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otf_wank's thoughts on weight, stop sharing your thoughts

HOW DARE YOU CALL ME FAT
Mars from Chicken Dinner Candybar does her regular Fat Love Friday and includes Marie from Agent Lover.

Marie is put off by her inclusion on a "fat" list and tells Mars so.

Mars offers to take it down. Marie refuses. Instead, she proclaims on her blog, "oh haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaale no!

Chaos ensues in the comments about fatphobia, body acceptance, fashion sense (or the lack thereof), and kissing-up commentors.

Is Marie brave or is she overreacting?

(I'm in the comments and I know Natalie [the 'overreacting' link], so I am slightly involved in the wank aftermath. It's pretty obvious which side i'm on.)

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Re: Might get some negative feedback on this, but...
ariadne484
2009-08-04 06:05 pm UTC (link)

I think the first thing that needs defining is what kind of weight level are we talking?

Whereas I think the first thing that needs explaining is why, whenever someone brings up fatphobia, other people rush in to explain how easy weight loss is, with the clear implication that fatphobia is totally acceptable because weight loss is a choice.

But I think a lot of harm is done by repeating mantras that encourage people who have weight levels that pose a health risk to them to think that they can do nothing to change.

And I know a lot of harm is done by a society that convinces fat people that we're worth less as human beings, and gives everyone else carte blanche to treat us badly.

You want to know what my goal is? To lose twenty pounds a year.

And may that goal continue working for you! I'm not being sarcastic, either. My goal, such as it is, is to be happy, to be a foodie, to not have to eat chicken breasts when I prefer the thighs, to live until whenever I die. For me, constant dieting wasn't living.

I hope you see your kids graduate. I also hope they're not making their fat classmates' lives as hellish as my own grade school experience.

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Re: Might get some negative feedback on this, but...

silrana
2009-08-04 06:37 pm UTC (link)

When did I ever say it was easy? I *love* food. I adore food. While I don't have a sweet tooth, I have a huge salt tooth, so no bag of potato chips within range is safe. I completely agree that a life of dieting is no fun at all. What I said was that lifestyle changes are *possible*.

I have found for me, the key is moderation and tweaking. Some things I won't give up. I have yet to find a low-fat cheese that doesn't taste like the wrapper it is in, so I eat the good stuff. I just eat less of it. And I try to be creative. Instead of fried or BBQ chicken wings, I dust them with Season-All and broil them. They're delicious, and a far amount of the fat runs off, instead of more being added. It is a healthy dish? Not really, but it's health-ier.

And I understand what you mean about society. I've been overweight for decades. I've yoyoed so many times I get motion sickness just thinking about it. I grew up with one of those "You'd be so pretty if you lost weight" (translation: you're fat and ugly) mothers. I am not brushing off the terrible pressure people get from society. But when there are bigger pressures - mortality - you see things a bit differently.

Again, I'm not trying to make people who maybe have some love handles feel like dirt for not working tirelessly to make them go away. Live is too short to worry about little things like that. What I'm trying to say is that there are a lot of people who have weight levels and lifestyles that are dangerous to them, if not now then in the long term. As I said in another post, I'm 5'2" and weigh 200 lbs. Nobody would look at me and think I just need to skip the pizza once in a while. I'm in for years of making little adjustments here and there to try to get to something approaching healthy.

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