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Anxious times.
  1. "Not only did the male pretend jurors prove “significantly more likely” to find the obese female defendants—rather than the slim ones—guilty, but the trim male participants were worst of all, frequently labeling the fat women “repeat offenders” with “awareness” of their crimes. And because the effect disappeared when the photographs depicted a man, the hypothesis that subjects were simply layering class-based assumptions—such as “poor people are more often overweight” and “poor people commit more crime”—on top of one another falls a bit short."
    Male Jurors More Likely To Find Fat Women Guilty, According to Depressing Study
  2. thenthwave: Oh, New York Times. Are you for real with this bullshit? NYT put together a slideshow of actresses who are ~*plump and proud*~, including Mindy Kaling, Lina Dunham, and Lady Gaga (yes, that Lady Gaga), all of which, you will notice, aren’t fat (or even “plump”). In fact, they have body types that are perfectly accepted by society. I don’t know their personal struggles, but I think it’s safe to bet that their thin privilege overfloweth. What about the other women included? Says the NYT about Retta, who plays Donna on “Parks and Recreation”: Overweight women are no longer being cast solely as the fat friend. Donna on “Parks and Recreation,” who is played by the actress and comedian Retta, “has an active love life and a naughty streak,” Ms. Stanley writes. That “active love life and a naughty streak” mentioned above is a reoccurring joke on Parks and Rec. Let me emphasize that last point: the concept that this character could be romantically or sexually involved with people is considered by viewers and writers to be a joke. That is not an achievement by any stretch of the imagination. And Rebel Wilson? NYT says: Rebel Wilson, an Australian actress and comedy writer, […] plays “the plus-size bride who gets a dashing, adoring groom in ‘Bachelorette.’ ” ‘The Bachelorette’, just so we’re all on the same page here, is at its core, one entire fat joke: how could a fat girl get a traditionally handsome man to marry her? LOL RIGHT? An entire movie based around a fat joke (with hundreds of additional fat jokes thrown in for good measure) is ACTUALLY not an achievement for anybody! Additionally, the inclusion of the above two actresses and the rolls they play reinforces the idea that it’s totally okay to be fat, but, you know, only if you are funny. The idea that a fat woman must be funny in order to be worthy in Hollywood isn’t doing any women any favors anywhere. When we have TV shows and movies where the lead is a fat woman and her weight is never, ever mentioned (ever!!), where she is portrayed as a human who is valuable with other qualities besides being funny, just as thin women are every damn day, then we will have achieved something. Until then, no, I will not accept this terrible, insulting, first-wave excuse for body positivity. NYT can take it and get bent.

    thenthwave:

    Oh, New York Times. Are you for real with this bullshit?

    NYT put together a slideshow of actresses who are ~*plump and proud*~, including Mindy Kaling, Lina Dunham, and Lady Gaga (yes, that Lady Gaga), all of which, you will notice, aren’t fat (or even “plump”). In fact, they have body types that are perfectly accepted by society. I don’t know their personal struggles, but I think it’s safe to bet that their thin privilege overfloweth.

    What about the other women included?

    Says the NYT about Retta, who plays Donna on “Parks and Recreation”:

    Overweight women are no longer being cast solely as the fat friend. Donna on “Parks and Recreation,” who is played by the actress and comedian Retta, “has an active love life and a naughty streak,” Ms. Stanley writes.

    That “active love life and a naughty streak” mentioned above is a reoccurring joke on Parks and Rec. Let me emphasize that last point: the concept that this character could be romantically or sexually involved with people is considered by viewers and writers to be a joke. That is not an achievement by any stretch of the imagination.

    And Rebel Wilson? NYT says:

    Rebel Wilson, an Australian actress and comedy writer, […] plays “the plus-size bride who gets a dashing, adoring groom in ‘Bachelorette.’ ”

    ‘The Bachelorette’, just so we’re all on the same page here, is at its core, one entire fat joke: how could a fat girl get a traditionally handsome man to marry her? LOL RIGHT? An entire movie based around a fat joke (with hundreds of additional fat jokes thrown in for good measure) is ACTUALLY not an achievement for anybody!

