Let's Glorify Obesity.

Source––Remember when everyone was mad because
this Gilette ad was "promoting obesity"? 

**brief mentions of alcoholism (the second picture and the paragraph following, I will bold mentions). The entire post discusses body image, specifically around weight, so if this is potentially triggering, proceed with extreme caution.**

***Also realized after writing this that I used skinny and fat as a dichotomy––like everyone's either one or the other. Both terms, in a modern context, are fairly politicized and capture just a portion of the population. "Fat" for the sake of this post, consists of the people who identify that way (read Lindy West's book Shrill, it captures the idea of "fat" as an identity really well) and "skinny" is sort of an ambiguous term referring in this case to the people who most benefit from societal ideas of beauty in terms of weight. I know a lot of us exist in this vague middle ground where we're not yelling at people on Twitter about their weight and feel like we don't measure up to societal ideals, and definitely aren't "skinny" but also benefit from some sort of privilege in terms of our bodies. For instance, if you can find your clothing size easily at a store, that's a privilege. It's a hard subject to write about and there aren't hard lines like we wish there were. I also realize that everyone, regardless of weight, has their own unique struggle with their body, but let's focus on this for a second, okay?

***I also want to recognize that this post is sort of absent of race, not because it wasn't a factor, but because I probably tiptoed around it due to my subpar understanding and because it's not my place to fill in the blanks. Race, of course, is an integral part of American beauty standards as we know it is deeply connected to ideas of white supremacy. But just because I'm not capturing the full scope doesn't mean you shouldn't read about it. Stephanie Yeboah writes about being a fat, black woman on her blog and it is amazing and engaging (and doesn't even feel like reading!). Also, if you're really in it for the long haul, Roxane Gay has a memoir called Hunger which details her experience essentially being fat.

Okay, I told myself no notes this time but here we are 400 words later, the beginning.

In the long and winding journey to find some sort of peace with my body, I follow people of all sizes who seem to have a good relationship with their own. But of course, for every person (especially every fat person) who has a positive self-image, there are thousands of people who want to rip that away due to their own insecurities and lurking superiority complex.

It all started with this Tweet. While the language (I guess) could be labeled provocative because it's not the usual, shameful rhetoric we're used to hearing from anyone over a size two, there's nothing inherently offensive about this Tweet. At first, I scrolled by it, not thinking too much about a girl eating a chicken salad and listening to Solange, sounds like a normal day to me. But then the video kept popping up on my timeline.

For some reason, many people don't see this Tweet so innocently. One man (a really zoomed in Shaquille O'Neal, to be exact **not affiliated with the real Shaq, of course) summed up the criticism of the video like this:

Not gonna source this one because that Twitter user can rot in hell :)
also how dare he use Robin, she would never.

Let's break this down, shall we? First of all, both alcoholics and fat people deserve to be treated as human but this is sort of a faulty metaphor. Alcoholism is a chronic disease that requires treatment. Fatness, on the other hand, is a way to describe someone's body. There are many causes, some related to underlying medical conditions, but some purely cosmetic. Fatness is not a medical condition, someone could be completely capable, mobile, active, athletic, even and not fall into the socially constructed idea of what our bodies should look like. Shocking, whiny men on Twitter aren't experts in analogies, I expected better, zoomed-in Shaq (also, ironic that this man is out here shaming people for their bodies while hiding behind a fake picture, huh...). 

If you watch the video, she's eating a salad. I know it's irrational to process the logic in this image, but what could he possibly want from her? Oh, I know, it's for her to slink away into the shadows never to be seen again or waste away into nothingness trying to fit into his ideal of attractiveness. This clearly isn't about her health, so drop the act. Weight has so much to do with genetics and poverty. If this man really cared about people's health, he'd lobby for expanded free and reduced lunch programs at schools and free organic farmers markets in poor neighborhoods, but he's not doing that, is he?

Also, why should she have to eat like a rabbit to appease people on Twitter (or anyone)? If health food's your thing, go right ahead, but you have no place policing others. Should fat people really have to let their weight be the sole focus of their universe? For what? And if that doesn't work, are they really supposed to wallow in shame forever? There are a million videos of skinny girls eating burgers whole or downing milkshakes that are labeled (often by these same people) as quirky and more "real" because she's not afraid to eat. Certainly, this isn't healthy behavior either (for the record, my problem isn't the girls posting the videos, do your thing), so why is it treated differently? 

Well, we know why, it's because these women aren't fat. We don't know anything about any of their habits. We don't know about their diets, their exercise or any details of their lives. But because of body type, we have decided one woman has "earned" her right to eat what she wants and the other hasn't. 

Let's talk about who's leaving these nasty comments. As much as I want to say "oh it's just straight men being assholes as usual" it's not (though y'all are NOT off the hook, fix yourselves). The replies come from men and women all wanting to feel superior for their body type. For years, skinny people have been praised as attractive, hardworking, meant-to-be-seen members of society. They were exclusively represented in media and set the standard for what everyone should look like. But now, with the digital age upon us, people with all body types have found their power and created space for themselves online. Skinny people are no longer given a cookie (metaphorically, of course, because according to Twitter commenters, they've all worked so hard to not be fat and would never) for looking the way they do and some of them are. THREATENED. Without fat people feeling shame about their bodies, scared Twitter users are realizing they can't use them as a cheap laugh or a way to soothe their insecurities. 

Anyway, the title is ironic, nobody is glorifying obesity and if you think a picture of a fat person being happy glorifies anything, you just want that person to be miserable with themselves and their body. In conclusion, down with Twitter doctors. Love yourself. Goodnight.

Here are some pictures of me glorifying my own body, like we all should :)