"It's ok to screw up your health - so long as you don't look fat..."

I’ve just read a wicked post on Definatalie’s website on how she defines “fat acceptance” and what it means to her. I just love it when other people echo your thoughts and feelings on a subject in a coherent and compelling way when you’re struggling to pin down what exactly the issues are. Nice one, Natalie!

Casual size-ism is rife in every aspect of life and I’m so deeply bored of it and trying to educate or challenge ignorant minds. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve tried to have a meaningful conversation with a smoking/drinking pal in the pub who rants about how “obesity costs the NHS millions and millions of pounds”. At this point, I usually try to explain that smoking and drinking related health problems have more of an impact on the NHS but they refuse to accept this and start moralizing about how “disgusting” or “lazy” fat people are. When people start preaching about issues from a moral standpoint – i.e. eating chocolate is “bad” or “wrong” - it’s generally a cue for me to stop trying to engage.

As Natalie so eloquently states, “…one must understand that human beings have different body shapes, racial backgrounds, medical conditions, and socio-economic circumstances (amongst other things) and fat is not just a result of eating too much or exercising too little.” She also rightly notes that “It is assumed automatically that thin = healthy, and I bet when you actually think about that assumption… it starts to unravel. Do you know thin people who don’t exercise and eat poorly? I do. But those people are not told by their doctors that they need to lose weight, because they might not have any visible markers of fatness (read: poor health). And that’s how fat is pathologized and that’s why this kind of assumption works against everyone, because even thin people aren’t getting the health care they need when their health workers are relying on fat as a measure of health.”

Surely anyone with an aeon of brain power knows all this stuff, right? That ‘thin’ does not necessarily equate to ‘health’ and that there are myriad reasons why some people are bigger than others? Why then, do people insist on clinging to offensive, judgemental and downright incorrect body fascism? A few suggestions:

- we’re utterly indoctrinated by media telling us that the desirable body shape is slim and white, and that anything falling outside of this category FAILS. Even if you’ve been suckered in to this, it by no means justifies regurgitating this nonsense by adopting hateful language

- people are insecure and feel it necessary to pass judgement on other people’s weight to make themselves feel better. Yep; loads of people do this in different ways but dissing someone based on their weight just sets off a red alert in my mind that the person saying it is a class A muppet and should be avoided at all costs

Tsk. I also want to know what the PC word is (if it even exists) for bigger people? If I was asked to describe someone who fell out of the minuscule window of size acceptability, I’d probably use the word “big”, e.g. “she’s a bigger lass, with dark hair, etc.”. How do the aforementioned folk feel about this? I see lots of “fat positive” terminology but this tends to be used by bigger people who (I’m assuming) have reclaimed the word “fat”. I’m not sure if I get to reclaim it as I’m not that big and it could be interpreted as prejudiced coming from my mush. Thoughts?

Thanks to Kathrynoh whose comments on Natalie’s post inspired the title for this post; absolutely on the money.

"Harry, I have no idea where this will lead us, but I have a definite feeling it will be a place both wonderful and strange..."

This bleak and light and rainy and weird weather we've been having of late really evokes Lynchian thoughts and feelings... I'm an enormous fan of David Lynch - Wild at Heart is one of my favourite films of all time - and a variety of factors have got me thinking about his genius recently. I watched the entire series of Twin Peaks earlier in the year and it was absolutely epic... the cinematography, performances, soundtrack, semiotics, location... it really couldn't have been more perfect. It also successfully scared the hell out of me; Lynch really creates exquisite horror.

I "happened" upon the Wikipedia entry for Twin Peaks whilst looking at prices for box-sets (horror and darkness seems an ideal wedding gift, non?) and discovered the location of the waterfalls in the opening credits: Snoqualmie Falls are located between Snoqualmie and Fall City in Washington, USA. They're absolutely gorgeous and whilst looking at the pics, I found this glorious shot:

How wonderful is this? It's so wonderfully sinister and the men in their late 19th century garb are priceless. I want it blown up and framed on my bedroom wall.

We interrupt this broadcast to say...

HOT

(Shameless sleaze on JD Samson)