Fat Hatred
Mo told me in response to this post that there’s no way there’s an equal amount of prejudice about skinny people as compared to their skinnier counterparts. She quotes Fatfu:
Fat has been thoroughly politicized in a way that other body sizes haven’t, and fat hatred has become woven into every aspect of the culture. There are layers of intolerance and hatred, abusive and hyperbolic rhetoric and increasingly organized discrimination, which is aggravated by a full-blown global hysteria about fat…..
The phrase fat hatred stuck with me. Why does fat hatred exist? It could be because we have an innate sense of what is unhealthy. In school stronger kids always single out the weaker kids. There are always opposites fat against thin, talkative against shy, dominating against reluctant. The positive or more acceptable child will be healthier, confident and have an acceptable body type. The rest of the class consists of the ‘geeks’ and the ‘fatties’ and the ‘punies’ and the ’shorties’.
We cannot deny that these kinds of prejudices exist in all communities. Where I come from, being thin is considered equivalent to being a stick insect, a cockroach, a pole…the idea of being the ideal woman has a lot to do with breast and girth size.
You may be tired of hi-tech fat hatred - umpteen fat-related comments in the blogosphere- but some writers and bloggers are trying to make sense of the issue. Check this interesting post.
I think the key word here is tolerance. Something you have to be taught at home when you are really young. Losing weight is for personal health gains and your size is not a bullet people can use to shoot you with.
obese, fat hatred, fat rant, fat bloggers, discrimination
June 14th, 2007 at 2:17 pm
My mom fought ‘fat hatred’ all her life, up until she passed away. She never got angry or mad at people. She realized they were the ones with the problem.
June 14th, 2007 at 3:03 pm
“Losing weight is for personal health gains and your size is not a bullet people can use to shoot you with.”
Amen to that!
June 14th, 2007 at 3:04 pm
Or at least, that it SHOULDN’T BE a bullet people use.
June 15th, 2007 at 11:02 pm
I’ve never heard the phrase “fat hatred” before. I’ve been anywhere from 40 to 70 pounds overweight for more than 15 years, and I can’t say that I’ve ever experienced bias or hatred because of it. I either interact with extremely nonjudgmental people or I am dumb as a box of rocks. I better open my eyes and find out.