fatlyyours

Finding My Value

2009-06-01T06:55:00.000-07:00

Just thought I'd drop in and let people know I'm still alive.

I haven't had the energy to start my new blog yet, and I'm sorry. I wanted to start right away around New Year, but I couldn't decide on the name, and was stumped by that. I wasn't able to make decisions at that point. I wasn't able to write much either. Everything just felt a bit overwhelming. In February, I was diagnosed with depression and got medication for it. It was a dark patch around that time, but I've gotten a lot better, and maybe it will be a good thing in the long run. I have a lot of self esteem issues that needed addressing, and I might as well deal with them now. That also includes my body image. I think I will be able to write much better stuff after all this.

I no longer see myself as "fat and ugly", and I no longer expect people to judge me solely based on my fat. It's a huge relief. I still had some of those feelings while blogging here, and I guess I shouldn't say it's ALL gone. I'm also feeling less guilty and inferior about my eating habits. The fatosphere helped me a lot, but I think I also needed to address some deeper personal issues to really make a change.

When I got the diagnosis, I decided to take pressure off myself in terms of political blogging - and even reading political blogs. I haven't been around the fatosphere much lately. I never really got to posting much in forums or getting to know people in the community. I don't really know if I want to change that or not. I have a certain problem with being a "member" of the fatosphere; I don't want to form opinions simply based on what some other bloggers think or say. I'm also just not a community person. So this might change, or it might not.

FA takes a lot of thought and even more guts, and lately I haven't had room for either with the depression. But I'm coming back slowly. Right now, I'm at a point where I'm re-evaluating things, but I'm not really sure yet where I'm going to end up. So maybe I'll continue my little break still and start blogging again later. I have, however, started the blog; it's called Finding My Value, and while there are no new posts yet, it already contains some of my old posts from this blog. I won't re-post all of them - some were written pretty shoddily and others I no longer agree with. But there are some of my favorite posts archived. I haven't re-posted any comments yet (tho I do have the comments saved); I will probably do that later.

I have a sporadically updated diary blog at Deniselle's Diary Blog.

And if you're into actor James Callis, I also have The Baltarstar Blog, a fan blog that I'm updating pretty much weekly.
I actually posted a sort of fat acceptance post there once, in response to a movie he made a while back. If you're interested, it's here. I'm past feeling bad about the movie, but kinda proud over the post, because it took some courage to show my colors. I don't really talk much about fat acceptance in the fan circles, but people know where I stand, and they've been respectful. They know me personally, so maybe that helps, but I must say I'm amazed that I got no negative feedback at all on that post.

If you want to follow me on Twitter, you're welcome to do so (although it's mostly a fan Twitter, I also talk a bit about my everyday life). I'm at BaltarStar.

Oh, and about my Facebook account: I haven't signed on in ages and might not go back there, because to be honest, I hate Facebook and all its confusing applications. I might make another account later. If you friended me there and I seemed to ignore you, this is why. Nothing personal.

So that's my personal update for now. I'm doing pretty well right now, but political stuff still overwhelms me a bit, so I might not be back for a little while yet. Courage and strength to everyone blogging about body image and acceptance, as well as to everyone struggling with these issues in their daily lives. You're beautiful and, most importantly, valuable just the way you are. Keep up the important work!

Happy New Year/Diary Blog

2009-01-06T10:19:00.000-08:00

OK, I'm done with the post-removing, but wasn't able to come up with a name that would satistfy me completely. Thanks for the title suggestions - I've been seriously considering Large Living Lesbian ("large loving" sounds a bit too much like fetishism, but "large living" might be nice). I've had too many holidays with my family to really think it through though, so the blog will probably surface in a week or two.

I've made a temporary home at Deniselle's Diary Blog, where I will be posting mostly diary-type entries. I've never had a diary blog in English before, and it felt like something I need to try out. This is not mutually exclusive with the political blog. I'll probably continue it after I establish the political one, but for now, all the important stuff I have to say will be there.

If there are any Battlestar Galactica/James Callis enthusiasts in the feed, just a reminder that I have the Baltarstar Blog where I muse on James and his character Gaius Baltar.

My other blogs are on a hiatus for now. I'll announce when I continue any of them.

Happy New Year to everyone! I'm still reading the fatosphere feed and other FA sites, and even if I never get around to commenting much, your blogs encourage me and every voice is important. Like many others, I was saddened to hear that Big Fat Blog is going down in April, but I can understand that after ten years, work situations and priorities change. Lots of respect to Paul McAleer for going on that long!

Also, Lindsay had an interesting post about whether or not the fatosphere is a community. Well worth a look.

One Final Post

2008-12-19T17:25:00.000-08:00

I must admit I'm feeling some sadness over leaving this blog, and I want to post at least this one more goodbye - hopefully not a goodbye to readers, but to the blog itself.

First of all, don't worry - I'm not leaving and I probably won't be gone that long. In fact, I would have started the new blog already if I could think of a name! My brain always blanks out on names and comes up with horrid joke ones instead. So the top contenders at the moment are, sadly, "My General Opinion Blog, Section B-429038490", "BIB - Body Image and Bigotry", and "Fat Angry Feminist Who Likes to Sleep With Other Women (But Not Too Hairy)". Yeah. If you can think of a better name for a blog about fat acceptance/feminism/homosexuality/any other general opinions I might have, feel free to offer suggestions. I've ruled out all names beginning with "fat" and "big", because there are already so many.

I want to clarify what I'm going to axe and what will stay. The fictional character posts are definitely staying, and I will continue to write them. I'm slow with them, because I try to make it as well thought out as possible, but they're coming. I've gotten some interesting suggestions via email, and will be writing about some of those in the future. Also staying are my latest posts about fat acceptance and most of the posts about my own body image.

