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coraaI love these videos. I just love 'em.
I've been reading a lot of blogs along the body-acceptance and health-at-every-size vein for a while now. I'm a skinny chick, so why do I do this? Well, a few reasons. Rigid ideas of body size are bad for everyone. I'm skinny but my boobs are small and my hips are bony -- so I also don't meet the 'standard.' I had a friend in junior high who, because of a congenital disease which inhibited nutrition-absorption, was a size zero at five foot eleven -- and she was mercilessly mocked for protruding collarbones, visible ribs, because it's not enough to just be thin, you have to be perfect. And then of course there was my friend in college who was bulimic (probably still is), and my other friend in college who was anorexic and hospitalized for it, and a high school friend who was also hospitalized for complications after starving him(yes, him)self. And I think that a lot of the current culture and feeling about the body is that it's wrong to like yourself and be happy if you're fat -- either because you're unattractive or because you're unhealthy (which is silly; fat people who exercise and eat well are quite often healthier than skinny people who, like me, sit on their asses and eat Nutella with a spoon. Really. I'm thin because I have thin ancestors).
And often I look at my friends who hate their bodies and think, "But you look great!" And it's so hard to say that, so very hard, because it's part of one of the ritual exchanges -- 'you look great, it's me who looks horrible' -- that no one accepts as being true. So how do I actually say: no, really, I think you look fantastic. I really do.
It matters to me.
But that's a terrible introduction to these videos, because they're bitchy and hilariously funny and -- oh god, the cliche, but still -- life-affirming, and left me feeling happy. Yeah, a little angry, but mostly happy. These YouTube videos are of Joy Nash, and she's brilliant and funny and even though I've never met her I want to go get coffee with her because she just seems that cool and fun. (And I'm a hermit!) They made me grin like an idiot. Because I think that people shouldn't ever feel obligated to hate themselves or their bodies.
Anyway, enough of me, here are the links to YouTube:
Fat Rant, Fat Rant 2: Confessions of the Compulsive, Totally Awesome (the shortest and maybe also my favorite), and Fat Rant 3: Staircase Wit.
(I feel terrible for making a disclaimer on this post, because the videos made me feel very positive, but: first, I wouldn't dream of telling my friends what to do with themselves, so if you diet and/or are trying to lose weight, please don't feel obliged to defend yourself to me. You don't need defending. Seriously. I'm not judging. Second, if you watch these and your impulse is, "But fat people should feel bad about being fat, because otherwise how will they learn??" or variants thereof, please don't tell me, just because you will not convince me, you will just irritate the fuck out of me. This is not the place to tell me that it really is important to make people hate themselves because it might theoretically make them slightly healthier. Really.)
If you wind up loving Joy as much as I did, she has a blog called, appropriately, Fat Rant.
I've been reading a lot of blogs along the body-acceptance and health-at-every-size vein for a while now. I'm a skinny chick, so why do I do this? Well, a few reasons. Rigid ideas of body size are bad for everyone. I'm skinny but my boobs are small and my hips are bony -- so I also don't meet the 'standard.' I had a friend in junior high who, because of a congenital disease which inhibited nutrition-absorption, was a size zero at five foot eleven -- and she was mercilessly mocked for protruding collarbones, visible ribs, because it's not enough to just be thin, you have to be perfect. And then of course there was my friend in college who was bulimic (probably still is), and my other friend in college who was anorexic and hospitalized for it, and a high school friend who was also hospitalized for complications after starving him(yes, him)self. And I think that a lot of the current culture and feeling about the body is that it's wrong to like yourself and be happy if you're fat -- either because you're unattractive or because you're unhealthy (which is silly; fat people who exercise and eat well are quite often healthier than skinny people who, like me, sit on their asses and eat Nutella with a spoon. Really. I'm thin because I have thin ancestors).
And often I look at my friends who hate their bodies and think, "But you look great!" And it's so hard to say that, so very hard, because it's part of one of the ritual exchanges -- 'you look great, it's me who looks horrible' -- that no one accepts as being true. So how do I actually say: no, really, I think you look fantastic. I really do.
It matters to me.
But that's a terrible introduction to these videos, because they're bitchy and hilariously funny and -- oh god, the cliche, but still -- life-affirming, and left me feeling happy. Yeah, a little angry, but mostly happy. These YouTube videos are of Joy Nash, and she's brilliant and funny and even though I've never met her I want to go get coffee with her because she just seems that cool and fun. (And I'm a hermit!) They made me grin like an idiot. Because I think that people shouldn't ever feel obligated to hate themselves or their bodies.
Anyway, enough of me, here are the links to YouTube:
Fat Rant, Fat Rant 2: Confessions of the Compulsive, Totally Awesome (the shortest and maybe also my favorite), and Fat Rant 3: Staircase Wit.
(I feel terrible for making a disclaimer on this post, because the videos made me feel very positive, but: first, I wouldn't dream of telling my friends what to do with themselves, so if you diet and/or are trying to lose weight, please don't feel obliged to defend yourself to me. You don't need defending. Seriously. I'm not judging. Second, if you watch these and your impulse is, "But fat people should feel bad about being fat, because otherwise how will they learn??" or variants thereof, please don't tell me, just because you will not convince me, you will just irritate the fuck out of me. This is not the place to tell me that it really is important to make people hate themselves because it might theoretically make them slightly healthier. Really.)
If you wind up loving Joy as much as I did, she has a blog called, appropriately, Fat Rant.
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no subject
Date: 2008-06-20 10:13 pm (UTC)I found the first Fat Rant forever ago and loved it, I didn't know there were sequels! That's so exciting!
no subject
Date: 2008-06-21 12:09 am (UTC)Everyone's different, though-- I'm fond of at least prominent collarbones. I feel like it's not looking bad that gets you teased in junior high school so much as just being in junior high school. Teenagers as a whole are vicious, evil people.
And regardless of the standard social exchange, I think you're gorgeous, bony hips and all. :)
As for fat, I agree. While trying to lose weight is good for your health and you can, theoretically, get your weight down to wherever you want it with enough diet and exercise, I'm convinced 90% or more of weight is genetics-- thin people generally have thin parents, and fat people tend to have fat parents. It's horribly unfair to say to someone "You're fat; if you'd just eat less, you could be thin and attractive"-- it's not that easy. I think of the difficulty of significant weight loss sort of like quitting smoking or becoming a recovering alcoholic-- extremely difficult, and requiring lifelong commitment.
Steve
no subject
Date: 2008-06-23 07:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-02 08:14 am (UTC)I don't know that much about how 'thin' got put on a pedestal in the last 50 or so years, I have only read a couple books on eating disorders, which usually seem to end up in the end being more about having a sense of control in life rather than appearances.. maybe I should look up some books on the general culture of thin.