Blue Meeple is for games. Imperfect Letter is for books. Killer Zebras* is for everything else.
*See Sunshine by Robin McKinley
Catching Elephant is a theme by Andy Taylor
Because telling fat people that they are in fact humans that deserve dignity and respect automatically means you’re ~*GLORIFYING OBESITY*~
By the way, don’t dribble on to me saying you worry about a fat person’s ‘health’. That’s just a bullshit excuse to voice your unwanted opinion on a fat person’s body considering you wouldn’t give a single flying fuckadoodle about someone’s health if they were skinny. Besides another person’s health is none of your damned business anyway. Run along now and preach to a choir that actually cares.
I’m going to be honest, so long as you’re not hurting anyone, you can eat soy sauce and milk duds all day long for all I care.
thank you so much for this comic imp.BOOM! Why I Glorify Obesity ereyday.
See how it sparkles?
Thoughts on the Fat-Acceptance Movement
TW: The OP links fat and health
I have been wanting to write something on this issue for a while. It may be an unpopular opinion, but it’s my current opinion on the topic…
I have known for years that the media has been and will continue to perpetuate unhealthy, unrealistic, ‘ideals’ that women (myself included for most of my teenage years and early 20’s) should live up to in order to be considered beautiful, successful, etc. Since joining Tumblr, this issue has become more and more apparent. That and the issue of body acceptance.While I hated myself for years, calling myself ugly and fat, I was not fat according to typical standards. I am naturally a petite person so I in no way am trying to say that I understand what it’s like to be fat because I don’t. I don’t know what it’s like, nor do most other people unless they are living the experience.
What I do know is that losing weight is hard. Bone structure, genetic factors, lifestyle, and for some, thyroid issues, can predispose someone towards becoming overweight or even obese.
Is it okay to be fat?
I honestly believe that everyone should be accepted for who they are regardless of the way they look. We’re all human after all - the fat-shaming, the hate, it’s unnecessary - where’s the compassion? You don’t know stranger’s stories. Why is it okay to assume that all fat people are lazy and eat McDonald’s every day? The fat girl you see walking down the road could could actually be following a clean and healthy diet while exercising regularly and the ‘skinny’ girl may be the one starving herself thin, bingeing on junk foods in secret. You don’t know. You can’t judge. You should not judge.
However, the one bone I have to pick with this acceptance movement is that I haven’t been able to see much talk about health. From a medical perspective, I have seen on a first hand basis the number of diseases and chronic health issues that are closely linked to obesity - diabetes and hypertension to name a couple…
So I guess I have a bit of a conundrum - I want women of all shapes and sizes to love themselves and their bodies, but I also want women to take care of their health. Many of the chronic diseases prevalent today are diseases of lifestyle i.e. linked to stress, poor diet, and lack of exercise.Can you be accepting of all body types and still want women to take interest in their health and in topics such as central obesity - a waist circumference of greater than 35” has been linked to many health risks - ?
Not everyone can look like a super model or would even want to… but everyone can live a healthy life.
First of all, I want to point out that health is not and sometimes cannot be a priority for all. Physical and mental disabilities can impact how much a person exercises. Healthy food and produce are not always accessible or affordable (check out alithea’s and waywardvictoriansnark’s excellent words on this). Also, some people just don’t care about eating well or exercising regularly which is a choice we allow thinner people to have. Because, you know, body autonomy and all that.
The absolute bottom line of fat acceptance (in my eyes) is that fat people deserve to be treated with respect and dignity. Health is not a criterion.
But it’s important to you, and that’s cool, so I’m going to pick on this sentence of yours: “However, the one bone I have to pick with this acceptance movement is that I haven’t been able to see much talk about health.”
Are you kidding? Health is the number 1 go-to rebuttal to fat acceptance; we talk about this shit ALL.THE.TIME. (So your statement that your post “may be an unpopular opinion” is totally false, as most people have your opinion.) How hard have you looked?!
Here are three sources to get you started:
- The Fat Nutritionist talks about, unsurprisingly, fatness and nutrition
- Dances With Fat mainly writes about fat and fitness
- Fat acceptance writers talk about health at every size, or HAES, a lot. A major advocate of this approach is Dr Linda Bacon.
Start there. Fat acceptance exists outside of tumblr, so read the books and blogs that are out there. You are not raising any new questions.
Finally, I get that you’re aiming for a respectful tone in your post but “Is it okay to be fat?” is a really shitty question to ask. I mean, you are using the existence of fat people as a thought piece. You are questioning if our existence is okay. We are not a concept, we are people.
We are not a concept, we are people.
People do seem to forget this, don’t they? That “the obese” and “fat people” - and worst of all, “childhood obesity” - don’t refer to some abstract idea, but real people with all the thoughts and feelings and diversity of every other group.
So why are diets so very unsuccessful long term? Let’s look at it from your body’s perspective. Your body isn’t aware that there is social value in meeting an arbitrary stereotype of beauty. Your body can’t actually imagine that there is enough food available, but you won’t feed it because you are hoping that it eats itself and becomes smaller, so it assumes that you live in a circumstance where sometimes you have to deal with starvation. If you add a bunch of exercise to that then your body assumes that there are times when you are starving and have to run long distances. Your body is very interested in helping you live, and so it reacts to this situation by putting measures into place for the express purpose of gaining and maintaining weight so that you can deal with your life of starvation and running. And it keeps that up long after your initial weight loss ends.