I'm going to axe old stuff that I no longer agree with, i.e. posts that state that "fatness is part of the western lifestyle" (i.e.fatness is a lifestyle - this is from my first ever post, and I must say I no longer agree with most of it). Also on the axe list are posts that basically serve to say "up yours, health fascists" (really useful), or any post where the stuff I'm linking to or referring to is no longer available (blogs taken down etc.). And finally, most of the posts that report old news items and stuff that, in retrospect, was sloppily written and posted just to post something that week. Some of these posts have already disappeared. I do have them saved in a Notepad file for myself, if only to read later on what a doofus I was in January 2007.

In other words, a lot of the content, especially the most recent content, is simply going to be transferred over to the new blog. I'm not sure what this means in terms of comments - I have saved the comments to all posts, but it seems complicated to re-post them in the comments section. I might want to edit some posts to include snippets from comments and my responses to them, where the comments gave me a deeper understanding of the issue.

I want to thank all the readers. It means so much to me that people read my writing, like it, and are inspired by it. It makes me feel much better about myself, and I hope the added self esteem also shows in the posts and helps others in turn. We're all in this together - body acceptance is a journey that never ends and none of us are "there" yet.

Stats off Sitemer, as of Dec 17th:

                    -- Site Summary ---                
     Visits

       Total ....................... 33,128       
       Average per Day ................ 154       
       Average Visit Length .......... 1:02       
       This Week .................... 1,077       

     Page Views

       Total ....................... 49,025       
       Average per Day ................ 221       
       Average per Visit .............. 1.4       
       This Week .................... 1,544

Wow. I just wanna say, I'm really touched that people still read so much. I've barely updated the blog in the past few months, yet I've had so many views. It feels a little surreal that 154 people check the blog daily - some, I know, through a search that has zero to do with Fat Acceptance, but a lot seem to come from Shapely Prose or other FA sites - and that I've had over 30,000 visits. I also see that there are four other bloggers following me. Wow.

If you sent me a comment and I published it but never responded, I'm sorry. Sometimes it was because I was so touched and excited by your comment that I just didn't know how to respond. Sometimes because the comment really made me think and I was going to rethink it and post in a few days, and then forgot. I hope no one has felt their post was dumb or unworthy of a response, because that's not at all what I was thinking. The same goes for any emails I may have forgotten to reply to - I have read them all, and I do appreciate all the viewpoints. I'm just bad at replying.

I hope you will continue to read, comment, email and challenge me.

To quote Krusty the Klown: I wish you all
Merry Christmas!
Happy Hanukkah!
Kwazy Kwanzaa!
A Tip Top Tet!
And a solemn, dignified Ramadan.

See you in the new blog! :)

A Fresh Start

2008-12-13T20:02:00.000-08:00

You may have noticed posting has been sporadic lately. I've been thinking about many post topics, but for some reason, haven't been able to post much. The blog doesn't really feel mine anymore. A lot changes in two years - I feel like I've outgrown it. It's like an old nightie that you want to keep forever because you like it so much, but at some point, you have to admit that it's tight and has holes in it. You can't wear it in front of guests anymore. You can only put it in the back of your closet. That's what I'm going to do with this blog.

I am going to take this blog offline on the 31st of December and start a new one (which might not be up right away, but it's coming soon). I will save all posts in text files, and I will re-post some of them in the new blog, but not all.

I want to emphasize that I'm not leaving Fat Acceptance, nor am I abandoning the things I talk about in the most recent posts. I simply want to reinvent the blog. The very first posts of this blog are not something I necessarily agree with anymore, and they bug me. They're angrier, less confident, less honest and open. They seem like they're written by someone else. There are many posts I'm proud of, but all in all, I feel I need to find a new focus. This blog never had a focus when I started out - it was just "an FA blog" at a time when I wasn't reading any other FA blogs and didn't really know what I was even writing about - or who I was writing for (in retrospect, it was probably just aimed at myself). Then it became a way to be a member of the FA community, and some of it was just sucking up. There's a lot that I've learned since then.

I need to reinvent myself on my own terms. There have been some events in the community that have shaken it, but maybe that's a good thing. It might mean that we have to increasingly redefine ourselves. That means growth. I'm hoping that we can still respect each other and learn form each other in the process, but we need to be free to grow into our own directions. I don't want to pigeonhole anymore, and I don't want to be pigeonholed.

Why not just delete the posts I don't like and keep the ones I like? For one thing, I want a new url. I no longer like the name. I think it's confrontational and somewhat aggressive. When I started, "fat" was a sort of war-cry word for me in a way that it isn't anymore. I'm a lot calmer now. I'm not sure what "fatly yours" even means. It felt funny at first, but then, a lot of things felt funny to me two years ago that bug me now. Even if I changed the title at the top, I'd have the name in the url still, so I think a fresh start is a good idea.

Why not leave this up as an archive then? Frankly, I don't want to have posts up that I'm ashamed of, because obviously people are finding the old stuff and linking to it, and I have to answer for things I no longer stand for. This happened last summer, when I had some drive-by haters from a webcomic community. Someone had found an old post I'd written about the body image issues in said comic, and they got mad. I got lots of mocking and angry comments, and a lot of it was just inane drivel - "shut up fatty" is one real example.

But it also made me think. Is this dialogue between me and non-FA people, or am I alienating those who aren't already rooted within the FA world? If outsiders read this and think "wow, what a load of bullshit" and just tell me that and leave - well, then this blog hasn't fulfilled its purpose at all. It doesn't get new people into FA, and it doesn't help build bridges between FA and outsiders. Now, I know there will always be some trolls, even if it were the best blog in the world. But the post they were commenting on was angry and confrontational. It was begging for angry responses. I didn't realize it when I wrote it, but I see it now.