    Additionally, the inclusion of the above two actresses and the rolls they play reinforces the idea that it’s totally okay to be fat, but, you know, only if you are funny. The idea that a fat woman must be funny in order to be worthy in Hollywood isn’t doing any women any favors anywhere.

    When we have TV shows and movies where the lead is a fat woman and her weight is never, ever mentioned (ever!!), where she is portrayed as a human who is valuable with other qualities besides being funny, just as thin women are every damn day, then we will have achieved something.

    Until then, no, I will not accept this terrible, insulting, first-wave excuse for body positivity. NYT can take it and get bent.

  3. »  21 Things to Stop Saying Unless You Hate Fat People

  4. "The reality is that fat people are often supported in hating their bodies, in starving themselves, in engaging in unsafe exercise, and in seeking out weight loss by any means necessary. A thin person who does these things is considered mentally ill. A fat person who does these things is redeemed by them. This is why our culture has no concept of a fat person who also has an eating disorder. If you’re fat, it’s not an eating disorder — it’s a lifestyle change."
    Lesley Kinzel (via simmerdown)

  5. »  An Open Letter To The Fat Girl - By Winona Dimeo-Ediger

    Dear Fat Girl,

    Last week, I saw an overweight news anchor respond to a bully with such power and confidence that it made me cry. It also made me want to write about my own experience of being a fat girl. I almost wrote this letter to my younger self: a deeply sad, chubby fourth grader who endured horrific taunts from classmates at recess, and even worse abuse in her own head when she’d go home and look in the mirror. But then I realized that there is something about these two little words, “fat” and “girl,” that denotes a shared life experience. If you’ve ever been a fat girl, you know what it’s like to have a body that feels like an enemy, to suppress your own voice because you think it doesn’t count, to be informed with a sigh that you have “such a pretty face,” as if it’s a bit of a tragedy. Here are some things I wish someone would have told me, back when I felt so hopeless.

    You don’t have to be funny. You can be funny, and you might find that cracking jokes helps ease and express the pain you keep inside, but don’t feel that your role in the world is limited to the goofy sidekick. The media will show you that this is the only way a fat girl is allowed to be, but trust me: your personality and your relationships are much deeper and more complex than that.

    You don’t have to cover up your body. No clothing should be off limits to you simply because your body is a different shape than the women who wear them in the magazines. Fashion can be a fun and powerful way to express yourself, so experiment with colors and fabrics and styles and find out what makes you feel beautiful. Wear whatever you want. Don’t apologize.

    On the other side of the equation, you don’t have to strip down to make a statement. I felt guilty for years because I was too shy to wear a bikini.Showing off my round belly at the beach would be so brave, I thought. I could really start a body revolution if I did that! Then one day I realized that I’m naturally a pretty modest person. Forget the stretch marks on my stomach — I’m not sure I would ever feel comfortable in a bikini. And you know what? That’s OK. Fat or thin, your body is yours, and you get to do exactly what you want with it.

    Remember that the word “fat” is not, by definition, synonymous with worthlessness, laziness, weakness or lack of intelligence. As an adjective it simply means “having excess flesh.” If you can get to a place where the word doesn’t feel so loaded, that’s good. It will make you less afraid of it, and help you realize that you can simultaneously be fat and smart, driven, beautiful, energetic, confident and unique.

    If you can’t unload the word “fat,” that’s OK too. I’m 27, and if someone called me fat today, I would probably cry. But then I’d think about the kind of small-minded person who is threatened by a woman taking up a few extra inches of space in the world, and another one-syllable adjective would come to mind: sad.

    Resist the temptation to separate your head from your body. Not literally, but in the way you conceptualize the two. It’s surprisingly easy to start viewing your body as a separate entity from yourself, a distant enemy you are always scheming to diminish or destroy. People will help you by saying things like “You have such a pretty face.” Celebrities will help you by losing weight and telling magazines “I got my body back!” as if their slightly larger body was actually possessed by an alien they valiantly defeated. The reality is your body and your mind and your spirit are so interconnected that you can’t really ever separate them, and in the process of trying, you risk losing yourself.

