There’s nothing anticapitalist about celebrating overconsumption.
Im trying to follow their logic. I could see there being something to criticize in that healthier food is more expensive so poverty and obesity are often correlated. So putting all the emphasis on individual responsibility while giving systems that allow for people to not be able to afford to eat reasonably a pass could be seen as akin to telling individual consumers that the climate is changing cos they didn’t recycle enough last week when corporations are blasting poison into the air.
But.. I dont see how being critical of a capitalist system that neglects people into obesity through poverty would lead to celebrating said obesity. You could be critical of peoples lack of access to healthy food, good healthcare, or education about nutrition, and understand that obese folks arent all just tumblr HAES warriors eating all the cake, but still recognize that obesity is not a good thing. You could be critical of the aspects of our society that make it more difficult for some people to be healthy, but wouldn’t your goal be “let’s fix that so everyone can be healthier” instead of “fuck it, it’s not all my fault so it’s not at all my fault”?
Isnt that like saying, “it’s harder to get a post secondary education if you dont have lots of money” and instead of working to make school more affordable or removing barriers that keep some people from going, just being like “fuck education anyway. The word education is just a capitalist ploy. There are things that make it harder for some people than others so the whole endeavour is trash”
People always ask me why I wear sports clothes all the time, I just say because they’re ‘comfortable’. But the truth about the word ‘comfortable’ runs a lot deeper.
For example today I needed to go out to the shops, I felt like wearing a pair of jeans, you know something different for a change. I put a pair on and a cute top, I looked in the mirror and felt disgusted, I hated how my legs looked in the jeans, my huge thighs, my stomach bulging through, my flabby arms… everything just looked HUGE.
I tried on a different pair of jeans…. nope still the same, I felt nauseous and couldn’t even see my face properly in the mirror, everything looked weird and not real. I could only see the imperfections of my body. I grabbed at my thighs, my belly, my arms, hoping they could just shrink.
I tried on a different top but I could see my belly and arms and they were huge and disgusting.
I thought about what the people in the shops might say:
‘Eww why is she wearing that, she looks huge’
‘Those jeans are too small for her fat ass’
‘You can see her fat belly through that top’
‘That outfit doesn’t go’
‘Those jeans aren’t in fashion anymore’
‘Has she looked in a mirror recently’
The thoughts go on….
So I take the clothes off, give up on the idea of jeans and put my sports clothes back on. Feeling disappointed in my weight and frustrated with my size.
It’s not that I think sports clothes make me thinner it’s just a comfort I have become used to. I know exactly how I feel in sports clothes, I love comfy trainers and I can always count on my black leggings to make me feel a little more secure.
This isn’t to make people comment and make me feel better about myself (you won’t anyway) but just a little glimpse into me feeling ‘comfortable’ in sports clothes.
I have struggled with body image from a very young age, I know many others who have and still do. It’s horrible and debilitating. From the moment I wake up to the time I go to sleep I think about my weight and my body.
Today I am in my sports clothes but one day I might be able to wear jeans and not hate what I see in the mirror.
We’re starting our “metabolism” module at med school this week, and I’m dreading it with every fibre of my being. You see, I am going to be a doctor, and I am fat.
I’m not the type of fat you feel after you’ve had a big lunch, and your usually flat belly is protesting against the waistband of your jeans. I’m the real kind. My BMI hovers a couple of points below “morbidly obese”.
I worry a lot about what people will think of me as a fat doctor. For the smartarses among you, of course I’ve tried to be non-fat, it goes without saying. The thing is though, bodies don’t really like weighing less all of a sudden and are pretty good at reversing things in the long run. Mostly my body settles back to the same size 18 shape eventually.
I am always aware of my fatness, but perhaps more so here at medical school. We are training to work with bodies, and mine is a type of body we warn our patients not to have. It is the first thing described in every list of ‘modifiable risk factors’. A colleague suggests “just don’t let yourself get too fat” as we talk about preventing a certain type of cancer. A final exam question asks us to list four poor health outcomes associated with obesity. I sit through lectures with slides that have sniggering titles like “how BIG is the problem?”
More like 30 or 40, right? You’ve really let yourself go, and your clothes are clearly showing that. Either start shedding all that fat, or those buttons will surely burst.