I realize now that my goal hasn't exactly been to invite new people in. I have wanted to fit in with the FA movement. I have wanted to be a part of an existing whole, which may or may not be an exclusive club where you're expected to agree with certain ideas. It's been enough for me to preach to the choir. But the choir seems to be disseminating anyway, and I really feel like the movement won't be expanded if we just talk amongst ourselves. That means we have to find a language and expression that reaches out.

The new blog will probably be a general opinion blog with an FA slant (I've been thinking of blogging more about gay issues, for instance - I don't have any blogs for that at the moment). If a random reader comes by and sees a post about FA, they may look at the other posts to see what I'm on about. If they see posts they can agree with - a gay rights post, a post discussing religion, etc. - they might relax and reconsider my FA positions. Everyone won't, and that's fine too. For those only interested in my FA posts, I will use tags so you can find the relevant posts.

Two years ago, I defined myself as the fat girl. I no longer feel that way. I'm no longer angry all the time. I am more than the fatness, and I want my blog to depict that.

Kate Winslet "Feeling Fat"

2008-11-04T10:55:00.000-08:00

Today's imdb news report that "Kate Winslet "still feels fat" after being a fat child:

"Once a fat kid, always a fat kid. Because you always think that you just look a little bit wrong or a little bit different from everyone else."

I wasn't a fat kid. I was a kid who had gone through skull operations and other stuff that other kids didn't understand. So I, too, always feel a little bit wrong and a little bit different. I think this is a result of a) bullying and b) a culture that pushes us to be "normal" and "beautiful", and I'm sure this is a familiar feeling to even the prettiest kids. I don't know what could be done about it, because as far as I know, the pressure to be the same as everyone else has always existed, both among children and adults. Only few people have had the courage to really break away from that, whether that means coming out of the closet, going against dominant beliefs, or indeed being fat acceptant in a fat hating culture.

I don't like how this article connects this feeling of "being different" to being fat. Yes, fat kids and adults have it hard, and it's good to bring that up. But fat is not the only kind of different, and I wish there was more of an admission of that. I don't like the tone of "awww, poor fat person". It's not very empowering.

Another interesting quote:

"And I still sort of have that. I often look at women who wear great jeans and high heels and nice little T-shirts wandering around the city and I think, I should make more of an effort. I should look like that."

Well, yes - we've all had those moments, and slim women have them too. But what I don't get here is whether she thinks this feeling is a bad thing and something she struggles against, or a feeling she agrees with. It sounds to me like it might be the latter, but maybe I'm underestimating her.

Kate Winslet is one of those actresses that I feel a bit ambivalent about, because I've heard statements from her back in her Titanic days - when she was putting on a bit of weight - that she wants to be different from the standard actress - eat and enjoy life. There was a somewhat rebellious tone to it all, it was accepting and brought out the hypocrisy of Hollywood when it comes to women and weight. Later, she was saying that she's still accepting but wasn't getting any roles, so she had better lose a few. Major cop-out or necessity? I'm still not sure what to think. I know it might be hard, even impossible, to get major roles when fat (or even just Hollywood fat), and if you believe this is something you can affect, I guess you want to change to get the roles, instead of having your career stand in one place while you eat whatever you want.

Only I don't think it's that simple. I think it's about sending a message too. If all Hollywood actresses refused to be skinny, the execs would have no choice except to accept a few heavier women into the major parts. On the other hand, does one woman's silent rebellion help and should she sacrifice her own career to encourage others? I'm really not sure what to say to this. I want to be a writer/translator, and no matter what my weight, I still can be. But what if my career hinged upon the loss of ten or twenty pounds? It's easy to say now that I'd persevere and never lose weight for that purpose, but I doubt that would really be the case if I really wanted that career. If I could lose the weight, maybe I would.

Would I rather have seen Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, my favorite movie ever, with someone else in the lead because Kate was too fat for the part? I don't think I would have. Ideally, I would have liked to see her in that part and chubby. But the way she does that role... I don't know. The world would have lost a lot if she hadn't lost weight, I guess. But this is where it gets complicated: the world's already lost a lot when extremely talented, chubby/fat actresses are being turned down left and right, and extremely talented slim actresses are being told to lose a few and then try again. Everyone doesn't have the choice to lose the weight, because everyone doesn't just get slim if they try hard enough. That's where it gets unfair.

UPDATED: "Lady Vengeance" has posted the full quote in the comments:

The full quote is, "I often look at women who wear great jeans and high heels and nice little T-shirts wandering around the city and I think, I should make more of an effort. I should look like that. But then I think, They can’t be happy in those heels.”

Thank you. And you know what, this is very interesting. This gives the quote a completely different slant. It sounds like, "I have moments of weakness when I think I should be somebody else, but then I realize I'm fine the way I am." The question is: why did imdb news dedide to report it as "awww, poor Kate, she feels so bad about herself looking at those pretty women"? I guess we know the answer - it gives enough lip service to "big girls have it hard", but doesn't rock the boat too much. Because implying that prettier women might not be happier after all - that's just too much.

This restores my faith in Kate a bit. I'm not saying she'd be a totally terrible role model if she wanted to go by that feeling and "make more of an effort". She's a great actress whom I admire, and I've enjoyed the nuances she brings to every role she's been in. So I wasn't meaning to slag her off either way.

But I'm still very relieved about that full quote.

Candace Cameron Revisited

2008-09-29T07:59:00.000-07:00

Some time ago, I blogged about DJ on Full House. I found this article from a year ago, and I wanted to post about how people view Candace Cameron, a chubby teenager who grew up to be a slim adult. The article is written by Mike Celizic at msnbc.com.

