Aesthetically Worthless:
OR, How I Kept Sane During the Anorexia Epidemic of 2006/2007
Kaiser Permanente is running a commercial these days set in the future where obesity and
smoking are archaic relics of a self indulgent culture long gone. Excuse me a moment while I
vomit. Being a card carrying Kaiser member I can attest to their inquisition of the fat, this latest
commercial a grim reminder to me of just how much it sucks to try and get decent medical care
when you wear a size 22.
I don't have Diabetes, type one or otherwise, but I've been tested for it three times in the last
year. I don't have high blood pressure, high cholesterol, chest pains or other cardiovascular
woes. In fact not a one of my personal medical concerns stem from my weight. My doctor,
however, refuses to even acknowledge the notion that being heavy is as natural for some as
being skinny is for others. He actually told me that if I didn't want to lose weight for medical
concerns, that I should do it for aesthetic ones. It's okay, I'll give you a minute to pick your jaw
off the floor, I know I needed one.
Since when is aesthetics something my doctor of medicine is qualified to lecture me on? It was
in this moment of perfect insult that I realized that what was once something left to Hollywood
and fashion editors has seeped it's ugly way into every facet of our society; the feeling that
people who are large are worthless, and need help to realize this from everyone who is small,
no matter how it may hurt feelings.
The whole scene left me wondering why my being a fat chick is such an issue for some
people. I mean, it's not an issue for my husband, or my friends, or my daughter, the people I do
hair for don't seem to care. Yet there are people out there who are consumed with the goal of
ridding our world of people who are large. I understand that people are entitled to whatever
opinions they have, and that's fine, as long as you aren't using that opinion to hurt someone
else. A weaker person would have burst into to tears right there in the doctor's office at being
told they have no aesthetic value by a professional.
When I was growing up I was always told that people come in all different shapes and sizes.
That there are as many varieties of people as there are stars in the sky, and just like the stars
they are all beautiful. When did this change? Did I miss the town meeting where we all decided
it was okay to treat people this way? Granted there is an obvious difference between a person
who needs to be a certain size to be healthy, but I know of just as many slim folk with
heart/cancer/health issues as I do fat folks. I certainly know just as many ugly skinny girls as I
do ugly big girls. It's a ridiculous position to hold that fat=ugly.
How, then, does a big person keep from killing themselves amid the torrent of utter crap telling
us that we are worthless? Is it really enough to be placated by the respective fashion and
television industry by showing a girl wearing a size 12 as a plus-size model? Size 12 isn't fat,
not even a little bit. Are we as a group, supposed to be okay with Torrid being the only place
we can get stylish clothing? Where is the line when it comes to what it's okay to call people? A
gay person, or black person can go to court when people berate or belittle them; Obese
people have no recourse. We're not taken seriously.
There are no fat superheroes. No fat super models. Not a large rock star, no A-list celebrities
that are chubby. We're the funny friend, the bumbling idiots. We are comic relief. The
handsome leading man never falls for his big girl friend. No, we are expected to develop a
thick skin, and take what we can get. Why is that?
I think it's fear. We are told from the time we are born what is and is not beautiful. From the
models wearing our clothes, to the women on TV, we are told this is how people are supposed
to look. The thing about beauty is that it really is in the eye of the beholder. Only the very
closed minded among us can say their taste in mates is so finite that it can be confined to a
size, a height, and a color of hair. Who, and to what, you are attracted to is something I feel
like we have very little conscious control over. You could psycho analyze it in to nothing, but
the end result is that at the end of the day you find a variety of people attractive, and not all of
them at the same time either. How scary it must be to learn you are attracted to someone
society has deemed ugly. That fear drives unspeakable cruelty, it's a matter of fight or flight.
And there are people attracted to us, no small number either. All kinds of people. That's how to
stay sane. Remembering that there are lots of people who don't only not care that there may
be curves and folds, but enjoy and relish that they are there. If I were as aesthetically
worthless as the world seems hellbent on convincing me, why do Americans spend more than
250 million dollars on BBW porno movies a year? Surely people aren't spending that kind of
money on gag-gifts. I once had a boyfriend tell me that “Fat girls are like mopeds. Fun to ride
but you wouldn't want your friends to see you on one.” Which sums up my theory pretty
concisely; fear of being found out as someone who can appreciate more than a narrow cross
section of women, resulting in vicious animosity.
The light at the end of the tunnel it seems is the growing number of men and women not willing
to take crap from small minded people anymore. Beauty, be it on the runway, off the rack, or
on the internet, need not be predicated by size or shape. It has nothing to do with weight
gained or lost, beautiful is beautiful. Buying into what other people think is beautiful is
shameful at best. As a sentient human being you have the right, and duty, to come to your own
conclusions, whatever they may be. I do think that slowly but surely the public opinion will
change. Where we may never release ourselves from millstone of the scale completely, I
sense that as a culture we will reach a breaking point wherein we realize that no one benefits
from a beige world where everyone looks the same. It's our differences that make us beautiful,
not our similarities.