    Don’t demonize or idolize the skinny girls. For years I literally thought my life would be completely perfect if I could take a pair of scissors and trim 20 pounds off my midsection, like a butcher cuts the fat off a roast. Then one night at a party in high school I found a skinny friend of mine crying because a boy had called her a cinnamon stick. My heart broke for her, and I realized that our society’s toxic relationship with weight hurts all women. The only way we can deal with it — and ultimately change it — is by sticking together.

    Don’t think that being fat means you deserve less of anything. For years, I believed that carrying around a few extra pounds meant I wasn’t entitled to fulfilling friendships, romantic love, emotional complexities, or even my own opinion. As a fat girl, I thought I had to settle. I kept my cruelest tormentor as one of my closest friends. I didn’t speak up when I knew the answer in class. I didn’t ask for what I wanted in any area of my life. What a waste.

    Don’t wait to start your life until you get skinny. Someday you’ll look back on those excuses, whether you’re skinny or not, and realize it wasn’t your weight that held you back, it was cowardice. It makes just as much sense to say, “I’ll apply for my dream job when I lose 10 pounds” as it does to say, “I’ll apply for my dream job when I grow three inches taller.” Stop hiding behind your body. Figure out what you want, and go get it.

    Think about the fact that one of the worst things you can be in our society is a fat girl. Think about why people are so insistent that women only take up a very small amount of space. Think about who is making these rules. Think about why we try so hard to follow them. Think about how different the world would be if we took all the energy we expend hating our bodies and trying to shrink ourselves down to an arbitrary size, and just lived the life we wanted to live. Just think about it.

    Love,

    Winona

  6. »  It Happened to Me: I Compulsively Buy Clothes That Don't Fit Me - By Anonymous

    Like countless others, I enjoy shopping online. Like, I REALLY enjoy it. If you walked into my closet, I could show you my carefully curated rack of new clothing. The quantity doesn’t seem that excessive at first, but then I pull out my bins, each one filled to the top with brand new, tagged clothing. Then you begin to see inklings of a problem.

    But that’s not the worst part. I wear a size 20, and most of the clothing is marked size 8 or 10. 

    For the last year or so, I’ve been compulsively buying up clothing from some of my favorite etailers — Yoox, Free People, Anthropologie, Zara, etc. Beautiful, gorgeous clothing, none of which is even remotely close to my actual dress size.

    closet

    I’m still trying to figure out how this began, and what triggered this compulsive behavior. What I do know is that last year I was reeling from health issues, increased stress at my old job, as well as the sudden illness and death of one of my parents. I was absolutely miserable, and nothing I did seemed to lift my spirits. 

    That is, until the day I discovered Free People’s website. It started with a skirt. The most beautiful boho, pink ruffled skirt I had ever seen. “It doesn’t fit me now, but once I lose weight it will” was my justification. Sure, as if dropping 100 pounds would be a walk in the park. However, I was able to sell myself on this pipe dream, and ordered the skirt.

    Soon after the skirt arrived, I bought one of my dream dresses on eBay, a printed See by Chloe dress. I had to have it — so what if it was a size 8? I’d wear it someday, when I lost weight. Next came the dreamy Rick Owens distressed skinny pants. And so began my daily routine spending hours surfing clothing websites and spending way too much money on clothes that didn’t fit me.

    Rick Owens Pants

    Fantasy vs. Reality

    The saddest part is that my everyday wardrobe is shoddy and old. I rarely buy any clothing that actually fits me. My illogical thought process is “Why bother spending on clothing that fits me now if I’m going to lose weight?” Over the last year, because of the lure of the pretty clothes in my closet, I made some weak attempts to lose weight, but nothing stuck. I’d lose 5 or 10 pounds, and then gain 15. I really do want to wear this stuff — it’s my dream wardrobe, and often I use it as a motivator. I want to be that person so bad. But mostly, I just sit in my closet and look forlornly at all the things I can’t wear.

    Even though there are many fashionable plus-size clothing options, I’ve resigned myself to the same dowdy mom jeans and sad tunics. My self-esteem is at zero. If you saw me on the street, you’d never think I had anything fierce or fashionable in my closet. 

    shoeboxes

    I also have a shoe problem.