Firstly, it states that when it comes to hardships child stars face as they grow up, Cameron "has seen it first-hand", because co-stars Jodie Sweetin and Mary-Kate Olsen suffered from drug abuse and anorexia, respectively. I always thought "first-hand" meant experiencing something yourself. I wouldn't say I have first-hand experience of anorexia or bulimia, just because I have friends who went through those issues. Also - even if Cameron worked closely with Sweetin and the Olsens as a child, it's not self-evident that they have close, or indeed any, contact today. They might, but there's nothing in the article to indicate that. But this is beside my point, it's just a pet peeve of mine that people lump actors from the same show together even after such a long time.

Cameron is described as "the cute kid who is now 31 and prettier than ever". I find this a bit disturbing. In the picture, she looks pretty much the same as she did when she was as a teenager - except a) grown up, b) slender, and c) blonde. One of these things is not like the others.

So yeah, a pretty 30-year-old would be more attractive to most adults than a baby-faced pre-teen/teenager. But that's just because a baby-faced 14-year-old looks like a child, not like a grown woman who might be a potential sexual partner. The quote also serves to show that people expected Cameron to grow up to be fat and unattractive - or perhaps "just cute" instead of pretty. It's this whole ugly duckling vibe that annoys me. Teenagers are not complete adults yet, and their looks aren't set in stone. Most of us didn't look our best as teenagers, nor do teenagers need to look good to fulfil someone's fantasy. They are still growing, and they have fragile enough self esteems as it is.

We have a phrase in Finnish: "At seventeen, a girl is at her prettiest". I remember hearing it a lot at 17 and thinking, "I'm going to end up horrible - I'm already so fat and have terrible acne!" Even if most people used the phrase jokingly, I still felt like a failure; I hadn't fulfilled my duty as a young girl. I actually think I look better today than I did then, despite being - gasp! - 30 pounds heavier. It might have to do with my self esteem being considerably better. Closer to "I'm OK the way I am" than "OMG, this article says I'm too fat!"

While I'm not sure if that phrase exists in English, the expectation certainly seems to. The writer seems confused that Cameron would be prettier now than at age, say, 14:

But Morales observed, even after having three children, Cameron looks to be in better shape than she was when she was a teenager.

Better shape. Because you know, she was chubby, so she was out of shape. And if you look like you've had children, you're out of shape. Also, teenagers should by default be in better shape than a 30-year-old (which is still young). I wonder how this question was phrased exactly. Both with this comment and the one I discussed above, I had to wonder why her teenage looks are even mentioned. If you have to bring up her looks, can't you just say "she looks great"?

Cameron attributed that to her husband, former NHL hockey star Valeri Bure, hom she married 11 years ago.
“He’s a professional athlete,” she said. “We work out together. We have fun with the kids. We all play tennis together, we ride bikes, we go on walks together. It’s really a family effort.”

I have nothing negative to say about this quote, really. Having exercise with the whole family is probably a great way of introducing children to sports - much better than, say, a school gym class where peer pressure, bullying and competitive atmosphere ruin the fun for most of the students. I just hate the fact that, in this article, the idea of family exercise is connected to Cameron keeping her weight in check and looking attractive.

What the article doesn't mention is that Cameron's parents got her a personal trainer at age 17, so she was "in shape" for the rest of the show. So when they say "as a teenager", they probably mean "between the ages of 13 and 16". So that's three years of being chubby, and they expected it to last her entire life, yet they also see it as a marker of poor lifestyle choices. An interesting double standard - chubby kids are naturally chubby and will be chubby forever, vs. chubby kids get too many snacks and too little exercise, and this is dangerous. I think both ideas exist in our culture, and it's all very confusing.

But you know what, maybe this needs to be said: chubby, for whatever reason, is not the same as unathletic. Many chubby kids love sports. My cousin, at age 6-10, was chubby, athletic, and outdoorsy. Now, at age 13, she's thinner and loves to stay indoors with little exercise. It's not always connected.

Also, teenagers are not complete adults and don't have to ascribe to beauty ideals. Maybe that bears repeating.

FA Chat on Stickam

2008-09-27T15:05:00.000-07:00

Join Lindsay and myself at the FA chat on Stickam!

More info on Lindsay's blog (link above). You do need to join, but it doesn't take long - three fields to fill out and you get your join email instantly. The chat room is called FA chat and is password-free today. Come one come all!

Feminism And the Fat Liberation Feed

2008-09-25T12:45:00.000-07:00

Two corrections: It's the Fat Liberation feed, and Coffee Catholic has been taken off it. But I'm not going to take down this post because I think I had a good point anyway.

OK, so the feminists vs. non-feminists thing has been going on for a while within the fatosphere, and it's been raised again, so I'm going to seize this opportunity to talk about it.

Dancing With My Mirror posted about a new Fat Liberation feed blog, Coffee Catholic. I basically agree with everything she says - I'm very disturbed that there are openly anti-feminist blogs in FA feeds. Personally, I can accept that some FA supporters don't like the label "feminist" and/or might not agree with all of the goals and values of "the feminist movement". I call myself a feminist without being part of any feminist group, because to me, feminist simply means "equal rights for both genders". Some might disagree on that definition.

I can understand that non-feminists feel excluded or marginalized in the feed. So by all means, speak out and talk about your gender views. But does this mean we have to start a war between the feminists and the non-feminists?

Big Liberty, who runs the Fat Liberation feed, defends Coffee Catholic's right to express her views:

While I agree that it might not be the most appropriate blog on the FL feed at times, you have to realize that there are people out there who are just as offended by some of the posts of blogs made on the Fatosphere, and who scroll past those posts as quickly as you scroll past CoffeeCatholic’s. While CC is extreme, it’s bothersome to those who are mostly used to having their own extreme viewpoints heard and encouraged. What not a lot of people realize is that some of the viewpoints of the blogs on the Fatosphere feed *are* extreme, and *not* mainstream.

