I work at a cafe that sells pastries. Last week, the fat loathing talk was rampant among customers and it was really annoying and toxic. But, one woman in particular really struck me…
I have no idea how the conversation came up. Naturally – I assume… I seem to be one of those people that people like to talk to and tell their feelings too. nor am I one to just bring up FA topics when the conversation hasn’t naturally gone in some diety or some such direction.
Anyhoo… we have this customer who starts some fat-hate rant. I mentioned that even obesity and morbid obesity are highly genetic and that many even very fat people are physically active and enjoy eating a healthy diet. And just wow… the anger that welled up in this woman was just amazing. “I AM FAT DUE TO GENETICS!! I KNOW WHAT FAT DUE TO GENETICS LOOKS LIKE! PEOPLE FATTER THAN ME WHO THINK THAT IT IS GENETICS ARE JUST TELLING THEMSELVES LIES TO MAKE THEMSELVES SLEEP BETTER AT NIGHT!!!!” Then she stomped off.
Right… so, because she is overweight due to genetics, no other person could be fat due to genetics and possibly be any fatter than she is… cuz we’re all just cookie cutter copies of this woman, right? *headdesk*
But, it was the anger that I really found interesting… that I still find interesting. She had a very disproportional repsonse which I find common when fat-hating ideas are challenged. What is it about challenging fat-loathing that people find so intimidating? I suspect they are afraid that the challenges will take away their FOBTs (fantasies of being thin) or will take away the “thin privilege” that even fat people can achieve if they submit to tormenting themselves on diets, so that they seem to at least be on their way to thinness… when in reality it is unlikely they will lose any weight in the long term and that diets are REALLY REALLY good at making people fatter. The irony.
Maybe some people just want their self-loathing and self-torture (diets, etc.) to mean something, so that they have to stimatize others who don’t flog themselves in the same ways so that they can feel righteous or something…
Even if this woman was factually correct within her rant (and she wasn’t, but anyway…), is that kinda anger and aggressiveness even worth it? Hate corrodes the hater perhaps even more than the victims of that hate. Take notice haters.
–AngryGrayRainbows
Angry Gray Rainbows 
I think that many people have very intricate belief systems that are founded on these faulty ideas at the base of them, so when one of those basic faulty ideas are challenged, they feel like their whole little popsickle castle they have built will come tumbling down if you remove the one popsickle stick from the bottom.
And they will fight to the death to keep you from doing that.
I think mature people who have gone through more self-examination don’t tend to react that way, so if you can remind yourself that you are dealing with people who are less mature than yourself (I know, that sounds condescending) it might provide you with more patience and greater emotional distance (if you need it).
It’s funny, it’s kind of a sacred thing you are doing. I am also one of those people who other people just seem to open up to, and I’m sure if I were in a position of serving pastries I would hear what you are hearing. But each of those interactions, if you end up adding one more little plus to the intuitive eating side or fat acceptance side of the equation in people’s brains, it can all add up.
Maybe we need to print business cards with the Fatosphere url on them, and when someone seems to be struggling with thoughts about this stuff, we could hand them a card. I don’t like to proselytize about anything, but there may be people who haven’t realized that there are others who are exploring things in this way.
I’d be extremely wary of engaging in any kind of debate with customers, because if you say the wrong thing — as in this case — it might mean your job. Having said that, I do applaud your bravery in rebutting her; it’s not always easy to stand up for issues of oppression.
LOL… they don’t pay me enough to care if I lose my job for simply and calmly stating what I believe in a conversational situation with a customer. 😉
I dunno… since I was a kid I have been willing to sacrifice important things (like jobs) to do what I think is right…. let alone this low-paying gig that pays nearly 1/10th I could make if I actually got a job in the field I am educated in, but choose to abstain from for the moment.
I know most other people would care… I just don’t… I never really have.
The thing is… I have spent my whole live observing the consequences of people NOT standing up for what is true and what is ethical and all that… and I am sick of it. Maybe someday when I have kids to worry about, I’ll care more about not losing a job. Maybe I won’t. I dunno….
I am lucky to have a husband who loves his job and who makes a ton of money, so my having a job doesn’t matter that much anyway, which allows me to focus on those things that I am passionate about….
But, thank you for the spirit of your comment which I know was meant in a spirit of helpfulness. 😉
I recognise this woman’s train of thought. I used to think like this: “I have fat genes, I have to be very careful not to become HUGE, actually I’m wroking pretty hard, watching what I eat, being active, and that’s probably why I’m not HUGE yet. And it’s unfair.. I’ll never be thin because of my fat genes, I work really hard and I’ll always be chubby like I am right now. Unless I start slacking off and then I’ll be HUGE. Oh gawd my life is hard. Those people who are fatter than me must be slacking off. How nice it would if I didn’t have to work so hard to not become like them. I wish I was naturally thin…”
If that woman has similar thoughts, I can see why she’s angry. The world is not fair and being fat is still not ok in the eyes of so many, usually one’s own family.
