#fat hate

[bacchicly]

A few imperfect thoughts about writing fat characters respectfully

By me :

A short (5'2"), fat (approx 300 pounds), middle aged (turning 42 thank god), married to not a fat man, mother of a pre-teen, white, CIS, Anglo, Canadian, upper-middle class woman who writes fic (including smut) about a character who is fat by TV and Hollywood standards (Penelope Garcia)

Note: fat hate or debates about whether being fat is healthy or not will not be tolerated on this post. That is not what this post is about. This is about giving some insight into what writers may want to consider when trying to respectfully include more fat characters in their work and generally moving towards writing doing less harm to fat people.

This post started with me wanting to respond to someone honnestly asking "how do I write good descriptions of fat people" because they wanted to write more fat characters and write them authentically (and I assume in a way that would be respectful to fat people) which is an awesome! ...Or maybe it started a few months ago when a writer friend asked about whether a fat character in a fic borrowing a shirt or hoody from her fit boyfriend made sense. ...Or maybe it started way back when I started writing my first fan fic featuring Penelope Garcia partly in response to being irritated about how so many writers wrote her as a young woman and were often silent on her size or spent a lot of time on her insecurities about her body... anyhoo that's where I come from... doesn't make me an expert except maybe on my own unique experience with a fat body...rather more a fellow muddler / fat character writer enthusiast.

THE BASICS

This first part is a quick list of basics you'll read in other posts about writing characters in general - but we'd better get them out of the way because they apply:

Every character is unique and they way they act and think and feel tends to be a product of some mix of what they look like, how their body works or doesn't, how their brain works and doesn't, their "personality", what they were taught, their unique experiences, and the situation/society they are currently in. There are patterns (which is why we get tropes) but the fun thing is that small things can make big differences. So to write an authentic character, it helps to have a fairly clear sense of at least some of those elements and do some imagining about how all of that would funnel into the moment your writing.

The amount to which you describe character bodies and the style which you use to describe them tends to depend on genre, what the heck is going on in your story, the pov you're writing from, the reason you're writing etc. So their are no hard or fast rules. There may be norms for certain styles of fiction, but then it's up to you to decide if it's stronger for you to lean into those norms or to write "against" them at a particular moment.

In order to be more respectful and less harmful to fat people (especially if you see value in actively challenging the anti-fat status quo), you may have to change how you describe all bodies in your work, as well the attitudes both fat people and non fat people have about bodies in general.

Now that that's out of the way... let's get specifically to my thoughts on writing fat characters. I'm going to divide this part into tips for DESCRIBING FAT BODIES, FAT BODIES IN SPACE, and THINKING AND FEELING IN A FAT BODY.

TIPS FOR DESCRIBING FAT (OR OTHER) BODIES

I would say that both consistency and diversity across the work is important, by this I mean :

Consistently describe bodies in about the same amount of detail across your work for the same type of character regardless of body type. So protagonists should get about the same depth and breath of body descriptions as each other regardless of body type. Same goes for vilalns, supporting characters etc. Sometimes people are mute about the look and shape of "strait sized" character bodies (because what's to describe - they are just "normal") but then spend a bunch of time on "other sized" bodies or vice versa (in this case, the fat body is erased usually because of some form of internalised fat hate or phobia paired with "if you can't say anything nice" don't say anything at all.) If you're doing either of these things, I'm not saying it's wrong and has to be fixed- I'm just saying it's a flag that you may want to think about why you are writing differently about different body types and what your work is saying about what bodies have value and which don't.

Diversity Bodies in the real world come in a lot of different shapes and sizes (I know I know obvious woman strikes again) but if you are writing stories with fairly large casts and everyone has the same body type - there better be a good reason for it within the narrative. Truthfully there are cases where this does make sense to some degree... if you're writing about a group where there are physical requirements and standards for the folks in that world (ballet dancers, fire fighters, cops, soldiers, fbi agents) there may or may not be less diversity in body type and more homogeneous attitudes to body norms within the group - and certainly those who are outside of the norm may be commented on or feel like they are "other". But if you are in a more free setting - if you write without a diversity of body types - especially in settings where there is diversity - that is probably a clue that you're not thinking enough about what your various characters look like and may be "normalizing" one type of body over others. Similarly, if you are writing about a real time and place where there is evidence that there were fat bodies and you have none...that's another flag to ask yourself why.

