not even gonna read the replies to this thread because i know most of them will piss me off
i'm overweight. not lizzo overweight, but i'm overweight. not skinny. big thighs and a tummy roll.
i eat healthy. i eat fucking carrot sticks, low fat yoghurt, lots of vegetables, lean meat. i've cut out sugar and most carbs. i rarely drink alcohol. no fruit juice! i'm still overweight.
i'm going through testing for cushing's disease, thyroid problems, polycystic ovarian syndrome. the first thing "concerned" people say when they judge my body is that i'm unhealthy and i need to have more self control.
nobody cares about my eating disorders. nobody cares about the fact that whatever autoimmune disorder i have has made me infertile. no one cares about the intense anxiety and depression i get when i look in the mirror. nobody cares that i spend most of my day irritable and hungry.
everyone just gives that tittering response of "well, it's YOUR body but you know being fat is unhealthy right?". fuck OFF if you think being fat is just laziness. i work harder than most people just to maintain my current weight. if you really care, fund my next endocrinologist session. fund my psych appointments. fund the medications i have to take so i don't get deathly sick.
it's frustrating and most people are never going to understand. i feel so sorry for lizzo. she's an AMAZING performer. she has so many popular hits. and yet whenever she's brought up the conversation INEVITABLY turns to "yeah but we shouldn't glorify her... she's fat."
if all that matters is being fat, and being fat is out of my control, what should i do? just kill myself to stop making skinny people uncomfortable?
Fucking preach it sis.
Also relating a lot for the "irritable and hungry" part, god I truly hate the way I become so angry, irritated, and tensed as hell whenever I have to watch my calorie intake and not go over a certain amount, because my body sure as hell doesn't feel like I should, is still releasing tons of hunger hormones that I have to keep on ignoring 24/7 (forcing me to have the will of several mythical goddesses to do so), and also not be a cranky ass bitch about it all because I'm a woman, and it's socially expected of me to be peachy and fluffy at any given time of my life under any circumstances, otherwise I'd burn myself socially and professionally.
For that matter, I related a bit to the part where it was said that Joaquin Phoenix was always in an awful angry mood on the set of the Joker, because the dude had to starve himself 24/7 for months, and that shit goes to your brain, and alter your mood so hard, it's truly difficult to not feel intensely miserable and awful all the goddamn time. That was relatable to me (not the rest where he was being an ass though). People rarely know how bad it can get mentally when you have to survive on a 1200kcal a day diet because that's the only way your body will actually start losing weight due to your extremely low metabolism, but that you're also in an infuriating mood all the goddamn time even your own friends gets worried about you.
"Fuck you got mine" but with weight loss is a new one.
I'm not surprised. People managing to lose their weight and finally fitting the beauty standards often did so by fatshaming themselves to the moon and back, and take a particular (misplaced) pride in it. There is a particular pride you feel when you finally enter the market of the "socially-deemed attractive and desirable people" (been there done that) after being denied the entrance to it for so long.
Most of them experience quite the depression and fatshaming spiral when, eventually, life catch up to them, their metabolisms catch up to them 1/2/5 years after, and they end up gaining the weight back. Sometimes mildly, but oftentimes the exact same amount they had lost and then some. But everybody managing to lose a ton of weight always so dearly wishes to be
The One™ that'll beat the odds of statistics and scientific researches. They then get a huge slap in the face back to reality, when it happens that they're not, in fact, the
Neo of Dieting.
Most of those "I lost weight I know what I'm talking about" posters in here also happen to be men, and are absolutely oblivious to the disparity of metabolisms, and to the way hormones can make it that much harder for women to lose weight and keep it off in comparison. Just a splendid display of privileges stemming from the anecdotal evidence of their life experiences, that they think should topple the tons of scientific research about obesity backing up the opposite of what they claim. It's ridiculous.