    I’ve been overweight most of my life, with the exception of a few years in my 20’s when I developed an eating disorder and lost a ton of weight. It was the worst of times, and the best. I went from being a shy, frumpy girl, to moving to a big city, falling in with an artsy party crowd, getting lots of attention, and finally feeling attractive. The ironic thing is, back then I didn’t have a lot of money, so while I finally had the body of my dreams, I could never afford new clothes, and always bought thrift. Still, I managed to make it work and felt beautiful.

    However, my weight loss occurred only because of my bulimic habits, and once I realized the harm I was doing to myself and cut it out, I started gaining back the weight, in spades. As the pounds came back on, my self-esteem went right out the door. I stopped going out and retreated back into myself.

    I still reminisce about and even idealize that time of my life, and I think that’s part of the reason why I went crazy buying too-small clothing. The idea was that when I lost weight, I would be beautiful again, and this time I’d have a kickass wardrobe. I was trying to recapture a bygone era of my life, which is both illusory and futile.

    fierce wardrobe

    Nowadays, I have finally (mostly) put myself in check. I have cut down on clothing purchases, and really agonize over any decision that involves parting with my money for clothes that do not currently fit me. I have also started selling some of the clothes on eBay to recoup my losses. However, I’ll never make back all of the money I spent. It’s been a very expensive mistake.

    Chloe Dress

    My Dream Dress

    I do feel empowered by my growing ability to shut down my compulsion. I’ve joined a gym and I am making an honest effort at getting in better shape. I still hang on to the hope of rocking my Chloe dress someday. It’s just a shame that I won’t let myself feel beautiful and free at my current size, instead of pining for an abstraction of who I think I should be.

  7. emphasize:

    captainporkerella:

    and i will post and re-post this til the end of fucking time.

    amazing doc by my friend Margaret and some other folks about fatness.

    yup yup.

    This brings up a lot of emotions for me.

  9. »  IN THE FAT VS. SKINNY SMACKDOWN, EVERYBODY LOSES - By Somer Sherwood

    Are skinny girls bitches? It turns out that some people would answer this with a “yes.”

    Recently, Glamour magazine did a study on how fat and skinny women are perceived in terms of personality traits. What it found was that skinny women are more often thought of as mean, controlling and superficial, while fat women are seen as lazy, sloppy and slow.

    Who’s doing all this judging? It seems like you and I are. From the Glamour article:

    Perhaps most striking, women of all weights hold these stereotypes: Plus-size respondents judged other plus-size women as ‘sloppy,’ and skinny types pegged their thin peers as ‘mean.’

    Woah. So it seems that even those of us who are victims of these thought systems are actually sometimes the very perpetrators of such body stereotyping. The only explananation I think if for this is that these perceptions have been so ingrained in us that we can’t help but think this way. Depressing.

    But it doesn’t have to stop at making internal judgments about each others’ bodies. Thanks to the iIternet, our opinions about other people and their bodies can be broadcast to millions, of course.

    Over the last week or so, one thinspo blog has gotten a lot of traffic over a post on the body of model Kate Upton. I’m not going to link to it here, because I think Emily and I both agree that this blog has probably gotten enough traffic already, but if you are unfamiliar with it, you can take a look at this Jezebel piece on the situation.

    (Of course, it would be easy enough to stop right here and pit fat against skinny and let us just sling insults at each other via anonymous Internet comments, but let’s look a little deeper. I know all of you xoJane readers are up for it; you were born ready, right?)

    Basically, this blogger used an assortment of unflattering adjectives to describe Kate Upton and made assumptions about her lifestyle based on her weight. The one that jumped out at me the most, however, was the claim that the size of Kate Upton’s body was over-the-top-sexual, “almost pornographic.” 

    While I don’t necessarily see “pornographic” as a negative thing, I was confused about this assessment. But it did make me think about how fashion models are generally very thin, while models such as Kate Upton, who appear  in Maxim or Sports Illustrated, are “allowed” to be a little bit heavier. Is this because heavier = sexier? Is Kate Upton’s body just downright pornographic, by virtue of its size and shape?