Copyright 2007, Libby Baldwin, all rights reserved
OR, How I Kept Sane During the Anorexia Epidemic of 2006/2007
Kaiser Permanente is running a commercial these days set in the future where obesity and
smoking are archaic relics of a self indulgent culture long gone. Excuse me a moment while I
vomit. Being a card carrying Kaiser member I can attest to their inquisition of the fat, this latest
commercial a grim reminder to me of just how much it sucks to try and get decent medical care
when you wear a size 22.
I don't have Diabetes, type one or otherwise, but I've been tested for it three times in the last
year. I don't have high blood pressure, high cholesterol, chest pains or other cardiovascular
woes. In fact not a one of my personal medical concerns stem from my weight. My doctor,
however, refuses to even acknowledge the notion that being heavy is as natural for some as
being skinny is for others. He actually told me that if I didn't want to lose weight for medical
concerns, that I should do it for aesthetic ones. It's okay, I'll give you a minute to pick your jaw
off the floor, I know I needed one.
Since when is aesthetics something my doctor of medicine is qualified to lecture me on? It was
in this moment of perfect insult that I realized that what was once something left to Hollywood
and fashion editors has seeped it's ugly way into every facet of our society; the feeling that
people who are large are worthless, and need help to realize this from everyone who is small,
no matter how it may hurt feelings.
The whole scene left me wondering why my being a fat chick is such an issue for some
people. I mean, it's not an issue for my husband, or my friends, or my daughter, the people I do
hair for don't seem to care. Yet there are people out there who are consumed with the goal of
ridding our world of people who are large. I understand that people are entitled to whatever
opinions they have, and that's fine, as long as you aren't using that opinion to hurt someone
else. A weaker person would have burst into to tears right there in the doctor's office at being
told they have no aesthetic value by a professional.
When I was growing up I was always told that people come in all different shapes and sizes.
That there are as many varieties of people as there are stars in the sky, and just like the stars
they are all beautiful. When did this change? Did I miss the town meeting where we all decided
it was okay to treat people this way? Granted there is an obvious difference between a person
who needs to be a certain size to be healthy, but I know of just as many slim folk with
heart/cancer/health issues as I do fat folks. I certainly know just as many ugly skinny girls as I
do ugly big girls. It's a ridiculous position to hold that fat=ugly.
How, then, does a big person keep from killing themselves amid the torrent of utter crap telling
us that we are worthless? Is it really enough to be placated by the respective fashion and
television industry by showing a girl wearing a size 12 as a plus-size model? Size 12 isn't fat,
not even a little bit. Are we as a group, supposed to be okay with Torrid being the only place
we can get stylish clothing? Where is the line when it comes to what it's okay to call people? A
gay person, or black person can go to court when people berate or belittle them; Obese
people have no recourse. We're not taken seriously.
There are no fat superheroes. No fat super models. Not a large rock star, no A-list celebrities
that are chubby. We're the funny friend, the bumbling idiots. We are comic relief. The
handsome leading man never falls for his big girl friend. No, we are expected to develop a
thick skin, and take what we can get. Why is that?
I think it's fear. We are told from the time we are born what is and is not beautiful. From the
models wearing our clothes, to the women on TV, we are told this is how people are supposed
to look. The thing about beauty is that it really is in the eye of the beholder. Only the very
closed minded among us can say their taste in mates is so finite that it can be confined to a
size, a height, and a color of hair. Who, and to what, you are attracted to is something I feel
like we have very little conscious control over. You could psycho analyze it in to nothing, but
the end result is that at the end of the day you find a variety of people attractive, and not all of
them at the same time either. How scary it must be to learn you are attracted to someone
society has deemed ugly. That fear drives unspeakable cruelty, it's a matter of fight or flight.
And there are people attracted to us, no small number either. All kinds of people. That's how to
stay sane. Remembering that there are lots of people who don't only not care that there may
be curves and folds, but enjoy and relish that they are there. If I were as aesthetically
worthless as the world seems hellbent on convincing me, why do Americans spend more than
250 million dollars on BBW porno movies a year? Surely people aren't spending that kind of
money on gag-gifts. I once had a boyfriend tell me that “Fat girls are like mopeds. Fun to ride
but you wouldn't want your friends to see you on one.” Which sums up my theory pretty
concisely; fear of being found out as someone who can appreciate more than a narrow cross
section of women, resulting in vicious animosity.
The light at the end of the tunnel it seems is the growing number of men and women not willing
to take crap from small minded people anymore. Beauty, be it on the runway, off the rack, or
on the internet, need not be predicated by size or shape. It has nothing to do with weight
gained or lost, beautiful is beautiful. Buying into what other people think is beautiful is
shameful at best. As a sentient human being you have the right, and duty, to come to your own
conclusions, whatever they may be. I do think that slowly but surely the public opinion will
change. Where we may never release ourselves from millstone of the scale completely, I
sense that as a culture we will reach a breaking point wherein we realize that no one benefits
from a beige world where everyone looks the same. It's our differences that make us beautiful,
not our similarities.
Copyright 2007, Libby Baldwin, all rights reserved
