bipanicbianger

[bipanicbianger]

Should I be offended that the “celebration” for me leaving my current job is just a tiny ice cream cake when everyone else that has left in the year I’ve been here has been a full meal?

What does a “dessert only” farewell say about the fat woman leaving?

I’m not mad because I love ice cream cake but it just kind of feels off. Especially since fat women face more weight bias and discrimination.

It’s just a minimum effort kind of thing that honestly bothers me when others have had this grand send offs. Literally last week someone had homemade BBQ for their last day. I don’t need much but like maybe something more than sweets? Protein? A fruit tray?

[bipanicbianger]

Fat Allyship

I've been on a journey of allyship for a very long time as a white, cis-gendered woman in a hetero-passing relationship with a cis-gendered man. Even being in a relationship with a Native American man, I learned that allyship isn't something I can claim to be, but it's something that I have to earn from others. There have been a lot of hard lessons with both of us in me becoming more and more anti-racist and him becoming a little budding feminist.

But something that I don't really see often is fat allyship. My shifting understanding of what it means to be an ally has also shifted how I have viewed people who claim to be fat allies. People I thought were my friends were actually disgusted by the idea of my body, but were nice to me because I was their exception (which isn't allyship, if you didn't know).

I experienced allyship from my neighbors yesterday that has been so special and joyful to me all night last night and into today.

One of my neighbors has an almost-six-year-old who just found out recently that she's going to be a big sister. She's so excited (and I am too because I love my neighbors deeply). I also have a lot of education and work experience working with kids and I understand that a kiddo that's 5/6 years old will associate similarities to things they already know.

This soon-to-be (fellow) big sister was outside playing, ran up to me when I came outside to say hello in her classic, high-pitched voice, and gave me a signature big hug. Her hugs would end wars they're so warm and sweet, but I digress. After the hug, she rubs my belly and asks, "Are you sure you don't have a baby in your big belly?" Me being me and a social worker, I take no offense because one, she's a kid and two, her mom's belly is growing with a baby so it makes sense that a big belly on another woman would mean there's a baby in there.

It was the other kiddo outside playing who melted my heart, refroze it, all so she could melt it again. This kiddo is nine years old, autistic, talks your ear off, and probably one of my favorite humans in the whole world. I love her to death.

She tells her friend in what she thinks is a quiet whisper, "You can't say that to people, ______. It isn't nice to comment on people's bodies when they don't ask first."

Be. Still. My. Heart.

I know she learned that from her Mama too, so I value my friendship with her mom even more now because she is teaching her kids to be kind, gracious, understanding people who don't judge people based on how they look, their skin tones, their body sizes, their gender expression, anything.

It was a simple little moment that wasn't actually meant for me, but I was still present for, and it has meant the world to me.

Allyship comes in many forms. My favorite little human who is shy but also talkative, incredibly polite but also a strong self-adovacte, particular but also very brave is probably one of the most meaningful and wonderful allies I've ever known.

More of an ally than my most of my friends and family.

It might be a universal fat experience (I hope not), but I have always been able to count on one hand who my true fat allies were. I can now add one more to that.

[bipanicbianger]

This is not like a fully completed thought but yk

So I've done my first aid + CPR a few times. And every single time I try and bring up scenarios for fat folks

Specifically like 'what if someone is too large for me to wrap my arms around then to do the heimleich'

And its incredibly rare I get a decent answer.

How absolutely insane is it that me, as a fat person, is asking how to have MY life saved or to save ANOTHER life, is an impossible feat if someone is fat.

Most of the time they tell me to 'just try anyways uwu'

There has got to be a better option.

[bipanicbianger]

[bipanicbianger]

for no reason whatsoever here’s a reminder that if you consider yourself a leftist/punk/abolitionist/anarchist/radical in any sort of way and get called into jury duty, you are to become the most square person on earth during the jury questionnaire!!!

don’t be that guy who says fuck the police in the jury questionnaire! that just gets you sent home! if you want to generate change, interact with the case and use your jury vote for good! ESPECIALLY if it’s a high profile case!

