Bitch Media - fat acceptance en Push(back) at the Intersections: Fat. So? <p>A mighty fine example of pushback at the intersections is currently unfolding in the comments sections on my fellow guest blogger Tasha's posts. In 'Size Matters,' she's exploring the depictions of fat women in pop culture. Like she said in <a href="/post/size-matters-how-i-learned-to-stop-worrying-and-love-the-flab">her intro</a>:</p> <blockquote><p>I hope we can have a big fat productive dialogue about big fat bodies and their representation in pop culture. On this particular topic, the personal will most definitely be political (but isn't it always?), so let's keep that in mind and not fat shame, body shame, or in any other way make fellow commenters (or me!) feel bad about what they're working with—or how they deal with it. </p></blockquote> <p>I have to admit, I wriggled with excitement when I found out I would be guest blogging with Tasha and that she would be writing about body image. The depiction of fat people in general and fat women in particular in pop culture is one of my many myriad interests and it's a definite feminist intersection. There's a lot of gendering and racializing that happens with fat, and there are a lot of social attitudes about fat that manifest in pop culture and the way we interact with it, from how fat women are depicted on television to how viewers react when fat characters have sexual relationships. </p> <p>Right in Tasha's introductory post, all kinds of interesting stuff started happening in the comments. Commenters were engaging with the material and adding to the discussion, of course, but people also showed up to inform Tasha and everyone else that fat is unhealthy, that she was 'glorifying' fat. Concern trolling erupted. Kelsey stepped in. People provided links to fat acceptance resources for the concern trolls, since it was clear that people were entering the conversation from different perspectives and with different levels of familiarity with size acceptance. </p> <p>It was clear that for some Bitch readers, size acceptance and its intersection with feminism were new and potentially scary topics, and the word 'fat' was a dirty word to be resisted as strongly as possible. Fat wasn't an adjective, but an epithet, to these readers. Comments on '<a href="/post/size-matters-small-screen-big-women">Small Screen, Big Women</a>' became equally explosive almost immediately, as commenters descended with body policing, attempts to define 'fat enough,' and a myriad of other fun topics like how <em>dare</em> Tasha call Sara Ramirez 'fat'! She's beautiful! </p> <p>In Tasha's followup to address the problems in comments, '<a href="/post/size-matters-but-you-have-such-a-pretty-face">But You Have Such A Pretty Face!</a>,' she discussed the fact that size acceptance seemed alien to some Bitch readers, and laid out some ground rules for comments on her posts. These were promptly disregarded as the 'don't you know fat is unhealthy' debate cropped up yet again, people derailed with unrelated topics, and others insisted on being educated (apparently <a href="">Google</a> is just too hard to find), and then commenters cried foul when Tasha and moderators attempted to get the conversation back on track. </p> <p>What the comments on Tasha's posts illustrate is the feminism has a long way to go when it comes to accepting bodies and identities and talking about them honestly. Reclaiming 'fat' as the adjective that it is has been an uphill battle for us fatties, and in spaces one might think would be body positive, we're still fighting that battle. </p> <p>There's a reason series like Tasha's are badly needed: We are not talking enough about how fat is depicted in pop culture and how that plays into our social attitudes. Tasha's feel-good post celebrating positive depictions of fat women in television was a pretty stellar example of how polarized fat has become in some circles, including feminism. Some feminist-identified women in comments wrote about vehemently resisting the label of 'fat' (which is their right, I don't believe in labeling people against their will) but also, in the process, contributed to the stigmatisation of fat and the shaming of people who do identify with this word. </p> <p>The fat acceptance movement has been active for a long time. The National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance has been around since <em>1969</em>, challenging social attitudes about fat and fighting for fat equality. There are clear intersections between fat acceptance and feminism, as writers like <a href="">Kate Harding</a> have amply demonstrated, and there is also an <em>unbelievable</em> level of pushback when it comes to talking about fat in some feminist spaces; fat is bad, fat is bad for you, fat people are bad people.