The magical tools in your toolkit for describing fat and other bodies: Body neutrality and POV

Body neutrality is about not loving bodies and not hating bodies just accepting bodies as they are....or in this case describing them as they are. No poetic language. No judgement. Just this is what this character looks like. If you're struggling to do this, I suggest doing a body map for at least two characters with different body types - possibly one that you find easy to think of positively (in this case likely someone thin or at least fit) and one that you find more difficult to describe positively (in this case someone fat).

Describe them head to toe, naked and then clothed, in detail - acurately but not poetically. Start with their feet and then work up bit by bit. Pay attention to things like hair, scars, shape of joints, acne, tightness or looseness of skin, colour of skin, nails, fat, lack of fat, muscle tone, where do they hold their stress, what's in the bowels, how well they do or don't work, do they have their appendix, what they ate last, proportions (is their torso long or short compared to their legs), lungs - how much do they hold, are they healthy? - now describe their throat, shoulders, hands, hair, then end with face.

The only rule is no positive or negative connotations to anything. it's neither good nor bad that they have stretch marks - they just do and they have faded to silver. Now that you "see them' clearly - now look at them through the eyes of someone who loves them in a familial way...what do they see most? what words do they use? now through someone who is attracted to them sexually and love them and aren't ashamed...what do they see most? what words do they use? Now through the eyes of someone who hates them or wants to change them? or a child? or a dog? Now... how does your character feel about these descriptions? Now you have a variety of words you can draw on to describe the body and you also should have a fairly good idea of what is a more skewed view of the body and a more realistic view.

Also...it can be helpful to remember there are no consistently good or bad words to describe bodies - it depends on context and who is using the words. It's a lot like how sick can be used to describe something negatively or positively depending on the agreed upon meaning of the word by a group.

DESCRIBING BODIES IN SPACE/MOTION

Ok here's the thing - for every activity you can think of - there is a fat body that does it well and a fat body that can't do it easily or at all and there are a lot of reasons for both. Often it has to do with the fact that a lot of equipment is built for people who are 250lbs or less; and anything for bigger people tends to cost a premium. Also, if it's not an easy new skill to acquire with the body you've got...it may take longer and more bravery to keep pushing through to achieve mastery. People may try to discourage you from pursuing things. Sometimes out of prejudice, sometimes out of impatience, sometimes out of caring.

So deciding what your character's body can do easily and what it can't and why is more important than me giving you a list of words for how to describe fat movements.

My suggestion is: do your research. What sorts of body types have done the activity in the real world? What are the exceptions? What changes? So for example if a fat person is climbing a mountain - do they need more help? Different equipment? A different route?

Things to consider:

- equipment / things that can have weight limits: bunk beds, roller coasters, scooters, waterslides, camping chairs, elevators, trampolines, some bikes, life jackets (finding one that fit was a nightmare), exercise balls, airline seats (learning to ask for the seatbelt extender without second thought or shame was a lifesaver)

- not all fat people have pain, those who do will move taking into account the specifics of the pain - same as a lean person

- when I was pregnant I just got more cylindrical and did not get a classic belly. I moved well and easily all the way through my pregnancy, I had none of the back pain or ankle pain some people get. I stood for a lot of my labour. I gave birth on my hands and knees. Other fat people will have had different experiences of pregnancy...but that was mine.

- clothing can have a huge impact on what bounces or jiggles and what doesn't

- most (but not all) fat people I know are particularly sensitive to appearing sweaty or smelling bad

- how winded someone gets is not directly correlated to body size, neither is heart rate or breathing style; I have theatre training and grew up swimming - I breath very slowly and very deeply normally - so when I talk a slow deep breath...it is very slow and deep indeed. I have always been fat but can swim forever - I have always gotten winded and kind of dizzy running... Other fat people may be opposite.

- people do not "see fat" consistently. People regularly underestimate how fat I am (by 100+ pounds or many clothing sizes) because I am short, well spoken, proportioned in a way that is seen as fairly typical, and very mobile and very light on my feet. Someone who weighs less than me but is slower moving, dull witted, in a sour mood, is illl, or poorly dressed may be perceived as much heavier than than someone the same weight or heavier who is behaving/clothed differently (which can change how much fat hate someone experiences) and definately heavier than they are. Height also changes how people perceive weight.

- many stores still don't carry plus sized clothing, but eventually i sort of got used to it - although some days it makes me angry and other days sad

- chairs with arms or the occasional booth can be uncomfortable or just plain impossible to sit in, it's probably partly my ADHD but I often forget this until it happens; for taller and fatter people than me this can be a much more regular occurrence.