the fact that obesity is an epidemic and is getting worse is 100% correct. the thing is, when it comes to fat people, suddenly all knowledge of social determinants of health gets thrown out the window and people default to "people just need to stop being lazy" (i'm not saying you said this, but it's rife in this thread)
for example, take drug use. if "you need to stop doing drugs" was all it took to cure addiction, we'd have no addicts. if "you need to pull your socks up and stop using drugs, this is all your fault" worked, we'd have no addicts
but we know that this shit is complicated! factors like mental health, poverty status, race, gender, all sorts of shit plays into addiction. it's not an easy problem and it's not an easy fix.
but weight loss? "it's calorie in calories out, stop being lazy. i did it, you can do it. if you're not losing weight you're doing something wrong. fat people need to stop being glorified (read: included) in society. it's easy. no excuses."
what about better work/life balance so people don't feel exhausted by the end of the day, so they have more time to exercise and cook nutritious food? what about accessible health care so that people can visit dieticians and doctors to work out sustainable weight loss options? what about subsidised gym costs? what about the ever increasing cost of living which means fast food and take out is often the most affordable option for poorer families? no? just "stop being lazy"? yeah okay.
The comparison with drug addiction is, I think very pertinent. While thinking about this whole issue yesterday, about what to answer to people who say we "shouldn't celebrate Lizzo's body", I couldn't help but feel disgusted by everything this would imply, and I drew that same comparison to drug addiction.
There are tons of drug addicts out there, tons of celebrities that happen to be drug addicts, and it is known that they are. Yet, when those celebrities get celebrated for, let's say, putting out a good album, making a stellar performance in a movie, being nominated to an Oscar, or doing anything that is worthy of praise and admiration, you don't see anybody, and I mean, NOBODY AT ALL barging in their threads being like "You can't celebrate that person, if you do, it means you're celebrating drug addiction and that ain't healthy".
There's no discourse whatsoever about how we, as a society, collectively join to celebrate known drug addicts, and how that is akin to celebrating drug addiction as well. Yet their bodies bear the marks and illnesses of that drug addiction. Their behaviors even more so. But nah, it's alright then, because people know better than to conflate the two together, know that a human being can be a drug addict and still be celebrated for their talent and their contribution to society, because they're not completely and totally stripped away from their humanity, their agenda, their talent and worth as a person, solely because they're a drug addict.
But somehow, it's perfectly okay to do that for fat people. Celebrating Lizzo, her success, her achievement, and the way she feels about her self, and heck, even celebrating the body she's doing all of that in, which is PART of herself, all of that is stripped away, all of who she is as a human being is thrown away in the trash, and only ever reduced to "she's fat, if you celebrate that woman in anyway whatsoever, you're promoting obesity". This is so fucking dehumanizing, and infuriating. Her body is part of who she is, and yes, deserves to be celebrated, because it allows her to be the way she is, it gives her the energy, talent and aura she has, because it gives her an edge on life that allows her to be inspired by it, in order to write about it in her songs, in a way that makes thousands and thousands of people feel loved, celebrated, accepted, uplifted, and feel positive about life in general, no matter what their weight is. You can't separate one from the other, just like you can't separate a drug addict digging into their own experience, in order to write amazing music, to direct an amazing movie, to act in a way that makes others relate and touch them in positive ways.
Yet the stigma surely isn't the same at all, and it's clearly because fatphobia is realer than ever.
I'll also add this old quote of mine from another thread, concerning what talking about obesity should also encompass, otherwise you're not even trying to start talking about it in the slightest productive way whatsoever, have no idea what you're talking about and should just stay silent:
Also, since we're at it.
You can't properly handle the problem of obesity, if your criticism of it doesn't take note of:
- social class
- sexism
- neo-liberal capitalism
- agro industries and how they work
- mental health
- income inequalities
- overwork culture
- education system
- racism
Obesity is far from being a "just eat 1500kcal a day and you'll be fine lol" problem. It's complex. It's tentacular. It's a lot of things interconnected and feeding one another, it's an insanely complex problem that goes beyond what most people think. There are books, podcasts, blogs, twitter accounts of fatpo activists that will teach you as much, and will educate you on the matter, but please just don't say anything at all if you're just showing ignorance, because such ignorance keeps on perpetuating a lot of harmful stereotypes that are absolutely not helping anyone anywhere.