</p> <p>Fat women, fat bodies, women reveling in their fat bodies, are still very threatening to a lot of people. Works like Leonard Nimoy's <a href="">Full Body Project (warning, nudity)</a> and Laurie Toby Edison's <a href="">Women en Large (warning, nudity)</a>, depicting fat women engaging in a variety of activities, alone and together, have attracted unbelievable amounts of bile and vitriol, including in feminist communities where the images were brought up for discussion and people said things like 'they are just unpleasant to look at' and speculated on the health of the participants. </p> <p>The visceral fear and hatred of fat bodies is widespread in our society, and it has far wider implications than the simple lack of inclusion of happy fat women in pop culture. It results in <a href="">stigma against fat patients in medical settings</a>, for example. These things are feminist issues; when people that look like me aren't included in pop culture, it hurts me. When people who look like me can't access medical treatment, it hurts me. When people who look like me are policed in feminist spaces, it makes me feel unwelcome in those spaces. </p> <p>When we talk about 'intersectionality,' this is what we mean; that people with different lived experiences and identities all belong in the feminist movement, if they want to be. That we need to foster a culture of inclusion, not exclusion, so that we can have complicated conversations, like conversations about fat, identity, depictions of fat, and how we interact, culturally and personally, with fat. </p> <p>For every person insisting that Sara Ramirez isn't fat because she's beautiful, there's a beautiful person with a body like Sara's, being reminded that she isn't beautiful because she's fat. </p> fat fat acceptance fat phobia intersectionality Social Commentary Wed, 11 Aug 2010 19:45:28 +0000 s.e. smith 4873 at Size Matters: But You Have Such a Pretty Face <p><img src="/sites/default/files/u3782/chandra_wilson.jpg" width="544" height="412" alt="chandra_wilson.jpg" /></p> <p>As there seems to be a basic lack of understanding of fat acceptance among many readers here, I think it's appropriate to take some time out and illustrate some of what I consider the main lessons taught by the fat positivity and fat acceptance movements. I recognize that Bitch does not regularly deal with issues of size and fatness, so we'll just discuss some key points and then we can go back to talking about fat in pop culture.</p> <p>First off, the last post I did, "<a href="/post/size-matters-small-screen-big-women" rel="nofollow">Size Matters: Small Screen, Big Women</a>" ignited an angry firestorm of folks upset because I called <em>Grey's Anatomy's</em> Sara Ramirez "fat." These comments included statements like:</p> <p><em>I never thought of Sara Ramirez as fat. I however do agree that she is super hot.</em></p> <p><em>It is sick you are calling Sara Ramirez fat! What is going on in this world when a woman who doesnt look like she is dying of starvation is called fat! Her stomach is flat!</em></p> <p><em>Sara is BEAUTIFUL. unbelievably beautiful and NOT fat. if she's fat then most of the world is freaking obese.</em></p> <p><em>I believe that questioning whether Sara Ramirez is fat is a pertinent question. [...] The truth is she has a <strong>healthy</strong> way and the fact that she is a plus sized woman shows how even sizes tend to consider <strong>a healthy weight and figure</strong> as plus sized. I believe she probably considers herself as plus sized because, amidst a Hollywood where ultra thin women are the rule, <strong>a healthy and beautiful voluptuous woman</strong> is an exception when she should be the rule.</em><br /> (emphasis supplied)</p> <p><em>I'd be very insulted and hurt if someone called me fat. And as I said above, I'm 5'5 and 190 lbs, and I'm sure people think I am, but I do not consider myself to be fat in any way.</em></p> <p>There are many different layers and flavors of fatphobia in those comments. The first comment may not have been meant to imply that fat was bad, however it does illustrate that Sara Ramirez is considered beautiful, but not fat, to that commenter. Maybe the commenter feels fat is bigger than that, but is not upset by hearing Sara Ramirez called fat. I don't know. The point is, fat and hot are not mutually exclusive.