- once (if) a character figures out how to dress/move their body in a way that feels comfortable and meets general standards (or at least theirs) of respectability - they may not think that much about their body...or at least until something external draws attention to it

- I don't like feeling like I'm squishing people, so I will make myself small and still on buses or at the theatre, I also don't like sitting on laps or being lifted or carried.

- I often feel much taller than I actually am - except when I am standing right beside someone taller or am trying to reach something on a high shelf. The same principle applies - I feel larger next to smaller people and smaller next to larger ones.

- clothing and what I'm carrying also changes how I move (just like my lean counterparts)

- I don't lounge, my car seat is set almost straight but I sit further back than my brother in law who has a similar height and weight - he leans the seat back but pulls closer. I don't nap. My leaner husband both lounges and naps.

- some fat folks eat, walk, and move quickly - some slowly; figuring out which your character does, when they behave "out of character", and why these are their preferences will go a long way to creating an authentic feeling fat character

- acne is a thing and learning to accept ones rolls and tummy aprons (and thus take care of them properly) is a common challenge; although many do it naturally without thinking much of it. You lift your breasts and wash underneath - you lift you belly and wash underneath.

- fat bodies have the same reactions as everyone else: they tingle, burn, get numb, get goose bumps, like to be touched in certain places and in certain ways, feel the breeze, get hot, get cold, shiver, stretch, relax, get aroused, feel release, hold tension, feel capable and strong, feel weak...no matter who you are sitting in a chair that's too small for you will put pressure on your body and feel uncomfortable or safe ..you can explore what that is like. Sometimes it is a reassuring sensation. Sometimes it is uncomfortable. This is the same for fat bodies. It just may happen more frequently and depending on your character's context and experience the emotional reaction / thoughts that are generated may be a bit different.

THINKING AND FEELING IN A FAT BODY.

I think I touched on some of this in some of the earlier sections...but here I want to talk a bit about my experience of being fat and my thoughts about it - your fat characters may or may not feel similarly...but my hope is that you at least think about options as opposed to only writing one or two types of fat character.

I mainly "feel" fat in moments when it is pointed out to me or I am limited in what I can do because of it

I quite like my body, it is my home and I feel very connected to it's features. In my experience this is unusual for many people in North American society regardless of actual body shape or weight. Sometimes I feel guilty for not hating my body the way "I am supposed to" and wonder vaguely if my body would be different if I could hate it more (although as I get older I doubt it).

I do feel some pressure to be a cheerful "good" fat person as a way to stay safe and survive.

Nothing makes people more uncomfortable than me calling myself fat without judgement or asking for accomodation matter of factly. It took me a long time to feel comfortable doing so, but I do it now all the time and it makes my life better.

I felt some pressure to be the fun friend who people feel comfortable eating whatever they wanted with and I often felt like I was depended on to order dessert so they could too. This may have been all in my mind though.

Fat bellies can be very intimate places.

Not all fat people have dieted, but many have. I was lucky enough to never be forced into a diet. I did try keto once but it was a bit intense and nuts so I stopped. I learned a bunch doing it though.

Medical people not treating you appropriately when your fat is 100% a thing.

Internalised fat hate and fat phobia is a thing for many fat people and it pops up at weird moments.

I don 't.give a damn about being in a bathing suit. As long as it fits and my boobs and butt.aren't.falling out - I am happy and feel very attractive. In fact I am probably at my most comfortable in a bathing suit or naked. My body is mine in both those instances.

To reach the "healthy weight" for my height - I would have to lose half of my body mass. That is a lot of me to loose. Embarking on something like that would be totally different than loosing 5 or 10 pounds. Trying to navigate the various medical opinions about whether being fat is bad or not is exhausting.

For me, being fat and older is easier than being fat and younger. This could easily be the opposite for someone else.

Some fat people are into sex, some are not . Some folks are into sex with fat people and some are not. Some are nice about it. Some are not. Some want nice. Some do not.

Fat people are all around you living their best life or their worst life or somewhere in between. We know we are fat. We sometimes care and sometimes don't.

Ok that's it. I don't know if it will help anyone or if it's just a collection of rambles - but at the end of the day...fat people are just people. We are not going to go away. We are all sorts. We are the heroes of our own stories. We are people who are loved, depended on, hated, ignored, and/or spotlighted.

Some fat people think about being fat all the time. Some rarely. Just please don't erase us or other us.

Just by taking the step to interrogate your own biases and any feelings / assumptions you have about fatness/thinness is a huge step and will help limit the harm you could unintentionally do to fat people...actually to all people. Like all forms of hate and intelorance - Fat hate hurts EVERYONE. I would argue it privileges a few...but even that can be excruciating for the individuals who strive to retain that priviledge. We need to dismantle it.

