossible for even the exemplars of it to live up to. The fact that just maybe they could have not spent all that time and energy and still had meaningful lives would make anyone angry.

Really, think about it. How much weight and energy do you, personally waste worrying about this? How many articles of clothing you can't wear now but will "get into one day" do you own? How many times a month, week, day do you stop yourself from eating something you really want and would enjoy because it's "bad?"

I have nothing against a life lived in moderation. I have everything against a life lived in deprivation, and so should you. Particularly since more and more studies are demonstrating that fat has more to do with genetics and less to do with diet than common wisdom suggests. If people like, I can link to some articles, but really the easiest way would be for you to go pick up books by Gina Kolata and Paul Campos. They've already done all the legwork, and probably summed up it up more coherently than I can.

Comments

[kashma.livejournal.com]

Interestingly, I see some parallels with anyone who chooses to buck the cultural norms of our American society, be that regarding skin care, living frugally, choosing to live a life centered around service to others, diet (as in being vegetarian or vegan) etc.

As far as moderation/deprivation go, deprivation is in the eyes of the beholder. If I hear one more time "I just couldn't live without my latte in the morning" I shall scream. And then I shall do my best to convince this person that they should spend a day outside all day, not even the night, with just what they can manage to get from can returns.

[polimicks.livejournal.com]

I'm actually talking about people who strive to limit their food intakes to the less than 1,000 calorie diets that some doctors are prescribing for patients.

I'm essentially talking about making yourself miserable in an attempt to attain the unattainable, for your entire life.

[kashma.livejournal.com]

I apologize if my comment was off base. Just sparked some thoughts on my end.
Just FYI, I was directed over here from sirriamnis


Less than 1000 calories? WTF? From all that I've read, that's just nuts. Just on the physical end of things, that's astounding to me that doctors would even suggest that, much less the psychological.

I completely agree that depriving yourself to obtain unattainable goals is just crazy.

[polimicks.livejournal.com]

It's ok, I am Sirriamnis. This is where I do my more politically/social rants that I maybe don't want exploding in my personal journal.


And yes, I've had several friends online and IRL in the last year whose doctors suggested 1000 cal/day plans to them.

[sirriamnis.livejournal.com]

My maternal grandmother has spent the last 30 years or more of her life (30 is all I can remember) on Weight Watchers. She carefully weighed and measured every morsel of food she ate. She had a special glass for her beverages, so she would know exactly how many ounces of skim milk or orange juice she was drinking.

This is not healthy... Quite frankly, if she weren't a woman, or if she were applying this much obsessive-compulsive behavior to any other factor of her life, people would suggest she get therapy to get over it. But because it's food and she's female, instead people congratulate her on her self-control.

It's a fucked up world we live in.

[bittermonkey.livejournal.com]

I was directed over here by you and I totally agree. So the fuck what if I'll never be a size 8 or 10 again? I eat what I want and I'm happy not to measure everything I eat. I've tried weight watchers and was fucking miserable on it after two weeks of adding up points. FTS! My blood pressure is great and blood sugar is fine and I have a husband who loves me, not to mention I've been hit on by THIN men.

I say eat what you want and STAY HAPPY!

[annetangent.livejournal.com]

I know this is months late but I figured you might be interested. They did some study and found overweight women were having more sex than average-sized women. I told my mom (who's a doctor) and she said, to paraphrase, "I'm not surprised, so many really thin women come in and say they have no energy, they're not interested, it hurts, it's not important. Why work so hard to be sexy when you don't care about having it?"