Don't we realize it? Because I think we do. None of us lives exclusively online, let alone exclusively inside the Fatosphere feed. We've met the people - who make up the majority - who don't think like us. FA is extreme and far from mainstream. So is feminism. That's kind of the point. We're an alternative to mainstream media. And the more different bloggers there are, the more alternatives we can provide.

I can understand that some people cringe at the feminist talk at, say, Shapely Prose or the F Word, but are these blogs directly hateful to non-feminists? I've never seen hate speech in them against people who think differently, or name-calling, like I've seen in some of the non-feminist blogs. I don't enjoy going into an FA discussion only to find bitter words about "feminazis" and all that. It's like a slap in the face. I don't think the feminist bloggers have done the same against the other side, so it feels uncalled for.

I’ve never read anything on CC’s blog that I believe is homophobic, for instance — she doesn’t hate gays, she just doesn’t like the idea of her life having to conform to what she sees as groups that are less about civil rights than they are about power-lobbying.

I'm not going to go deep into this, but I don't think homophobia means hating gays on a personal level. I think the most prevalent form of homophobia is being opposed to gay rights because it's all about power, or all about hurting Christianity, hurting heterosexual marriages, etc. The famous "homosexual agenda" that some people rave about, but that I've never encountered among actual gays. In short, I think it's a conspiracy theory. Even in what you said - "her life having to conform to" - what does she have to conform to because of gay rights groups? No one's forcing her to have a lesbian relationship. No one's even forcing her to accept gays. The only thing she has to do is accept that society as a whole is becoming more accepting of gays. It's about tolerating different opinions and values.

You have to understand that there are many people who think that demanding special privileges for people based on their sexual orientation, gender, ethnicity, religion or non-religion, etc is hateful and discriminatory. This is something in my experience not a lot of social left-wingers really grasp.

I grasp it alright. It's just that I disagree, and in fact think it's an abuse of the terms "hateful" and "discriminatory". No one's asking for "special privileges" for gays. The right to marry is something heterosexuals take for granted, but when it comes to gays, it's suddenly a special privilege. Ditto the right for adoption. These are not special privileges, they're civil rights. Like, you know, freedom of choice. And if gays were to get these rights, the heterosexuals would lose what exactly? Nothing but their privilege as the only acceptable sexuality. I don't see the discrimination and hate in that.

I see a huge contradiction between being a fat rights activist and being against feminism, gay rights, etc. I really don't see how you can be for one civil rights group but against another - either you believe in equal rights for everyone or you don't. If you only support civil rights groups that directly serve your goals and resist those that want to take away your privileges, I consider that selfish. No, every heterosexual doesn't have to be a vocal gay rights supporter, but to go against our rights because you think that's somehow taking away from yours? I don't consider it a positive expression of a differing viewpoint. I consider it discrimination.

But back to feminism: I want to point out that I think there's a middle ground between being a feminist and being anti-feminist. You can agree with some things feminists say, disagree with others, and have calm public discourse about it. For instance, if a feminist blogger posts about women's position, you can make a post responding to it, pointing out where you think s/he has it wrong. If a feminist says things that you consider hateful towards men or other women, point that out in a calm post. If they were truly being hateful, this wins you points, and it serves to give a voice to the non-feminists in the feed.

But publicy berating feminists means that you're against all feminists - even the moderate and polite ones - and all concepts of feminism, including equal rights for women. If you're talking about the most extreme feminists only, make that clear in your speech. Moderate feminists, who might agree with a lot of your other points, have every right to be offended when you say feminists are man-hating nazi fanatics. Feminism is something that's very important to a lot of women - and men! - and it's hurtful to make us into some pack of feral cats that attacks men and culture left and right.

So who deserves a voice? Why do the left-wing extremists deserve a voice on the feeds, while the (only) right-wing extremist doesn’t?

I think that both deserve a voice. Or more precisely, everyone who's willing to have respectful discourse instead of hatefully attacking others has a right to speak. But lately, it seems like the right-wing, non- or anti-feminist blogs have been having a contest at who shouts the loudest and offends the left-wing feminists the most. Not to mention that they're leaving the fatosphere and deleting their blogs left and right. To me, this is counterproductive with gaining a voice in the fatosphere. I'm not against having separate feeds, but it does seem like the Fat Liberation feed has become some sort of "voice of the resistance" where people feel safe to make covert and overt attacks at liberal feminist blogs, sometimes directly but mostly indirectly. I just don't get the impression that they want a fair discussion. If they use the most offensive rhetoric possible, you can be sure that the left-wing feminists are going to respond negatively too. Maybe it makes them feel even more persecuted, but the truth is, they started it.

I mean, look at the quote from Coffee Catholic:

“That’s because you creepy man-looking Feminist/Liberals cannot even begin to imagine what it means to love beyond your selfish self-serving selves.”

And then look at Kate Harding's latest post at Shapely Prose, one of the blogs Big Liberty mentions as an example of extremism in the fatosphere. Tell me - differing views aside, which one is being more diplomatic and dealing more with the shades of gray? Is Kate's style really "OMG I hate men and non-feminist women" in the same way that Coffee Catholic's is the opposite?

A part of political discourse is that we don't always agree with each other, even within the same movement. But hating people who think differently is not a part of that.

Daphne on Frasier

2008-09-24T11:55:00.000-07:00

Daphne (in front) in her slim weight. I couldn't find any photos of her "fat" look.

I liked Frasier a lot. It was an unusually intelligent sitcom. The characters were likeable yet flawed, not simple stereotypes. Frasier and his brother Niles were obnoxious rich snobs, but with a heart, and the show was both funny and touching. Jane Leeves played Daphne, a quirky British physical therapist with a quick wit. She also became Niles' secret crush for years to come.