[intirfl]

wish i could cut this fat out

[living400lbs]

Yay Aubrey Gordon for pointing out (in the Maintenance Phase podcast on Ozempic) that if she were to use Ozempic she would have a 50% chance of losing 15% of her body weight.

Which would take her from a morbidly obese BMI to ...drumroll... a morbidly obese BMI.

If a 15% weight loss would put you into the "normal weight" category, you are not in the "morbidly obese" category.

[thisisthinprivilege]

Submitted anonymously

My mom is fat. I am fat. Disclosure, though, I'm a small fat, and my weight would be considered pretty average if I was taller. So I still have some privilege, since I fit into "straight" sizes and am only a bit overweight. 

Anyway, I've dealt with a lot of shit for being overweight, mostly from my also overweight mom. She is, I guess, a small fat too. She's short, too. But she can fit into seats and whatnot and is nowhere near enormous. Actually, she's pretty small in size. 

Well, my mother is absolutely mentally ill. She encourages starving yourself, talks about her bulimic and anorexic tendencies as a teenager as if it was no big deal, and when I tell her she had (has?) an eating disorder, she denies it. VEHEMENTLY. And she agrees that her relationship with food is unhealthy, but still denies her having an eating disorder. She hardly eats.

Well, I recently got into a huge fight with her because she said, and I quote, "I don't like fat people."

I got really angry and asked her why she hates fat people if she herself is overweight. And then I told her that I'm pretty big myself and that she was pretty much insulting me.

Then she starting talking about how all fat people are "fat pigs" and that they ALL eat too much, ALL don't exercise, etc. I asked her why she's overweight if she hardly eats, and she didn't respond. 

This is the same mom who constantly tells me if I lose weight I'll be liked more, have boys like me, look better in clothes, be prettier, be worth more, etc. A few years back I tried to starve myself, and when she found out, instead of being upset that I was potentially developing an eating disorder, she told me "if you're going to starve you need to eat at least ONE thing a day to get your nutrients."

LIKE, WHAT THE FUCK? She should have been telling me that I was beautiful and perfect the way I was, but instead she was telling me to basically starve save for one snack a day. She tells me people don't typically like fat people, etc, and then denies that she ever says anything to me about my weight when I bring it up to her.

When I was, like 10, FUCKING TEN, she told me I was fat, point-blank, to my face. I was only 90 pounds.

She constantly makes comments about my thick legs, and asks me if I want to look more like my skinny friends. When I say I don't care, she tells me that I actually do care. Because EVERYONE who's overweight just wants dreadfully to be thin, apparently. 

We had a HUGE fight, and I was crying and telling her she was indecent and shouldn't judge people based off of their bodies, and she spewed some bullshit about how people like to be around "healthy" people and not fat people. 

Every time she wants to make me want to lose weight, she tells me boys like skinny girls and I will finally "be noticed" once I lose weight. When I tell her I don't care about appeasing shallow fuckboys, she doesn't believe me and says that all teenage girls like boys and want boys to be all over them. Okay, lol. Sure. "If you ever want a boyfriend and want to have fun in high school, you need to lose weight. Sorry, but boys like skinny girls."

Hm. Okay. 

So, encourage me to have an eating disorder, insult me, tell me I'm not worth enough if I'm not thin. I really don't understand. She's overweight herself, and she's abusive to me. She was when I was very young too, but I didn't realize how unhealthy it was until recently. She hates that I'm a fat activist and thinks I'm going to get my "ass kicked" one day for supporting basic human decency. Hm. 

Thin privilege is not having ALREADY FAT PEOPLE reprimand you for your natural body type.

Thin privilege is not being insulted and abused by parents for their body.

[accidentalslayer]

The way society conditions fat girls to hate their own body so that, years into the future, they do it to themselves and other girls is one of the many reasons I want to violently beat the shit out of the first person (and society) who told me that "maybe a doughnut is more your speed" instead of a relationship.

Surprise not surprise: that person was the first female friend I had.

Bonus surprise: she was no friend.

[landunderthewave]

No one is losing their job because of their fucking LDL cholesterol levels.

Michael Hobbes illustrating on Maintenance Phase why "health concerns" directed at fat people are just a smokescreen for the ableist and fatphobic judgements that fat people are facing.