Why Do Dieters Regain Weight? by Ragen Chastain
(Source: rosescented)
(made rebloggbale upon request)
The argument that ‘plus-size’ clothes cost more because they take more fabric is bullshit. If clothing sizes were priced by the amount of material they take to make, each size would cost a little more than the size below it. And if a size 20 would cost more than a size 12 then a size 10 should cost more than a size 2. But it doesn’t. Because your argument is fucking bullshit.
And if fat bodies were valued as much as thin bodies, the extra cost in materials would be applied over all sizes and averaged out to one price. If fat bodies were valued as much as thin bodies, this wouldn’t even be a fucking conversation. End of story.
![calmingmanatee:
[Image description: A photograph of a manatee in the ocean. It is on the left side of the frame, facing the camera. Algae is growing on its body. TEXT: “You might be big, you might be small, you might be short, you might be tall, whatever you are, whatever you’re called, you are you sized. And that’s the best size of all.”]
(Photo credit)
“You sized”! I love it.](http://24.media.tumblr.com/0f5eb5626e9945b083e21cced616fd8a/tumblr_mgvl9rfRox1rxqd36o1_500.jpg)
[Image description: A photograph of a manatee in the ocean. It is on the left side of the frame, facing the camera. Algae is growing on its body. TEXT: “You might be big, you might be small, you might be short, you might be tall, whatever you are, whatever you’re called, you are you sized. And that’s the best size of all.”]
“You sized”! I love it.
drst:
i saw this earlier and LOVED IT but then the person posted the artist’s motivation/inspiration and it filled me with such intense rage.
from their diviantart, emphasis mine:
I’ve seen numerous fanarts of Velma, depicting her as some über curvy and sexy and geeky fantasy material… and for some reason, I wanted to draw the opposite - a tubby Velma, an out of shape Velma, a having-finished-with-the-mystery-squad-letting-herself-go Velma… I mean, that happens, right? People get done with what they think are their glory days and kind of just… exist instead of living.
So here we have Velma that’s been stood up on a date. I picture this being her first date with that particular guy, but not the first time she’s been abandoned like that.
Instead of distress, I wanted to show her as being used to this sort of thing by now - she’s gotten into a habit of bringing a book along with her, even. I would say she never held out much hope for succeeding with the date tonight, but, nevertheless, tried to make herself look nice. She’s not grieving much, as her outlook on the whole situation is rather removed and philosophical after so many failures.
I wonder why she keeps trying?when i saw this, i was like “oh man! this is awesome! look at velma looking a-may-zing in that great dress, drinking a glass of wine, reading a book. looks like paradise!”
but the artist made this thinking “velma lets her self go, gets fat, and then gets stood up on dates. and she is so used to being treated like garbage, that she just assumes it will happen, and brings a book” because that’s totally what happens, right? you get fat and nobody wants to hang out with you or date you or be seen with you??
this artist is a fucking dumb-ass.
“I’ve seen numerous fanarts of Velma, depicting her as some über curvy and sexy and geeky fantasy material… and for some reason, I wanted to draw the opposite.” well BUMMER DUDE because that is actually exactly what you did.
What an asshole (the artist, not the commenters). She looks fabulous.
I wonder if the artist has any idea what they’ve created here - which is actually a pretty apt commentary in that, hey, here’s this woman who a lot of people think is totally awesome, who is completely attractive, who seems pretty self-sufficient and has had a lot of interesting things going on in her life - but, oh, man, she’s “used to” being stood up so she just takes it like it’s her due and doesn’t ever question why it’s supposed to be her fault. This artist has created a portrait of so many fat people that I know who are AWESOME and who genuinely believe that there is something wrong with them morally and socially because they’ve been told time and again that being fat is some kind of mortal sin.
And, yeah, we get all up in arms about “confidence is sexy” because, hey, it’s a fucking cliche. But there really are self-fulfilling prophecies; we learn not to see people flirt with us because we don’t believe anyone could possibly flirt with us. We hate our own bodies because, hey, we’re supposed to, right?
And meanwhile, to some objective observer, this fat woman in this picture is just hanging out, looking fly, reading a book and drinking some wine.
One of the most effective tools of oppression is to make the oppressed believe it is their fault, that they deserve it. And fat people are really fucking good at hating ourselves.
tl;dr: love the picture, think the artist is probs a fat-hating douche who has helped perpetuate the loathing so many fat people feel for themselves. Good times.
Bolding in the above commentary is mine, because a) that is probably true most of the time, which makes my heart hurt (for how much self-hate I still have sometimes) and b) except when she’s being viewed by the person who drew this picture, who clearly sees fat girls drinking wine and reading and can only think “she’s clearly been stood up again, poor fat slob” which makes my heart hurt more because maybe she’s just had a bad day and wants a glass of wine and some goddamned peace and quiet.
Fat politics is hard, you guys.
Love this additional commentary.
And but so maybe she also just likes going out and having a glass of wine and reading a book. The things that people read into strangers without any knowledge of that person whatsoever are sometimes astonishing. And the way that lots of people look at fatties and see sad folks no matter what the fat person is actually doing really IS something that kills me.
Being fat means that we can be happily reading a book with a glass of wine & others may see us as ….. A LONELY NIGHTMARE.
It is fascinating that such a beautiful and sexy picture could emerge with such nastiness as the motivation. Really, just amazing.
It didn’t occur to me that she’d been stood up for a date. I often choose to go out to eat with a book to keep me company.
Lady Captain America :)
(Source: cougarmeat)