When Daphne and Niles finally hooked up in the eighth season, Leeves had just become pregnant. The writers apparently didn't know how to handle this. A pregnancy that early on would have been difficult to fit in the storyline (since Daphne had just left her fiancé, the baby might have been his). Their solution was to make her fat.

After my own weight gain, I have always wanted to see a sympathetic, realistic portrayal of a young woman gaining weight. Women on TV seem to either already be fat or skinny and stay that way, and the fat female characters are almost always elderly. Since most people don't get fat overnight, I think it would be interesting to explore the weight issues from a calm everyday angle, rather than the usual "lol, fatty loves to eat!" point of view. Frasier was more intelligent than most sitcoms, so this could have been possible. However, the writers suffered from what I suspect is a simple case of ignorance and ambivalence on the issue. They didn't know what to do with this storyline, and it was all over the place.

Temporarily fatter sitcom characters, who always quickly lose the weight, generally make me mad. I even hated that episode of Seinfeld, and I love Seinfeld. It's just not a good idea to make your character gain weight all of a sudden, unless you have something real to say about it. Most writers don't.

I know I'm asking for way too much, but here's how I wish it had gone down:
1. Daphne gains a little weight, preferably without snacking constantly or changing her eating habits in a major way.
2. Horrified, she goes on a very strict diet. The others around her are concerned. Bonus points if the diet is doctor-prescribed.
3. She loses the weight, then quickly gains it back, and develops an obsessive spiral of dieting, thus gaining even more weight.
4. In the end, Frasier and Niles confront her about her dieting, and try to help her understand why she's so obsessed with her weight. Bonus points if she takes her time losing the weight, or doesn't lose it at all.

And here's the way it went down. Imagine eye-rolling at most points:
1. When Daphne and Niles get together, he keeps taking her on lavish dinners and bringing her chocolates, etc. Daphne starts overeating and gains weight.
2. In the course of a couple of months, Dapne gains sixty pounds (!!).
3. In the end, she is forced to face her weight gain. She decides to diet and Niles tries to help her, but she keeps cheating by hiding food all over the house.
4. When she gets caught cheating, Niles and Frasier are sympathetic to her issues and suggest a spa diet.
5. Daphne goes to the spa, then comes back in some weeks, having lost all of the weight. She never gains weight again (except when she gets pregnant the following season).

This is wrong on so many levels. The extreme weight gain could have been a sign of a serious illness or an eating disorder, but no one even considers that. Do people really gain 60 pounds in the course of a few months, only to lose it all within the same year? To add insult to injury, Jane Leeves came back from her maternity leave looking thinner than ever.

In each episode, Daphne is shown eating all the time, completely oblivious to how others might see this. Frasier's father Martin makes mean fat jokes when she's out of the room, and people whisper about her weight gain behind her back. No one makes remarks to Daphne's face, however, because they want to be tactful. Martin says he will mention the issue to Daphne "after she's too big to chase me but before she needs the motorized scooter" - a good example of the mean-spirited and uninspired fat jokes in this season. The studio audience, to their credit, had to be told to laugh. There was zero reaction at first, so they were told that Jane here is pregnant, please bear with us. The reaction should have been a sign that this does. not. work.

Frasier, who's a psychiatrist, doesn't handle this very professionally. He participates in Martin's jokes about Daphne and seems appalled at her eating habits. When time comes to confront Daphne about her problem, he can't find a way to say anything to her or even to Niles. There's a whole awkward scene where he tries to show Niles his concern, and Niles keeps misunderstanding him. People who can say mean stuff behind your back, but can't talk about your weight to you in a constructive way are usually not all that accepting. I wonder how Frasier would deal with a patient who had a "weight problem".

In the scene where it all comes out, Daphne and Niles come home from a restaurant and she falls and sprains her ankle. Niles, who's puny, can't lift her, and she has to face the reality of her weight gain. I felt this scene was an awfully contrived way of bringing on the big realization. Does there have to be one big moment like that? Most people are acutely aware of any weight gain, let alone sixty pounds in just a couple of months. Had they shown Daphne worrying about her weight before, being defensive about it, asking Niles if she's still attractive to him, etc., it would have made her much more real and relatable. Of course, that would have made all the fat jokes seem mean, so it would have spoiled all the "fun".

Daphne says, "I've spent weeks watching meself expand. I kept hoping it would go away by itself." This, to me, reads as "fatties delude themselves". Would it really be possible to ignore for that long? She would have had to change her entire wardrobe. Besides, most women I know would jump straight into "OMG, I'm such a fat pig" when they gain weight. I still do that too, despite my FA beliefs. So I call bullshit on this attitude. Niles apologizes for all the lavish dinners, but Daphne thinks it's her own fault: "I just need to develop some willpower." This I liked, because it was a realistic, self-aware response. (Even if I don't agree with the idea of "willpower" presented here.)

Martin comes in to help with the lifting, and Daphne now shows she's aware of his jokes: "No cracks, old man! I know I've gotten heavy and I've resolved to do something about it." The latter part bugs. She seems to be saying that it's no longer OK to make fun of her body, but it was OK when she was still stuffing her face. Why is this the only time we see Daphne confronting Martin about his attitude? One of my pet peeves, when TV characters make fat jokes, is that the fatty never gets to say anything sassy back. Daphne used to be sassy, but that was dropped when she gained weight.

I also felt that this scene, which ends with Frasier coming in and helping them lift Daphne, was unnecessarily humiliating. Does her moment of realization need an audience? I've noticed this in both cartoons and sitcoms: the moment of transition from fatty to dieter comes through a moment of humiliation - usually getting stuck or breaking something. This even allows for more dull fat jokes; Martin blithely notes: "It took three Cranes to lift you." Hilarious.