It also happens to me very often that strangers strike up conversation with me. I guess I’m open that way, they feel that I will listen, and very often I enjoy listening to them. But this woman’s rant makes me a little sad.
I can see that. I used to do the same thing, too. My whole family is morbidly obese, and I have been obese nearly all of my life. With the exception of about 8 years, during which I somehow managed to lose the weight and starve and work myself to maintain in the “normal”-overweight range. I had myself so convinced that I was somehow better than others for all of my efforts, and that it was possible to stay thin despite genetics. But really, I hated myself and my body every day (even at my thinnest), and felt so sorry for myself that I had to work so hard just to stay at a BMI under 30, while others lost weight and/or stayed thin so effortlessly.
So if someone had pointed this out to me, I would have been upset, first that you were challenging the fact that I had lost weight despite genetics, and secondly that I was being lumped in with all those “bad fatties”. The latter would really be the kicker – “but don’t you see, I work so haaaaarddddd, and that lady over there is a little bigger than me so obviously she doesn’t work at all, how daaaaaare you!!1!”.
Not justfiying it at all. I hate that I used to think like that!! Just trying to explain where the anger may have come from.
Oh, this.
I have to catch my inbetweenie self with this shit all the time, even after 5+ years of being on the HEAS bandwagon.
Somewhere there is someone who weighs 50 pounds less than I do who is positive that I must eat bonbons and lie around the couch all day just because I am my weight, so why the heck should I make any assumptions about someone who weighs 100, 200, or 300 pounds more than I do?
So, it’s obvious “angry lady” has some issues and you just happened to be the one her anger landed on that day.
It sounds a lot to me like she is defending herself pretty mightily and putting down anyone else who is fatter than her. I wonder if she thinks there’s a limit to the fat a person can have if it’s genetic…like there’s a cut off point if it’s genetic? She sounds pretty judgmental to me and possibly like she’s better than anyone else. It’s kind of like that quote, “me thinks she doth protest too much.” She got awful livid about something that’s not that big a deal. There’s definitely something underlying for her.
Sounds to me like she’s really tired, needs a break and maybe a cruise through the fatosphere. (WRT2, love the idea about passing out cards…wouldn’t that be great? I could do it a lot around my work.)
Of course, she might have been having a terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad day and would’ve reacted that way over ANYTHING. People are not always rational 😉
Yes, this is possible. I try to remember this whenever someone gives me a random dirty look or someone cuts me off in traffic or something…
I got the sense that it was the weight issue that really triggered this woman, because we were chatting for several minutes up to that point and she was alright until the fat stuff came up. But who knows… it’s not like I can read minds. It’s just the vibe that I thought I got.
Hopefully that woman will come back again and we can chat again… without the dramz.
The weight issue is probably a “hot-button” for her, but I know there are days when I almost anything will set me off 😉
Hopefully she’ll be in a better mental space when she’s there next.
Aaaaaaaaaah, living 400lbs, have you read Alexander’s terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad day???? A favorite of mine and hubbys!!!
Yes! Judith Viorst for the win 🙂
This reminds me of when Me Me Roth started shrieking at Rachel (backstage at some TV show I think?) that she has a fat family and that she works so hard, blah blah blah… Some people feel like they have bad genetics and get insanely angry at the suggestion that others might have even “worse” (more prone to fat) genes because obviously nobody works as hard as they do and if they did they’d be thin… it’s very sad and reflects a lot of unhealthy feelings and assumptions.
You know, I put an ad on Craigslist the other day looking for fat girl-buddies, and have gotten some emails that are kind of like this woman’s reaction to what you said.
(BTW, hi everyone. Nice to meet you. :D)
I think that there is a mixture of factors that contribute to the highly irrational, vitriolic, and absurd responses that people have when you question the “fat=evil” paradigm, and that a lot of them have been touched on here.
One thing is that people will give you very positive feedback when you diet, say you are on a diet, starting a workout program, or doing anything that can be for the percieved purpose of “losing weight.” I think that folks sometimes get so used to everyone agreeing with them on certain points of view that when they are questioned, they just don’t know how to act. I think that a survival mechanism that fat folks have sometimes is to appeal to the culturally dominant idea that thin is better when they relate to people. It can get them pity sometimes and it can also get them praise for doing certain things.
I mean, you should get praise for being self-confident. But we live in a patriarchy, so that doesn’t happen that often; unless, of course, you express your self confidence in ways that are approved by The Man. Like by saying, “I love myself, and by losing weight I am taking care of myself,” etc., yadda yadda.
Sorry to ramble on. This is one that hits close to home. 😀