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[bipanicbianger]

I don't know if the Green Day concert was the one I was at or not, but waiting for the show to start and everyone (and I mean everyone except my lame roommate) stopping to sing Bohemian Rhapsody was one of the most amazing moments of my life. I have chills thinking about it. Freddy paved the way for so many things and I really wish he was with us to enjoy the way that his music has transformed generations of performers, concert-goers, and just people for existing and enjoying things authentically.

what a legend

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[bipanicbianger]

Fashion has to be the only art medium where people get mad about having a bigger canvas

[bipanicbianger]

This pride and all year long, I want to give a shout out to us fat queer people

To fat queer people who never get to see representation of themselves because the vast majority of queer representation is of thin people

To fat queer people who have to put ten times the effort into their gender expression just to be viewed as 10% of their gender

To fat queer people who get misgendered no matter how they look

To fat queer people who can never present how they want to anyway because affirming clothes in their size are either nonexistent, triple the price, or terrible quality

To fat asexuals who are believed even less about their identity because they're told it's just a matter of "no one wanting to have sex with them"

To fat aromantics who aren't respected because their aromanticism is viewed as "No one loved you anyway"

To fat gay people who have their identities denied because "You just couldn't find a man/woman who wanted you"

To fat nonbinary people whose bodies are viewed in the queer community as inherently gendered and incapable of being androgynous

To fat binary trans people who are always viewed as whatever gender hurts them most

To fat trans people who are denied surgeries due to medical fatphobia, have difficulty finding products like binders in their size, are told that thinness is a must to "pass" as their gender, and have their bodies weaponized by terfs

To fat queer people who are viewed as "cringe" for the crime of existing as fat and queer

To fat queer people who can't even buy pride merchandise without having to worry if their size will be offered and then have to pay more than thin queer people just to show their queer pride

To fat queer people who developed eating disorders due to the fatphobia peddled by their own communities

To fat queer people whose identities are partially influenced or entirely caused by the fatphobia they have experienced for years and decades

To fat queer people who are forced by fellow queer people into sexual positions they're uncomfortable with, such as topping, just because they're bigger and have stereotypes forced onto their body

To fat queer people who joined a relationship and experienced sexual trauma because their partner only wanted to humiliate a fat person and ignore your boundaries

To fat queer people who only see themselves in queer porn as a tool for the humiliation of thin queer people who dared to have sex with a fat person or never see your body in sexual content at all

To fat femmes who are viewed as butch no matter what they do because their fatness is gendered against their will

To fat butches who don't feel able to experiment with femininity if they want to

To fat queer people who have an even harder time finding a partner in the queer community because of rampant fatphobia

To fat queer people who have had to hear "No fats, no femmes"

To fat queer people who are constantly told they're not "truly oppressed" because they "don't have it as bad as [X queer identity]"

To fat intersex people who have to deal with strangers believing they're an expert on your body because fat people can't have knowledge about how their own bodies work

To fat queer people who can't even trust that other queer people fighting for equality won't use fat bodies as symbolism for immoral behaviors and beliefs

To fat queer people who can't rely on doctors who accept queer identities to not still discriminate against them because of medical fatphobia

To fat queer people who don't believe they can be loved without being fetishized

To fat queer people whose queer identities are viewed even more as a fetish because their bodies are viewed as a fetish

To fat queer people who took way longer to realize they're queer because they never saw any queer representation that included them

And to so, so, so many other fat people with experiences of fatphobia in the queer community

You all belong. You are the identities you say you are. You do not make the queer community "look bad" just because fatphobes want to use our bodies as weapons for fatphobia and queerphobia. You deserve to be respected and have representation. You deserve to not be treated as an afterthought.

We are queer, and our experiences matter.

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[bipanicbianger]

Reflections on my job in my last week

I currently hate my job for many reasons (and a ubiquitous feeling, I'm sure). I work for a non-profit that has a contracted position with the county to conduct drug assessments for folks applying for food stamps with drug-related felonies.

I absolutely hate the job. Did I mention that?