Niles tries to help Daphne by getting her an exercise machine and leaner food. After a while, she is caught hiding donuts and chocolate bars all around the house. On the one hand, I don't think it would have made sense for her to suddenly stop overeating cold turkey. On the other hand, I found the hidden snacks to be an annoyingly stereotypical fatty joke (OMG donuts!). This is, again, keeping with the tradition of fat hate in comics and sitcoms: fatty has no willpower, so others need to make her diet, and she will continue to fight against it in secret. When she's caught, Daphne breaks down, cries and admits that she has a problem. The reaction from both Niles and Frasier is sympathetic:

  Niles: Come here, come here, it's all right my love.  We're going
to get you through this.
Frasier: Of course we will, Daph.  You know, there are professionals
who can help.
Martin: Yeah, they can wire your jaw shut, staple your stomach, put
a balloon in your gut...
Frasier: Thank you Dad!  I was referring to something more like a spa,
all right?  Although you might look into that jaw thing!

This time, Martin is confronted by Frasier (an element of hypocrisy on his part, since he did laugh at Daphne behind her back). I liked how Martin's extreme suggestions aren't treated as valid options. However, the fat jokes in the previous episodes sort of ruin the sympathetic attitude here. The only one who gets a pass from me is Niles, who has been nothing but caring to Daphne throughout. What I missed in this scene was the possibility that Daphne might not have to lose weight after all. If there's an eating problem, it can be helped without a weight loss goal, right? It bugs me that the writers didn't even see this as an option. If you've gained weight, you must lose it.

Upon Daphne's arrival, the others throw her a surprise welcome party. Her therapist has told her that Niles was looking at her through "love goggles" and not even noticing the weight gain. In fact, the therapist believes Daphne ate because she wanted to rebel against the idealized picture Niles has of her. Niles is hurt by this, which leads to the couple's first fight. Frasier tries to talk it over with Niles and says: "The woman gained sixty pounds, and everyone in the world saw it but you. All you ever saw was a perfect woman in a red dress." It may be true, but I don't like his vaguely despising tone here - "the woman"? - and the idea that everyone saw it. Well, I guess I don't mind that everyone saw it, but rather that everyone was staring and commenting at it behind her back. It still seems like Frasier thinks that's perfectly OK.

In the end, Daphne and Niles accept each other's flaws and make up. The weight gain/loss is used as a transition in their relationship.

David Hyde Pierce, who plays Niles, says in an interview:

“It was very important that the issue wasn’t her being overweight, since weight gain or loss is a very sensitive issue and not to be treated lightly, especially when so many people in Hollywood are really thin.”

It's a bit puzzling that they obviously gave this some thought and yet managed to make the plot pretty offensive. Yes, it's a sensitive issue - which is why you might want to not make fat jokes when you have a storyline like this. Also, it seems to me like her weight was the issue - why else go to a weight loss spa instead of seeing an eating disorders specialist or something? I seem to remember an older interview that I can no longer find, where Pierce mentioned that fans found it sweet that Niles loves Daphne and doesn't really even notice her weight gain. It says a lot about the audience's expectations, but I could almost agree that it is sweet - if it weren't for the "Niles is oblivious to Daphne's flaws" and "Daphne's trying to make herself unattractive" aspects. It's not completely unfeasible that she would do this, and it at least elevates the plot beyond "fatties love eating". But I was hoping that Niles' non-reaction could have been caused by something more positive - genuine love, seeing fat as attractive, or just not caring about weight.

So what does this storyline change? Nothing. No one learns anything. Daphne and Niles have to face each other's flaws, which they would have done eventually anyway. Martin wasn't confronted about his attitude. Daphne returns to status quo. Everyone's views on fat were validated through Daphne's crash diet, and that's it. Most sitcoms are known for their shallow treatment of deeper issues, but I think Frasier could have done better. I wouldn't say this about a show I have less respect for, but I really think this storyline was a disgrace.

Weight Issues in "The King of Queens"

2008-09-22T08:18:00.000-07:00

The King of Queens was a sitcom about Doug and Carrie Heffernan, an ordinary couple with a less-than-glamorous life. Doug (Kevin James) is fat, while Carrie (Leah Remini) is thin. The weight wasn't the main point of the show, but it was often played for laughs, and it was dealt with in some episodes.

Lots of people consider this show to be fat positive, mainly for the following reasons:
a) Doug is the protagonist, the loveable everyman character;
and
b) he has a hot wife.

I think both points are somewhat problematic. Yes, Doug is a loveable character, but he's a loveable loser, an everyman slob with no education, a low-income job and (sometimes) poor manners. This is how fat men are often depicted on TV. The fact that he's a protagonist is not fat positive per se, because fat men aren't as big a taboo on TV as fat women. Lots of shows depict fat men as the everyman archetype - famous examples include Homer Simpson and Peter Griffin on Family Guy. Are we supposed to identify with them? Often, yes. Are we supposed to see them as ideals or acceptable models for behavior? Mostly not. While Doug isn't as dumb as Homer or as obnoxious as Peter, he's frequently depicted as selfish, careless and sexist.

Also, just like Homer Simpson, he's shown eating all the time. I definitely think his weight is supposed to be one of his loveable flaws. "Fat is a loveable flaw", while more positive than "fat kills" or "fat means you're a bad person", is still not very positive. There's still the "flaw" part. Even if eating lots of fatty meat (among other things) is more socially acceptable for a man than for a woman, it's still viewed as greed by many people, and the show definitely doesn't do much to dispel that idea. For example, in an episode, Doug is unwilling to share his chocolate bar. Then there's the fact that Doug is often shown dieting, and at one point, the actor lost some weight and they wrote that into the show as an obvious source of pride. Doug was even admired by ladies more after his diet. The initiator of Doug's diets is almost always his "hot" wife Carrie. This is par for the course in sitcom land: fat people don't go on diets, they are put on diets by doctors or loved ones.

