I wanna love You better whatever it takes . . . » fat power

Size acceptance vs. Fat Activism

laterain — Sat, 08 Sep 2007 02:07:25 +0000

so I was wandering the internet, and came across this blogger’s set of questions, which I thought were worth answering here . . . (WAS worth answering here?! grammar police, are you out there?)

anyway, here’s her list:

So tell me:
1. What is your definition of a Fat Activist?
2. What qualities give a Fat Activist the capital letters in that title?
3. How is a Fat Activist different from a Fat-Acceptance Supporter?

And my answers . . .

1) I would define it as being someone who is willing to (and does) speak out against false information and stereotypes about fatness and fat people . . . I used to refer to myself as a “size acceptance activist”, which seems to fit in better with the whole concept of HAES.

2) I’m not going to quibble about capital letters, but I think it’s about being true to it and consistently acting/speaking out about what you believe. But I also wonder if this is a case of self-identification, and I’m not sure that any of us gets to decide who is and isn’t a Fat Activist with a capital “FA” . . .

3) “Activist” versus “Supporter” to me is about doing/speaking out versus merely saying, “sure, I believe in that”. In some ways, there’s not really a cost to being a supporter in the same way that there is a cost to being an “activist”. For example, I’m passionate about fighting racism, and I would say that there are probably a lot of people who would say they “support” fighting racism, but the cost to these people is nothing like the cost of people who are really in the trenches, working to fight against racism. If you’ll permit me the analogy, I feel like it’s the same thing with being a size acceptance activist. You take the risk. You speak out when it’s not popular.

Anything else, and you’re just a supporter . . .

whoa. are you serious?

laterain — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 13:23:09 +0000

I never in a million years would have guessed that this was the case! I thought it was natural!

(yes, I’m being sarcastic!)

our culture is just so messed up

laterain — Sun, 22 Jul 2007 00:58:43 +0000

but I’m glad that there are people like this who can at least try to talk some sense into folks.

aw, come on, you’ve gotta help . . .

laterain — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 19:15:35 +0000

http://www.savethecookie.com/

AirTran is cheap, but Midwest has those big, comfy seats.

oh my gosh . . . this is too funny

laterain — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 01:31:33 +0000

WARNING: if you don’t like four-letter words, please don’t visit the site I’m about to recommend. but if you do look at it, please don’t say I didn’t warn you about the obscenity beforehand.

The same goes, perhaps, for those with weak stomachs.

HOWEVER . . . this is the FUNNIEST thing I have read all week . . . funny, and yet sad at the same time . . . because we still live in a society that tries to tell us that anything–even $hitting your pants on a daily basis–is preferable to the horrors of being fat.

the Fat Tax

laterain — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 02:40:59 +0000

If you are not a fat girl, and especially if you are not a fat girl who has ever been a bridesmaid, then you may not be familiar with the “fat tax.”

Basically, someone along the way had a brilliant idea to charge more money for fat women’s clothing. Interestingly, when I was younger, I worked at a department store, in “special sizes”, which was comprised of both the Plus Size department and the Petites department. (Perfect! So if you didn’t already feel like a beached whale, you could hang around with women who are 4’9″ tall and weigh 85 pounds soaking wet. I loved being in the fitting room and hearing women complain about how the size zero was too big!!!)

ANYWAY . . . in both of these departments, the clothes cost more. This caused many people to question the reasoning behind all of this– “Well, if the fat clothes cost more because they use more material, why do the petite sizes cost more? Don’t those use LESS material?”

My boss used to say that it was something to do with the machines they used to make the clothes (and we hope that by “machines” she didn’t mean “Honduran children”) and how they had to be “re-calibrated” to adjust to making the clothes in different sizes. Others might say that it was a simple matter of supply and demand–nobody, least of all myself, missed the fact that there were three floors of “misses” sizes and only 1/4 of a floor each for Plus sizes and Petites (we shared the floor with seasonal–coats and swimsuits, never at the right time of the year–and with lingerie.)

But yesterday I was going through a catalog, and saw that they had actually broken the prices out into THREE tiers of pricing. The tiny people (sizes 12, 14, 16) pay the least, then the “regular size” fat people (sizes 18, 20, 22, 24) pay a little bit more, and then, worst of all, the fattest of the fat (size acceptance folks sometimes refer to this as “super-sized”–not because these people eat too much McDonald’s, but because mainstream stores tend to exclude them from the mix)–anyway–the larger sizes were actually listed at a THIRD (yes, higher still) price!!!

And it became very clear to me in that moment WHY they charge more. It’s simply because they can . . . because we who live in this world in larger bodies think that we deserve to be treated like shit.

all I’m saying is, don’t believe the hype. FAT AND PROUD, BABY!