    Maybe the key here is the perception (thanks, Glamour survey!) that thin women are more in control, which could also mean “less sexy.” And that heavier women are perceived as being less in control, and that translates to S-E-X. So, a skinny woman walking down the runway in a string bikini is Fashion, and a heavier woman wearing the same is Almost Porn. 

    And maybe you’re thinking, “Great! Fat is sexy! ‘Real women have curves!’Hurrah!” But that’s no good, either. This is a knife that cuts both ways. 

    One issue the Glamour article points out is that even “good” labels can be harmful, not only because we are assuming personality traits based on physical appearance, but also because by assigning a favorable trait to one body type, we assume that the opposite must be true of the opposite body type. 

    So, for example, if heavier women are considered “sexy,” then thinner women are viewed as “unsexy” by default. If heavy women are considered “empathetic,” then skinny women must be cold and unfeeling. By labeling thin women as “ambitious,” we are indirectly labeling fat women as “lazy.” And so on.

    And now my head just exploded, because no one wins. There is no body that is immune to criticism. Sometimes it feels as if all of us are judged and judging, even though that may not be the case. These are the times I refer to the infinite wisdom of Mr. Rogers: “Everybody’s fancy. Everybody’s fine. Your body’s fancy and so is mine.” 

    I would like bodies to just be bodies. They are vessels in which our souls (or robot innards, depending on your particular beliefs or non-beliefs) reside. We eat, poop and cry with them, though perhaps not all three at the same exact time. We make babies with them, or we don’t. We have sex with them, we adorn them with impulsive midnight Etsy purchases, maybe we take them out for a run on occasion, or we remove our bras in public.

    Sometimes they are sexy and “almost pornographic,” and sometimes they are just there to carry us along through the day so that we can go home and catch up on our TV watching. Bodies. We have them. 

  10. »  The Strongest Woman In America Lives In Poverty

    Sarah Robles at the Olympic trials. Photo courtesy of Robles.

    Posted about 4 days ago

    Weightlifter Sarah Robles is an incredible athlete, but outside the world of squats and snatches, barely anyone knows her name. And even though she’s the U.S.’s best chance at an Olympic medal, she’ll never get the fame or fortune that come so easily to her fellow athletes — in part because, at 5 feet, 10.5 inches and 275 pounds, she doesn’t fit the ideal of thin, toned athletic beauty.

    “You can get that sponsorship if you’re a super-built guy or a girl who looks good in a bikini. But not if you’re a girl who’s built like a guy,” she says. The 23-year-old from California became the highest ranked weightlifter in the country last year after placing 11th at the world championships, beating out every male and female American on the roster. On her best day, she can lift more than 568 pounds — that’s roughly five IKEA couches, 65 gallons of milk, or one large adult male lion.

    But that doesn’t mean much when it comes to signing the endorsement deals that could pay the bills. Track star Lolo Jones, 29, soccer player Alex Morgan, 22, and swimmer Natalie Coughlin, 29, are natural television stars with camera-friendly good looks and slim, muscular figures. But women weightlifters aren’t go-tos when Sports Illustrated is looking for athletes to model body paint in the swimsuit issue. They don’t collaborate with Cole Haan on accessories lines and sit next to Anna Wintour at Fashion Week, like tennis beauty Maria Sharapova. And male weightlifters often get their sponsorships from supplements or diet pills, because their buff, ripped bodies align with male beauty ideals. Men on diet pills want to look like weightlifters — most women would rather not.

    Courtesy Sarah Robles.

    Meanwhile, Robles — whose rigorous training schedule leaves her little time for outside work — struggles to pay for food. It would be hard enough for the average person to live off the $400 a month she receives from U.S.A. Weightlifting, but it’s especially difficult for someone who consumes 3,000 to 4,000 calories a day, a goal she meets through several daily servings of grains, meats and vegetables, along with weekly pizza nights.

    She also gets discounted groceries from food banks and donations from her coach, family and friends — or, as Robles says, “prayers and pity.” Robles could save cash by moving into the free dormitories at U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado, but she refuses to leave her coach, Joe Micela, who’s become a father figure to her: Her own father died of a blood vessel disease when she was 17.

