Weight-related Rant ahead.

[beanside]

Be warned, and don't read if you don't want to hear it.

It's kind of funny that poisontaster posted about fandom safe space earlier.

Cause here I am, triggered to all hell, and fighting with myself not to do something phenomenally stupid.

I clicked on some artwork of chubby Jensen, and it was cute. Hey, chubby Jensen was getting love! Awesome! This must be a big bang about chubby Jensen learning to love himself!

Ah. No. A half page of Jensen's family sending him exercise gear (Cause fatties don't exercise, see!), he decides to jog, and ends up passing out (because we all know fatties are going to die of heart disease, right?) and wakes in the hospital. Then, he feels like he should apologize to the orderlies who have to transfer his fat ass to another bed. (it takes THREE! Because, he's a fatty, got it?) That's about when I stopped and had to go in another room and not cry. Oh wait, no, the fatty got sent to fat camp. Where Jared will teach him to be skinny and not to eat everything in sight, and maybe to get off his fat ass. And at the end, when he's had "dramatic" weight loss, and run a marathon (seriously how many skinny people can do that?) then, he gets the sexin with Jared.

Y'know what, fuck that. If that's your thing, cool. But I don't need to read 40k words of hate. Whether that was what the author intended, that's what I see.

I'm fat. I'm very fat. I'm what they call a "death fattie." As in, OMG if you don't lose weight you're gonna die right now!!!!! Obesityheartattackdiabetes, deeeeaaaattthhh.

Y'know who's going to die first? The people who are out there yo-yo dieting because they hate their fat. Why are they yo-yoing? Because all denying yourself calories does is reset your body so that when you gain it back (and you will--results not typical, right) you gain more, and it's harder to take off. If you're fat, and you work out, you're less likely to die than someone who yo-yos.

But...the American Obesity Association says...wait? Who is on the board of the AOA? Weight Watchers? Jenny Craig? The Board of Bariatric Surgeons? Wow. They have a lot to gain by keeping people yo-yoing, don't they?

People. I've got bad news for you. I, in all my 300 pound glory, eat about the same as a skinny person. I get lunch sized portions, and have it for dinner, too. I don't eat a ton of candy, though I don't deny myself it, either. I eat what my body says it wants. And when it's full, I stop.

I'm sick of feeling like I should apologize for living. I'm sick of feeling judged every time I order dessert, or say "Yes, you better fucking well put whipped cream on my frappicino." Fuck it. I will wear sexy clothes if I want. If you don't like it, tough. I will go out in public and I will order what I damned well want. I will not let someone make me feel like less of a person because I'm wearing a tank top, and happy. I'm sorry if you're miserable. I'm not.

I have a wife who loves me (god bless lesbians, btw. a better community of fatty chasers is hard to find) I have a business starting that will make me happy, and hopefully provide for me and my wife. I don't have time for hate.

I am a child of the Morrigan, and I do not suffer fools.

I am a child of the Goddess, and She made me in Her image.

I am a child of the God, and He didn't go for a skinny chick. (I mean, look at the Venus of Wilendorf!!) (which is not to say that he didn't like the skinny chicks, too...my God isn't picky, he just likes the ladies)

I am me, and I am enough.

Comments

[siubhlach.livejournal.com]

Yes. Yesyesyesyesyesyesyes.

This comment pretty much sums it up for me.

The vindictive bitch in me takes so much pleasure in regularly and routinely showing up every single one of my thinner friends by being consistently fitter than them. It takes even more pleasure in doing the same thing to strangers (I walk fast; the look of consternation of the faces of young guys when they realise that actually, not only can they not overtake me, they also can't keep up, is a real joy to see). Do not assume that you know anything about me because you can see how big my hips are.

[hederahelix.livejournal.com]

Well, and to be fair, since looking back I see it's not clear in my original comment since I've said the thing about gazelles a million times to people whom I know well, I'll add a few things here.

I have no problem with skinny people. I don't personally care one way or the other if skinny people are fit or not. It's their lives. In addition, I have enough friends with disabilities that are not physically obvious that I am perfectly aware that some skinny people cannot be fit because of physical limitations.

And I've known plenty of people who eat like horses and remain super skinny. Clearly, that's what their genes or thyroids gave them as a metabolism and more power to em.

But there is a definite subgroup of skinny women who come to my gym and look at anyone who isn't skinny with overt disdain. They convey with sneers all the many ways that they see the older, rounder, less conventionally attractive women as clearly doomed to suck in the class.

And when they cockily take up a spot at the front of the room and then fail, I cackle inwardly with glee. When I talk about gazelles, I'm talking about the latter group of skinny women who think that just because they are skinny, they are also fit and obviously more fit than my clearly rounder (and therefore lazy, overeating, depressed self).

Like you, I take far more pleasure than I should in showing up the gazelles. Skinny people who aren't gazelles do not evoke that same response because they aren't condescending to me in the first place.

I'm a lot physically stronger than I look. I cannot tell you how many times--at work, in an airport, at a store--I pick up something that everyone around me thinks is too heavy and is afraid I can't lift. I can't tell you how many times men in airports do that "Oh, I'll help the poor weak woman" thing only to realize partway into lifting my bag that it weights about four times what they thought it was going to weigh.

It's one of the few pleasures I routinely derive from interacting with the TSA. I just put on my best, sweet, southern-belle learned smile at 'em while they huff and puff and look positively shocked.

[siubhlach.livejournal.com]

You know, it's funny, but I never for a second assumed your comment was aimed at all skinny people (and mine is guilty of the same lack of clarity - the pleasure element is very much restricted to those occasions when I see that look of 'oh, she's fat, I can easily out-fitness her' flit over someone's face).

I think it's very much a sign of our times; as a society, we tell people that thin means healthy, and skinny means fit. And we make so many assumptions about people on the basis of how they look, how they talk, how they're dressed. What's so infuriating about the fat stereotypes for me is not actually the negativity of them, but just how fundamentally flawed so many of them are. It infuriates me the way I often get disbeliving looks from people when we talk about how much we eat; yes, actually, I do eat less than you on a daily basis. Presumably, my system is just far, far more efficient than yours when it comes to processing food (interesting point of note, my SO, who is one of those skinny people who eats like a horse always turns into a human furnace after every meal - to the extent that he generates so much heat that in the summer I can't actually sit next to him). Don't dismiss me when I tell you part of why I weigh what I do is down to my metabolism. It's not an excuse, it's a fact!