aweightyissue

[aweightyissue]

Enough with the hand wringing over weight loss.

There is nothing wrong with a desire to be thin. Even if it’s merely for looks, even if it has nothing to do with your health.

Weight is a status symbol. So is fashion. Wearing couture means you’re wealthy, being thin does too. It’s expensive and time consuming to achieve and maintain.

People do all sorts of things to signal social status and wealth. We drive certain cars, buy certain clothes, live in certain neighborhoods. Weight is just another form of that.

Who can blame someone for wanting to conform to these societal norms? Thinness is unquestionably an advantage

There is nothing wrong with NOT wanting to lose weight either.

Supreme Court justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan fall outside the conventional standard of thinness. As does German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Stephen Hawking could only move one muscle in his cheek. Einstein wasn’t concerned about styling his bair.

Their contributions to world are more valuable than say, Kate Moss.

It’s absurd to base the value of someone’s contribution to the world by their body.

Your body is not your value but it’s also no one else’s lousiness what you do with it. If you want to change it or not change it. There is nothing wrong with it.

Ozempic is not the enemy.

[aweightyissue]

There is nothing. I mean nothing, more powerful than a woman when she figures out that her worth is not determined by what other people think of her body.

If I can teach my daughter one thing, it would be that her thighs, her weight, nor her dress size are imperfections that need to be fixed.

I am not saying people shouldn’t change their bodies if they want to. They just shouldn’t feel compelled to do it because other people think they should.

To quote “Everyone is free to wear sunscreen,” “Enjoy your body, use it every way you can. Don’t be afraid of it, or what other people think of it. It’s the greatest instrument you’ll ever own.”

So this is a totally useless rant, but as a skinny girl, I’m getting extra, extra tired of fat-shaming.

I work for a corsetier at a Renaissance Faire. We sell corsets. Not flimsy bullshit costume corsets; like real, durable, waist-training corsets. Today a woman came in with her boyfriend, so I helped her pick out a corset and try it on. While her boyfriend—who was decidedly enthused about the whole corset thing—sat watching me lace her in, he told me, grinning, “Of all the good jobs at the Renaissance Faire, I think you have the best.”

I shrugged in agreement. “I touch butts and reach down cleavage all day; I mean…” Because we like to be a bit rakish at the Faire, and, y’know, it’s true. Tying people into corsets pretty much invariably requires getting handsy.

The couple laughed at that, and the boyfriend said, “That’s the job I would want!” But then he chuckled again and said, offhand, “Or maybe not; while we were looking at the racks, there were some pretty big sizes on there!”

Our sizes are all done in inches, and the biggest we make is a 46. And you’d better believe our large sizes sell. For a second I wasn’t sure what to say to the guy’s comment, but I answered him casually. “We get a lot of beautiful big ladies in here.” Because we do. “We make corsets for real women, not Barbie dolls,” I added. Wasn’t trying to be smart, just kind of tossed it out there because that’s the line we like to use when people ask about larger sizes, and because, again, we do.

The boyfriend went quiet at that; I didn’t think anything of it, I just kept on lacing. A moment later, he said, a little awkwardly (but sincerely enough), “Didn’t mean to be offensive.”

I quickly smiled and brushed it off, said he wasn’t, said I was just saying. (Don’t want to make the customers uncomfortable, you know?) And that was the end of it. His comment had rubbed me the wrong way, but it wasn’t a big deal. Now, I wear a 20-inch corset. I’m a few cup sizes short of being one of the Barbie dolls. Like his girlfriend, I’m one of the “hot chicks”; he doesn’t have to worry about offending me by implying that I wouldn’t be fun to poke and pull at.

Honestly though, of all the people I fit sexy technically-undergarments to in a day, fat girls are maybe my favorite people to lace up. Because they are just so damn happy that we have stuff that fits them. They are so damn happy that the corsets we make in their sizes are all the same pretty, shiny colors and cool flower/dragon/skull/etc. prints that the smaller corsets are, not ugly beige and boring “granny” colors. They are so goddamn happy that at least one (of several on the grounds) corset shop carries things that they can wear, that they actually want to wear, and that they look fucking awesome in. This is only my second season working, and we’ve fit 60+ inch waists and double-K busts. The only people we’ve ever had to tell sorry, we don’t have anything that fits them, are twelve-year-old kids.

It’s half-wonderful, half-heartbreaking how excited those women get. Women who say with sad smiles, when we ask if they want to get fitted, “Oh, no, you don’t have anything that fits me,” and then are stunned when we’re 300% confident that yes we do, and we have options. Women who can’t stop smiling and looking at themselves in the mirror after we’ve got them laced in.

I had a lady last week whose waist I measured (cinching the tape tight, as per procedure) at 41 inches—honestly not all that big. So she picked out a 41-inch corset to try on. I could tell halfway through getting her laced that it was going to be a bit big for her, so I mentioned it and said she might do better to try a smaller size. She started crying on the spot. She was so overwhelmed; she couldn’t believe someone had just told her that a 41 was too big. She told me about how hard clothes shopping was for her, how her mother would tell her she needed an XXXL instead of an XXL, how she had recently lost weight but still couldn’t wear certain colors because they didn’t fit or she wasn’t confident enough.

