cw for weight/body image, of course
Usually discussions about this get overrun by chuds so I think it’d be nice to hear what people here have to say.
Personally I think it’s some good and positive ideas but they’re mixed in with potentially harmful medical misinformation.
Fat people aren’t immoral and shouldn’t be shamed. And regardless of their weight everyone should probably take regular exercise and eat healthy.
Shit. I am fat, and I exercise regularly. I would have to do like pro level working out to get skinny. So then I would be working out twice as hard as anyone as still fat.
As it stands I am stronger and faster than most my skinny friends.
Is it? I am saying it is harder than any other tbing we expect of people socially and that should affect our moral calculations. Once you reach a slecific pojnt eating right and exercising a reasonable ammount doesnt fix thr probelm and it takes an extra measure of effort on top of reasonable levels.
My thoughts are, scientific data supports typically lower weight being healthier for some reasons but not for all reasons or in all cases, it’s not a guarantee of health but it can serve as a rough marker, good nutrition and regular exercise should be encouraged and supported across the board, shaming is terrible and should be banned. Studies show shaming is equivocal at best for motivating and outright harmful far, far more often, with the added health issues of eating disorders, anxiety disorders and suicide accompanying shaming. On the other hand, binge eating itself may be a sign of escapism or a coping mechanism, a symptom of another illness which should be treated carefully – I’m probably not alone in having ballooned in weight while being terribly depressed because fuck it, another bag of chips and a sitcom on rerun is the only pleasure my goddamn brain is getting. But you don’t attack the person for being fat, it’s a delicate situation. Trigger warning, something around a third of people who qualify as medically obese were found to be sexually assaulted.
And insofar as it goes, around here if people are binge drinking or doing drugs to unhealthy levels it’s rare we get moralizing about “what they’re doing to their body.” Even if it’s harmful, question your own motivation in how you approach and the information being presented. More understanding, more positive support, less judgment, full communism
Moreover, I am confused as to why fat acceptance activists would think that fatphobia is something that employers or No
IMO employers should definitely not discriminate over physical and medical condition unless the job has a medical/physical requirement by itself e.g a blind pilot, a firefighter that can’t run or lift weights etc. If the job is sitting in a goddamn office then any sort of discrimination is just bullshit. A fat person may require a bigger chair? Deal with it I am sure the CEO could buy the entire Amazon stock of office chairs if he needs to. It is not as if most those “”“jobs”“” are even productive or necessary to begin with…
I hate all this concern trolling about “fat isn’t healthy, we can’t let people promote the idea that fat is healthy, it’s dangerous.” Do you think people get and stay fat because they have rationally decided it’s good for them? Do you really think they’re not told constantly by others, in big and small ways, that their body isn’t acceptable? Do you really think that if we make a big stink about how unhealthy fatness is, it’s gonna help people maintain a lower weight? I question whether this urge to inform people on the health consequences of fatness comes from a place of compassion at all - it really demonstrates that a person has no idea what the experience of fat people is today, and no clue about what actually causes people to get and stay fat.
As someone who fits into the morbidly obese category I have very mixed feelings about the Fat Acceptance movement.
On the one hand body shaming is horrible and should be fought. There is a lot of nasty prejudice attached to being overweight that does no good for anybody. The social emphasis we put on being thin does a lot of damage to people who cannot live up to ridiculously unattainable beauty standards and ultimately leads to dangerous eating disorders.
I also like the message that you shouldn’t let your weight hold you back but rather live your life to the fullest now instead of waiting for that elusive point in the future where you’ve lost enough weight to be allowed to dance, dress nicely, get married, feel sexy etc., etc.
But on the other hand I really don’t like the tendency the fat acceptable movement has to gloss over all the negative aspects of obesity. At the end of the day obesity is a fucking health problem — a disability even in the worst cases. The fat acceptance I’ve been exposed to has been very hostile towards attempts of losing weight and I believe that mere acceptance is doing obese people a disservice.
As a morbidly obese person getting rid of the prejudice will be an improvement but it won’t keep my legs from swelling at night. It will not make me die less early. It will not protect my joints from being overloaded. It will not make it easier for me to get up from the couch. It will not make my movements less restricted or the mechanical possibilities of my sex life less limited. Being fat would still suck ass if everybody accepted and celebrated it.
What I really want is to not be so fat any more. And that is hard. To lose weight you have to fight your own body’s survival mechanisms. Being genetically wired to store every available calorie was a winning strategy back when humans evolved and food was scarce and starvation was the norm. But in a modern society where food is readily available it just makes you fat.
To lose weight you have to fight your own body’s survival mechanisms.
Don’t forget capitalism ramming as much sugar as possible in to everything then packing it in to brightly colored cardboard and strategically placing it to be highly visible when you go to buy a freaking light bulb.
But yeah, I agree with you. Am fat, nothing morally or ethically wrong with being fat, but I don’t want to be fat, and it’s not fashionable to be fat and not want to be fat in some circles.
