Basically what happened last night way, I found an LJ post from an old high school friend of mine, and she was lamenting a bit about weight. I'll spare you the details in the interest of her privacy, but I commented on how weight loss is a struggle because of our bodies' not wanting us to do it (you know, that old adage that I've been pointing out time and time again on here). That got me thinking about society's obsession with weight, and how upsetting I find that obsession. This is what I ended up LJ-ing about it:
(please excuse any errors btw, I did this at 2 in the morning.
I've been thinking about this a bit this evening, since I posted a comment related to this issue in a friend's LJ.
I've been bothered a lot recently by what I consider to be an extraordinary over-emphasis on the importance of weight-loss. Obviously this involves the over-emphasis the medical community puts on it as being vital for a person's health and well-being to lose weight if they are overweight or obese according to that prehistoric arse-tacular woefully inaccurate measurement of body composition, the BMI, but I've been dwelling more on the importance society places on weight loss.
Let me give you an example that I read a few years ago. JK Rowling, Goddess Incarnate, was at a party a few years ago (about half a year after the release of HBP, if I'm not mistaken), and she saw someone she had not seen for a while. The first thing this person says upon seeing her is "look at the weight you've lost! You look great!"
JK Rowling so did not like this. In the past year she had written a book and given birth to Mackenzie, and yet the thing that deserved the true admiration in this friend's eyes was her weight loss? I mean, woah. She ranted about it on her website, and it was a rant I quite enjoyed reading, and this was before I got into FA.
Here's another example. In 2007 I came down with what I'm fairly sure was food poisoning. I was suffering from nausea so unbearable that I had to go to hospital. I stayed at the hospital for all of Easter Sunday (which was WAY FUN, but at least they gave me an easter egg on my breakfast tray), and got to leave on Monday, still feeling rather tender. When I left my weight was mentioned. Considering how in those past few days I'd consumed only fluids, some of which I threw up again not long after, I'd probably dropped a kilo or two. Dad said something to me along the lines of "welp, that's a good start". Really, father? Your nausea-phobic daughter has spent an easter weekend in hospital, and you're there thinking about my weight? That's just lovely.
It strikes me as utterly ridiculous that weight loss is considered so important. I know why it's considered so important, but that doesn't stop it from seeming ridiculous, to me. I've heard stories of people enduring many-month-long battles with cancer, and having friends and family say to them something to the effect of "wowzers, you've lost weight, you therefore look amazing, how can I do that?" Now, I dunno how many people have seen people suffering from cancer, but as far as I can tell they don't exactly look like the picture of health, beauty and glowing radiance most of the time. But FUCK all of that! How about a bit of recognition for how absolutely horrible their condition is and how AMAZING it is that they are able to endure that suffering and, in the case of many, still turn up to public events with a smile on their face? THAT is amazing. THAT is worth commenting on. NOT the side effect of both the cancer itself and the treatment of said cancer that is weight loss.
I think most people, fat or thin, worry about weight to some extent. Certainly most people believe that fat people are inferior, in some way, to thin people. This would sound so much less self-depreciating if I was thin, but hear me out. I'm not saying that most people consciously think they are superior to people who are fatter than them, not at all. But there are many different measures for superiority, and in the measure that focuses on health, at least, many thin people see themselves as better than fat people.
And that's fair enough, considering all of those really scary-sounding studies out there, what doctors and teachers tell us time and time again about obesity, the horrible images we see of fat people sitting at computers in t-shirts slightly too small for them eating chips and playing WOW, compared to the lovely pictures we see of thin people jogging in parks looking happy and vibrant, etc. But I would argue that health isn't necessarily the issue here. For the haters of fat people out there, their "concern about fat people's health" is the label that they hide under when they shout their abuse to fatties, but I would like to ask who the fuck they're kidding. They don't give a rat's hairy disease-infested anus about our health - they just like knowing that in the eyes of society we're inferior, and because fat people aren't considered a legitimate minority group that is unjustifiably discriminated against, they are perfectly able to treat us as inferior. No, my personal belief is that the obsession with weight comes mainly from the widely-held belief that fat is ugly, and that ugliness must be gotten rid of at all costs.
It's sad that most people in this world, including me (even now) can be so petty, but yeah, it's true. Often back in the days when I was hell-bent on losing weight at all costs, I'd be feeling faint from hunger as all of us fatties desperate to be rid of our evil fatness have felt at some point or other, and thinking "well yay, maybe I'm getting thin now. Maybe soon I'll be beautiful." Concern for my health really very rarely entered the equation, probably because I'm only 22 and health-wise I've always been very, very fortunate. But argghhh noooooo I've always been fat and being fat is the most horrible thing evaaarrr and you must lose it Gillian you MUST YOU MUST YOU MUST!!! Why? My health seriously is not going to get much better right now. My level of beauty, however, could go up in leaps and bounds, if ONLY i would lose weight! That's the real motivation. That's always been the real motivation. The only motivation. Why else do so many fat people hate to look at photos of themselves, or when people look at photos of themselves they cluck their tongues and say "eugh, I look fat in this photo"?
I think it's common knowledge that society places way too much importance on aesthetic appearance, and it's often done in really contradictory ways (you know, fashion magazines that say on one page that INTELLIGENCE IS SEXY!!! then on the next page list 50 different ways of enhancing the shape of your eyes with nothing but an eye pencil and a spitball). The problem with the thin=beautiful mentality, along with many other thoughts on what equals beauty, is that it is detrimental to our physical, mental and emotional health. When a person goes on a diet, what happens is that physically they are not getting the nutrition they need, mentally they become obsessed with counting calories and documenting minutes of exercise and all of that stuff, and emotionally they are putting too much stock into what happens, and dictating their happiness based on the outcome of the diet, so when the diet fails they're miserable. It's a horrible kind of life to lead, and I always hated it.
I've found that in the past month I've started to listen to my body. It tells me what it wants me to eat, and it tells me well. I've been eating more veggies, more balanced meals, and less food in general (no binging. Really. None. At all.) I've felt the benefits. I think I'm starting to menstruate more regularly again. My next step is exercise. Once I start doing more of that, who knows how much better I'll start to feel. It's so exciting to think that in terms of health I could be so much more, and I am so much more than I was. And this, all while weighing 100kg.
I want to spread this joy to everybody who is bogged down with sadness about weight. It's a sadness that I feel is so unnecessary, so un-called for. I want people to feel the happiness I'm feeling now - a happiness that started with what was perhaps a horrible realisation - I'm never going be anything other than a big fat fattie - and became something amazing. I may always be a big fat fattie, but within that there is so much I can do - stuff that I've never ever dreamed of doing before. It's so exciting it's almost scary.
What think y'all?
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