In an episode, Carrie puts Doug on a diet, and Doug finds she nags less about it if he gets her drunk. So he starts getting her drunk every night (yeah, it's a sitcom). When Carrie finds out he's been doing this, she gets furious. He says he loves her the way she is, only more when she's drunk. Hurt, Carrie says, "I love you the way you are, too. Fat, really fat, five pounds lighter but still too fat..." This doesn't sound particularly caring, and even if it's said in anger with the obvious intent of hurting him, it shows an underlying negative attitude about his weight. Doug tells her it hurts that she wants him to diet. Carrie says she does it because she wants him to live to be 40. Doug says, in an inflated voice, "Well it still hurts!" The audience laughs.

We're supposed to think that it's just love, taking care of him, but you know what? It often does hurt. She doesn't win the argument with the "fat people die young" cliché, because it's extremely rare for anyone to die before 40 simply because they're fat. While Doug is big, he's not big enough to be unable to function, and he doesn't seem to have any health problems. And then there's her previous comment about how fat he is, which might not invalidate the caring part, but makes me ask whether caring is the only reason she makes him diet. What's even more revealing is that in another episode, Carrie encourages Doug to work out harder after looking at a photo of him as a young athlete.

In a later episode, Carrie tells Doug he has a food addiction and takes him into counseling. This is an example of what I'd call caring. I'm not sure what to think of the implication that Doug's an emotional eater, however. This show likes to keep its themes light, and no real explanation is given for Doug's eating. He does get it "in control" for a while and loses some weight, but it seems like they dropped the ball on that storyline later on. It's not necessarily a bad development that he eats somewhat healthier, but I think the writers should have made up their minds. Either he's an emotional eater who needs to get it in control before he dies young, or he's just a happy-go-lucky guy who loves eating and should stay the way he is. I feel like the writers used whichever worked for the episode (true of many things on this show), and it leads to a pretty ambivalent threatment of the character's food issues.

The portrayal of Carrie also annoys me. I have noticed a tendency in sitcoms to make the wife the "conscience" or the reasonable person, while the husband is the man-child who wants to be free - eat whatever he wants, drink beer, watch TV, be a slob and what have you. I'm not really sure which is the positive portrayal, as viewers tend to identify with the man-child more than the wife. There also seems to be a tendency to begin the show with more equal roles and end it with the wife as the dull yet reasonable one who's always making remarks about the husband's lifestyle. While Carrie isn't as nagging as, say, Debra on Everybody Loves Raymond, she often seems nagging and despising of Doug's weight and eating in particular.

Then there's the "hot wife" aspect. There are many problems with this. Are fat women the consolation prize? If Doug had a not-so-hot wife, would he be "settling" because he can't have anyone "better"? Is a show with a fat husband and fat wife - Roseanne or... are there any others? - less empowering for fat people than a show like this? Why are there fewer stories where the woman is fat and the man is thin? The wife in any given TV show or movie will be younger, thinner, more trendy and more looks-conscious than her husband.

There are those who complain about the "unrealistic" portrayal of fat man/hot wife. "Why would she ever want to be with a slob like Doug?" I don't know where these people live, but I've seen lots of couples like this - and even (gasp!) fat woman and slim man couples - in real life. These comments make me wonder if it isn't a fat positive portrayal after all (a hot woman can love a fat man). But given the sexism of "Carrie's body=Doug's manhood", as well as the aspect of Carrie constantly wanting Doug to be thinner (which might imply that Carrie is "settling"), I can't really give it a pass.

What's worse, Doug's worth as a man seems to be constructed through Carrie's hotness. When he goes to a class reunion, he wants to show her off as his only achievement. Interestingly, Doug first tries to lose weight, but failing at that, he knows Carrie will be his trump card and people will still consider him something of a success. Doug's body is seen as a kind of failure, while Carrie's body is a cause of pride, not only for herself, but also for Doug.

There was an unexpected change in the fat husband/hot wife dynamic when Leah Remini got pregnant. For some reason, the writers didn't want Carrie to be pregnant, so they went with the old hiding trick of sitcoms. Carrie suddenly took to wearing surprisingly loose garments. Viewers complained, as usual, about the obvious baby pouch. This has never been a very good way of hiding an actor's pregnancy. However, something unexpected happened: Remini kept a lot of weight on after she gave birth. Now Carrie was permanently chubbier for no reason. The writers decided it was time to address this.

Doug tells Carrie that he thinks she's getting chubby. As Carrie points out, Doug has been fat throughout their marriage, but Doug thinks there's a difference: he was always fat, while Carrie's weight has changed. Her reaction to this is getting a personal trainer for them both. But alas, Doug cheats on his lessons, because it's Carrie who has to lose weight and not him. I haven't seen this episode, so I'm not sure how the conflict is resolved when Carrie eventually finds out. But it bugs, a lot.

Doug might as well say what he's thinking: it's ok for the man to be fat, even gain a lot of weight, but not for the woman. "Let's both diet" is not necessarily the compromise it sounds like. I'll admit that Carrie pressurizing Doug to go on a diet isn't very positive either, and some might see this as a "tables have turned" moment. Interestingly, both seem to see the other's body as shared property and lay some claim on its shape and size. However, this episode shows that Carrie sees her body as Doug's property to some extent, while Doug doesn't see his body as Carrie's property.

My watching of the show was sporadic, so I'm sure these are only some of the examples of the disturbingly ambivalent weight issues on the show. If you know of more, feel free to analyze them in the comments.