[snail-is-wired]

Hating yourself won't make your health improve

Exercise should be an act of self care, not a punishment for how others perceive your body

Food is energy *and* comfort and culture, not just calories

If someone you don't even know comments on your weight, your build, your shape they are not concerned for you,

they are angry you don't fit into their ideals of what makes someone deserving of respect

because they martyr themselves in the ice cream aisle and you exist with an extra 5/10/50+ pounds

dieting is anything that works, even if it kills you, and you shouldn't settle for less because otherwise you are lazy and fat and subhuman

the way people treat you when you lose or gain weight is disheartening

how much should I weigh to be respected as a person?

[nycnomad]

My latest video is less about murder and more about a post-apocalyptic NYC neighborhood, if killing ain’t yer thing. (But rest assured, there’s still a little old-timey murder in it.)

YouTube is trying to be TikTok like every other platform, so they have YouTube Shorts. They don’t count toward the watch hours that eventually get you ad revenue, but they do tend to reach a wider audience, so I’ve posted a few. 

But BOY OH BOY, is that where the dregs of society live. This is where people like to pick apart my facial expressions (the horror of seeing a happy person who smiles when she talks), discuss my weight, talk about how #metoo people are the awful ones, and rant about how we can’t ban free speech if it means banning fat-shaming.

I’m thinking I just won’t post any more Shorts, because my subscriber numbers seem to be growing organically on their own, but I HAVE gotten 19 subscribers in 3 Shorts, which isn’t 0. 

I don’t have a problem handling the negative comments, because the kind of person who needs to try to bring down strangers is just sad to me.

But the thing I DON’T like is my husband seeing them. He’s logged into my YouTube account because he does all of my editing, so he gets the notifications when someone has called me a “gnargoyle”. 

I know he loves me endlessly and thinks I’m beautiful and perfect, blahblahblah, but I’m bothered by the idea that he has to see other men (it’s always men) basically saying that his choice was bad and he could have done better.

Or am I being way too dramatic here?

[coffeerant]

I think people should stop making the different Steven's from aus skinny or just buff, leave steven fat. He's also apart of greg who is fat, not just rose, so when rose is swapped for someone like blue diamond I don't think that means steven is suddenly lanky or something. Blue diamond isn't even suppper thin, lol. They make steven buff when they swap rose for yellow, but hey, guess what, fat people can have muscle too! No need to erase his fatness. Why are people so fast to erase positive fat rep at any chance they have? Hmmm.

[ahundredhundredheartbeats]

fatphobia kills people

medical abuse rooted in fatphobia kills people

[fuzzynecromancer]

There's some thin people who just seethe with hate if a fat person has a thin partner who openly loves their body. It threatens their entire sense of self worth.

[intirfl]

i wish i was born skinny instead of fucking whale

[living400lbs]

"Discrimination based on body size is common and persistent in American workplaces — but it's largely left out of diversity and inclusion training, and overlooked in employment law.

Why it matters: There's an economic cost to not being thin.

"Weight stigma is present at every stage of the employment cycle," says Rebecca Puhl, a professor at the department of human development at the University of Connecticut. It's harder to get hired, promoted and paid."

From

Note also : we don't have a way to make fat people permanently thin. Medicare’s Search for Effective Obesity Treatments: Diets Are Not the Answer (PDF) by UCLA reviews 31 studies on diets and recommended that Medicare not cover diet programs because they are not effective enough to be worth Medicare coverage.  News articles summarized these findings here and here.

For more about being fat, see https://living400lbs.com

[mayasongbird]

I recently experienced a pretty bad fatphobic experience in the hospital where I was said that the reason one foot of mine was swollen was because I am overweight. Well I said it was because I stepped on glass and an infection got in my foot because I lived in a dusty warehouse for a year (art life struggles)! It was the worst experience! Dr Santa Cruz at Alta bates is a complete clown for discarding me and my swollen foot and leg for being plus size. He said my bad habits. Sir I fast 18hrs a damn day and only eat in a 6 hr window frame. Anyway. It sucks to be judged by the cover of my book. This planet can suck my cock!

#fatphobiasucks!

[sweaty-confetti]

idk y’all should treat fat men better. and i don’t mean mildly chubby guys i mean honest-to-god love-handles-and-double-chins fat guys. stop calling them shit like discord mods or gross weebs or nasty creeps or neckbeards or that they’re stinky or sweaty or beer bellied or whatever else. fatphobia isn’t cute, even repackaged in a neat little box of “ew men”

[landunderthewave]

Love the random clickbait videos in my Youtube sidebar. "I'm over fat accepance!" You still hate fat people and you have always hated fat people. Just because you felt compelled to shut your mouth about it for like three months doesn't mean anything changed.