</p> <p>The second comment illustrates the belief many have that all fat people have the same body type, and that if you possess a physical trait like a "flat stomach" that immediately disqualifies you from the fat game. This is not true. The comment also infers that being fat is negative; that it's an insult to Ms. Ramirez because she's not fat, she's "healthy." Which is of course, another stereotype about fat, that being fat is inherently unhealthy. It's not.</p> <p>Then there's the third comment, probably the most telling comment of them all: Sara is beautiful, therefore she cannot be labeled fat because that would basically blow the commenters' minds, and then everyone else who is "fat" would have to be moved up to "obese," which to this commenter apparently means "extremely fat" and most likely "unattractive."</p> <p>The fourth commenter sees Ms. Ramirez as being at a "healthy weight," so she's not "fat." She thinks Ms. Ramirez calls herself plus sized because she is "healthy" and the rest of Hollywood is unnaturally skinny. She describes Ms. Ramirez as "voluptuous" without, apparently, recognizing that "voluptuous" is just a workaround for saying fat. Again we have the fat=unhealthy stereotype, and it again is untrue.</p> <p>Finally, we have the fifth comment, which is perhaps the most unfortunate comment in some ways. This person recognizes that others may see her as fat, but she believes she's not fat and is very offended and insulted by even the thought of being called fat. I would let that slide as being the feelings of someone who hasn't come to terms with their fat, because I've been at that same weight and height and thought the exact same thing. But the fact that this commenter is so virulently against having the word applied to her AND IS EXPRESSING IT ON A FAT POSITIVE THREAD is offensive to me, because I am fat and I don't think my body is something that should be an insult to be compared to.</p> <p>Now, in the post there was a bit of a trick (unintended) that ended up bringing out the true reasoning behind many of the comments defensive of Ms. Ramirez. Chandra Wilson (pictured above), another fat actress on <em>Grey's Anatomy</em>, is actually much smaller in all dimensions than Sara Ramirez. Yet no one took to <em>her</em> defense. She basically got thrown under the proverbial fat bus. Why is that? Well, Chandra Wilson is not conventionally attractive. She is also not portrayed as a sex symbol on the show. She's a stout black woman who I happen to think is gorgeous, but she's not part of the sex antics on the show.</p> <p>Basically what these comments are saying is "Sara Ramirez is hot, and fat people are not hot. Ergo, Sara Ramirez is not fat." They are also, by lack of inclusion, saying "Chandra Wilson is fat, even though she's smaller than Sara Ramirez, because she is not hot (to me)." And finally, they're saying what every fat woman who has a conventionally attractive face hears many times over their life as a fatty: "You have such a pretty face." </p> <p>Here's the ground rules, once again and spelled out in detail for those who didn't seem to grasp them the first time:</p> <p><strong>No fat shaming</strong>, this includes comments that infer that being fat is unhealthy, unattractive, or undesirable. The word fat will be used to describe some people you may not be comfortable viewing as fat because of their attractiveness. Sit back with that thought and refrain from expressing it. Once again, NO FAT SHAMING.</p> <p><strong>No debating over whether or not "fat" is a positive term</strong>. In this little space, in the "Size Matters" portion of the Bitch blogs, "fat" is either VALUE NEUTRAL or POSITIVE. "Obese/overweight/healthy weight" and other nebulous terms are not allowed. Here, all weights are healthy.</p> <p><strong>WE ARE TALKING ABOUT FAT WOMEN IN POP CULTURE</strong>. So don't act shocked when you hear the word "fat" on this blog. I'm not using curvy, voluptuous, zaftig, full-figured, or any other euphemisms. FAT. Deal with it.</p> <p>Hopefully this will help eliminate some of the drama that occurred on that last thread.</p> <p>Okay? So let's go back to having fun talking about pop culture.</p> fat acceptance fat positivity Size Matters Social Commentary Mon, 09 Aug 2010 17:52:09 +0000 Tasha Fierce 4886 at