She did end up getting her corset, and after I checked her out she asked if she could give me a hug, so we ended up standing there hugging each other for a minute. While we did, I told her, “Do not ever let anyone tell you any bullshit. You are gorgeous.” She said, “I have a new boyfriend and he keeps telling me that.” I told her he was right, and to just keep telling herself she’s gorgeous; it was okay if she didn’t always believe it, but to keep telling herself anyway. (That’s how I talked myself through shit when I had bad anxiety.)

We all know fat-shaming is bad. The stupidity, fatphobia, and misogyny of it has pissed me off since I first became aware of it. But working with clothing, especially as figure-hugging and precise as corsets, has given me a new perspective on it—how much it affects people and just how shitty it is. Like, what does it say that I had a grown, only average-big woman crying into my shoulder because she was so overjoyed not to be the uppermost extremity of what a manufacturer can clothe?

My job rocks and it’s really rewarding, but sometimes it highlights some of the ugliest shit about society. I’m so glad I work at a shop that’s not bullshit about body types and operates with more people in mind than just scrawny white chicks like me. The fat women I work with are a ton of fun to lace up, and they’re so much more than their size—they’re cool, they’re smart, they’re funny, they’re sweet, they’re great to talk to, and yes, they’re hot. I’m so damn done with them getting short-changed and shamed by petty fucks who refuse to make them nice clothes, who refuse to even try to work for them, who refuse to consider them pretty. This whole rant was useless and won’t get read, but I had to vent because it’s been driving me nuts.

So actually, screw you, random dude. Fat girls are the highlight of my job.

[aweightyissue]

On Weight Loss and Morality

Conversations around weight and weight loss have always been contentious.

The oft repeated mantra of weight loss has been “there is no silver bullet.”

It’s a jeering remark meant to chide dieters for trying anything beyond eating skinless chicken breast and 20 hours a week working out.

If you want to lose weight you have to pay the penance for every excess pound. You have to earn it.

Their smug satisfaction of watching weight loss aids fail is salt in the wound. They snickered at limitations and failure of Amphetamines, PhenFen, Ephedrine, Orlistat, LapBands, and Gastric Bypass.

See? You can’t cheat your way out. You did this to yourself, now you must suffer the consequences.

An anti weight loss movement emerged in opposition to this mentality. Body positivity is a healthy response to diet culture; making the radical assertion that existing in your body, the way it is, without trying to change, is not only okay, it’s a good thing.

Love your body and focus on being healthy. Your weight is not your worth. This cannot be said enough. Your worth in this world is not related to how your body looks.

When around came GLP-1 medications, the reactions have been fascinating.

The drugs themselves are remarkably effective, and instead of targeting the weight, they correct the underlying metabolic problem. They’ve been on the market for years and are generally known to be safe.

The ire toward them, is in some ways unsurprising.

No! You can’t do it the easy way! You have to work at it!

You’re stealing them from the deserving- the diabetics. Ironically, the same people they blame for their own illness.

The body positivity crowd response is fascinating as well. Taking the drugs is a betrayal. You shouldn’t want to change your body. You’re giving into diet culture. You shouldn’t want to fit conventional beauty standards.

The response has been negative from both sides. People feel entitled to police the bodies and choices you make about your body.

Both of these reactions are moral judgments. You have to pay for your sins. Either for gluttony or vanity.

The thing is, there should be no judgement at all.

Weight loss requires a lot of mental energy. You have to commit your mental and physical energy to it. There are a million reasons why someone can’t or doesn’t want to do that. And that’s okay. There is no reason why you should feel obligated to.

However, ignoring the very real disabling effects of obesity is also a kind of denial of humanity. It’s not anyone’s business, and to condemn someone for trying to prevent or correct the effects is kind of cruelty all its own.

There’s no reason someone should have to justify their desire to change their bodies or their efforts to do so.

Try to love your body, regardless of its size, but it’s okay if you want to lose weight and you don’t have to justify your reasons or your decision to use medication to do it.

Everyone else, support people if they choose to change their bodies as well as when they choose not to. It’s not your decision, your business or your place to judge them.

We, the body positivity advocates don’t criticize trans people for changing their bodies because they’re unhappy with the way it looks. We don’t shame people with disfiguring congenital defects who choose to have corrective surgery; even when it poses no health risk. We understand the very real effects of social stigma, and wouldn’t criticize them for avoiding it.

You’re punishing people trying to lose weight for the sins of vanity and envy.

The other assholes, you wouldn’t tell a cancer patient “there’s no silver bullet” or snicker when an experimental or risky treatment fails. You don’t tell people with high blood pressure or high cholesterol that taking medicine is “taking the easy way out.” You know it’s cruel, you simply want to punish people for the sins of gluttony and sloth.

All I’m saying is - leave the people taking weight loss meds alone.

Weight is not a moral issue.

Weight is not a moral issue.

Weight is not a moral issue.

Weight is not a moral issue.

Weight is not a moral issue.