This started as a Facebook post, but then I got ranty and it went long, and I thought, screw it, I have a blog, amirite?).
I don’t do the “fat activism” thing. I don’t do any activism thing. That’s because I’m deeply self-centered and really don’t give a crap about anything that doesn’t affect me, Dawn Taylor, Queen of the Universe. (See also: Gun control, polar bears, Somali orphans, clean water.) But sometimes something global is personal enough that I get all militant about it. And being fat is as personal as things get for me.
There’s a lot of nasty shit said on the Internet about fat people. This isn’t news. It’s so common, and so obnoxious and over-the-top, that it’s actually kind of easy to ignore. You see it, and think, “Oh, there’s another whack-job fat hater spewing toxic waste from his sad studio apartment full of out-dated Maxim magazines,” and move on. It’s like litter on the street, or the Kardashians. It’s ugly, but so common it’s just part of the landscape.
No, what’s gotten on my last nerve are the ostensibly non-hateful comments on the Internet about how sad it is that fat people are fat, and that you, the commenter, don’t HATE fat people, you just feel sorry for them, because obesity is an EPIDEMIC, and they’re making bad CHOICES, and it’s making EVERYONE’S HEALTH INSURANCE cost more (yes, that and people who don’t wear motorcycle helmets … that’s why insurance is fucked!) and it’s sad that they don’t care about their HEALTH, and that they can come up with all sorts of JUSTIFICATIONS (like, say, fat activism) for being gigantic blobs of useless flesh. So sad. So much deep feeling in your heart for these unfortunate losers.
Today, I snapped. Here is my response to reading the 15,000,000,000th comment in that vein:
Dear Caring Person Who Doesn’t Hate on Fatties, No, Really, You Don’t:
I’m never sure what to make of people who express pity for fat people. I mean, I’m fat. Okay. That’s a thing. It’s not like I’m unaware of it. But really, I’m not a pathetic creature that needs your pity. And I don’t need to justify or rationalize anything, because I’m not doing anything that I need to make excuses for. I live inside my body, and it’s a round one. Trust me … I’m not being fat at you, even if I’m sitting next to you on an airplane, or eating a sandwich in your line of sight. So I don’t need to rationalize. AND THAT’S BECAUSE, let me repeat myself, I’M NOT DOING ANYTHING WRONG BY WEIGHING MORE THAN YOU . [click to continue…]
comments: 5
Rant: Fat People Don’t Need Your Pity
by dawn on May 9, 2013
This started as a Facebook post, but then I got ranty and it went long, and I thought, screw it, I have a blog, amirite?).
I don’t do the “fat activism” thing. I don’t do any activism thing. That’s because I’m deeply self-centered and really don’t give a crap about anything that doesn’t affect me, Dawn Taylor, Queen of the Universe. (See also: Gun control, polar bears, Somali orphans, clean water.) But sometimes something global is personal enough that I get all militant about it. And being fat is as personal as things get for me.
There’s a lot of nasty shit said on the Internet about fat people. This isn’t news. It’s so common, and so obnoxious and over-the-top, that it’s actually kind of easy to ignore. You see it, and think, “Oh, there’s another whack-job fat hater spewing toxic waste from his sad studio apartment full of out-dated Maxim magazines,” and move on. It’s like litter on the street, or the Kardashians. It’s ugly, but so common it’s just part of the landscape.
No, what’s gotten on my last nerve are the ostensibly non-hateful comments on the Internet about how sad it is that fat people are fat, and that you, the commenter, don’t HATE fat people, you just feel sorry for them, because obesity is an EPIDEMIC, and they’re making bad CHOICES, and it’s making EVERYONE’S HEALTH INSURANCE cost more (yes, that and people who don’t wear motorcycle helmets … that’s why insurance is fucked!) and it’s sad that they don’t care about their HEALTH, and that they can come up with all sorts of JUSTIFICATIONS (like, say, fat activism) for being gigantic blobs of useless flesh. So sad. So much deep feeling in your heart for these unfortunate losers.
Today, I snapped. Here is my response to reading the 15,000,000,000th comment in that vein:
Dear Caring Person Who Doesn’t Hate on Fatties, No, Really, You Don’t:
I’m never sure what to make of people who express pity for fat people. I mean, I’m fat. Okay. That’s a thing. It’s not like I’m unaware of it. But really, I’m not a pathetic creature that needs your pity. And I don’t need to justify or rationalize anything, because I’m not doing anything that I need to make excuses for. I live inside my body, and it’s a round one. Trust me … I’m not being fat at you, even if I’m sitting next to you on an airplane, or eating a sandwich in your line of sight. So I don’t need to rationalize. AND THAT’S BECAUSE, let me repeat myself, I’M NOT DOING ANYTHING WRONG BY WEIGHING MORE THAN YOU . [click to continue…]
comments: 5