It's easy, straightforward work; get a referral, make some calls, do the assessment, update a log, then move on to the next one. It's honestly an ideal social work job for someone getting their MSW (someone like me). Except it's not actually really good social work because it's not doing anything but perpetuating a system of oppression. I can tell you who has charges for weed versus other "harder" drugs based on how they answer the "do you feel bad or guilty about your drug use" question on the questionnaire. And let me tell you that the majority of those people with felonies for weed are black men. Not a shocker considering the history of classifying weed as a type 1 substance AND normalizing calling "marijuana" to make it seem foreign to criminalize black and brown people in the 70s and 80s (thanks Nixon and Reagan).

This kind of work is also very lonely. One of the reasons why I got into social work and fell in love with it is because of the community-focused nature of the work. It's literally in the name--SOCIAL work. I spend two hours a week at the county food stamp office for drop-in hours to conduct assessments in person. That's it. I know that this is a post-COVID world, and the way that it works now is a post-COVID policy, but it's so impersonal and lacking in empathy for people just trying to get food. There is more meaningful conversation and understanding in the assessments conducted in person than in those done over the phone (and a millennial who talks on the phone for the majority of her work?! Gross!). It's not good work. It's devoid of the heart of social work. It misses the entire point of recovery, of rebuilding a life, of community.

I live in Western North Carolina, so a lot of these assessments over the last couple of months are from people who lost everything because of Hurricane Helene (#thatbitchHelene). For about four months, the county pushed all eligible applications through regardless of criminal histories requiring assessments, stating that in six months when they were renewing their food stamps, they would complete their assessment at that time. DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY PEOPLE HAVE LOST FOOD STAMPS BECAUSE THEY DIDN'T WANT TO ANSWER THE PHONE FOR AN UNKNOWN NUMBER?! Or now have a disconnected number from when they applied six months ago?

Do you know how nauseating it is to be the person who has to decide if a person no longer gets food stamps because they didn't answer a phone call to answer 15 questions?

I absolutely hate this job. And it has only made me see how deeply broken our social safety net system truly is. It makes me more scared for the future if this dumb, ugly, big-bill-tiny-penis legislation passes the Senate and cuts Medicaid, SNAP, Social Security, Medicare, etc., for people. Even in the best of times, people deserve housing, food, and healthcare. But what about regions like WNC that are still recovering from natural and ecological disasters? Where people are without homes, family, pets, friends, because a river washed away their homes? Because the water created toxic mud that affects their health? Because the only way they can eat now is with food stamps because their work was destroyed?

I know that the next person who comes along may not be as compassionate or willing to live in the grey area of the policies and laws in this position as I am. I feel so guilty about leaving, knowing that I was helping people eat, even if it was so far removed from actual community work. Where I'm starting next week will be just as meaningful, but will be more satisfying and direct work with clients (it also pays WAY better, and I also have bills to pay).

Social work is an emotionally demanding profession that involves making tough, ethical decisions like this. I think I'll feel really guilty for a long time. There are other non-social-worky reasons why I am leaving, but those pale in comparison to how deeply troubling it is to be entrenched in a system designed to oppress people and feel powerless to do anything about it.

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[bipanicbianger]

Thinking about how when the Oceangate sub imploded, the coastguard picked it up on their radar and knew from the moment it happened that everyone on board was already gone, and yet there was still a five day manhunt.

And how like a week before that, a refugee ship sank off the coast of Greece, whose officials knew this was happening and had ships within reach, but intentionally did nothing.

And how there was like the most expansive manhunt in recent history to find a suspect in the UHC shooting. In a city known for its unsolved crimes. How Briana Boston was arrested for a vaguely perceived threat to a CEO she wasn't even speaking to nor mentioned, while internet stalkers are never addressed unless they hurt someone, and then it's a maybe

And just how there is always money to perform for the rich, even when they can't actually be helped. And there is never money to help the poor, no matter how easy they would be to save.

And for some reason it's considered "dangerous and extreme" to want a world where our lives aren't just fodder at the whims of the rich.

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I really hate how much the anti-fatphobia discourse is centered around, like "it's hard to find cute clothes that fit" and "some people might not find you attractive" and not, you know, DOCTORS WILL LET YOU DIE.