Love Your Fat Self

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I think that’s a cop-out, and it’s not a cop-out for me. It’s a cop-out for the people who judge my size. It’s like, at this point, we all know that the media, old white men, corporations, the fashion industry, and all sorts of bad people or things out there shape the way we view ourselves and others. Okay, I get it. But don’t you think, at some point, knowing all this, we should start taking some responsibility for our thoughts and words? I mean, isn’t that the point of all this higher education, all this enlightenment?

As she reaches the end, she starts screaming her questions at the stunned audience: “So what’s going on, people? Why do I still feel like crap? Huh? Who can tell me? Do you know? Can someone please explain it to me?”

I can almost hear the audience members’ brains buzzing with rationalizations: But fat is unhealthy. I don’t date fat women, but I have nothing against them. Why is she complaining? She’s one of those beautiful fat women. When is this going to be over? It’s torture.

Gareth pulls herself together, takes a deep breath, and says calmly, “I know what you are all thinking, and it’s OK,” then ends, cool as ice, “You want the fat bitch to shut up,” and struts out of the spotlight and off the stage.

Gareth is beautiful, especially tonight. She’s dressed in a knee-length black skirt, cut in uneven triangles on the bottom. Her shirt is a rainbow of reds, oranges, and yellows—as fiery as her monologue—cut low, revealing the tops of her breasts, freckled with beauty marks. Her eyes are outlined in dark pencil, making them seem even bigger than they are, even more striking. The spotlight bathes her in an ethereal light.

But most of the audience members instead focus on her anger. They are not used to being called on the carpet for their judgment of obesity. They feel attacked, misunderstood, perhaps defensive. They have fat friends. They aren’t narrow-minded, just concerned about the obesity epidemic. They thought that was the right way to be. They feel unmoored, the first phase of a new consciousness.

Gareth’s monologue provokes a storm of self-reflection. I would never say anything rude to a fat man or woman about his or her weight, but would I think it? I preach tolerance, but would I consider dating someone who is overweight? When I compliment Gareth on her new haircut, is there a part of me that feels relieved that she is undeniably beautiful despite being fat? Do I identify her anger more quickly than I would a thinner friend’s? Do I patronize her by complimenting her eyes, her sense of humor, her determination—as if the rest of her doesn’t exist?

Just as racism is not primarily about frightened white women clutching their purses but about the seemingly mundane, unconscious voices in our heads—Why do black girls have to be so loud? That Latina woman is probably a great nanny. This new Asian guy is probably really smart—sizeism is not about the drunken man who screams “fat bitch” at Gareth on the subway as much as it is about the march of hateful inner monologues: That girl would be so pretty if she would just lose some weight. I wonder what’s wrong with her, must be lazy. This fat bitch is taking up more than her share of the bus seat.

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