    Robles grew up in Desert Hot Springs and San Jacinto, Calif., where she became a top-ranked shot putter who earned scholarships to University of Alabama and later Arizona State University. She was self-conscious about her body from a young age, until middle school, when she first got into sports and discovered she could use her large frame to her advantage.

    “When she got into sports, she came home one day and she said, ‘I finally feel accepted.’ That’s when she just kind of settled into herself,” her mom Joy Robles says.

    Coach Micela began working with Robles in 2008, when she was attending Arizona State and began lifting weights to improve her shot-put throw. Within just three months of training with Micela, Robles had qualified for weightlifting nationals and decided to forfeit her scholarship. She began competing across the country and the world — beating every other American at the world championships last year. Then, in March, Robles and fellow super heavyweight competitor Holley Mangold qualified for the U.S. Olympics team. (Robles beat Mangold by four kilograms.)

    Because of her financial troubles, Micela donates much of his time and pays to travel with Robles to competitions. Most Olympians make money through their governing bodies, as well as sponsorships, endorsements, speaking engagements, and the like. These endorsements can be worth six figures or more — like Michael Phelps’ $1 million deal to be a spokesman for Mazda in China — or they can compensate athletes with free equipment or products. PowerBar is Robles’ only product sponsorship and her name isn’t yet big enough to land her any big special appearances. 

    “It’s simple,” Robles says. “If a company wants to advertise their brand, there’s no benefit in sponsoring you if you’re not getting any exposure.”

    Robles competing at the world championships last year. Courtesy of Robles.

    As an Olympian, Robles doesn’t have to pay for her own travel, lodging and food in London. Neither does her mother, Joy, who won a special grant for Olympic parents from Procter & Gamble.

    “I really didn’t think I had a chance in hell of going,” says Joy, who has only been able to afford to see her daughter lift competitively three times. “We’re so used to not good stuff happening, so this is just kind of mind-boggling.”

    Since the Olympics began hosting women’s weightlifting in 2000, only two American women have ever earned medals, both at the inaugural Sydney games: Tara Nott, who won gold in the flyweight category, and Cheryl Haworth, who earned bronze in super heavyweight, Robles’ category. If she does medal, Robles says her chances of landing more sponsorships won’t dramatically increase — after all, they didn’t increase much for Cheryl Haworth after her win at age 17. Following Haworth’s second Olympics, she had to sell her house and move to the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs.

    “Being an Olympian isn’t always glamorous. We don’t get tons of dough. Maybe one or two percent of athletes can actually make a living off it,” says Haworth, 29, who retired two years ago and now works as an admissions officer for the Savannah College of Art and Design. “It’s a sacrifice that not everyone is willing to make. Not everybody is willing to scrounge or figure out how to pay those bills … Sarah’s ability to get through those tough times really sets her apart.”

    Courtesy of Valerie Dew Photography.

    Robles wants to teach P.E. when she retires from weightlifting — sometime in the next four to 10 years, she says. When she’s not training, she blogs, crafts and goes to church. She went on a few dates before the Olympic trials, but she’s shy, and it’s hard to find a guy who’s comfortable dating a woman who’s bigger, taller and completely committed to her training.

    “I still have bad thoughts about myself, but I’ve learned that you have to love yourself the way you are,” Robles says. “I may look like this, but I’m in the Olympics because of the way I am.”

    Robles has become a role model to the bigger girls who come work out in herMesa, Ariz., gym. She’s not entirely comfortable with the idea of being someone’s mentor, but she’s easing herself into the job. On her blog, she shares weightlifting tips and stories of being a plus-size athlete. She also has a Twitterand Facebook page, where she shares her mantra, “Beauty is strength,” with about 350 followers. It’s become her personal brand, and if she’s lucky, sponsors with a similar message will catch on.

    Still, Robles and Micela aren’t overly optimistic about her chances in London. Robles might be the best in the U.S., but the current women’s world record is about 150 pounds over her personal best.

    “If she beats her own record, I’ll be happy,” says Micela, whom Robles calls her “number one sponsor.”

    “I’ve learned that if you love yourself now, you can do amazing things. If you don’t, you’re closing so many doors,” Robles says. “It’s not an easy thing to do. It takes work and it takes practice. Just like my sport.”

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