Maybe you’re wondering why I haven’t commented on the Nike mannequin and the resulting shit show on the internet. ARE you wondering that? I know some of you have sent me links and articles or tagged me in your mentions. So why haven’t I had my say yet? Why haven’t I posted MY Nike activewear selfie yet? 🤔🤔🤔
Weight is not a behavior.
Body size is not a lifestyle.
BMI is not an indicator for health.
And health is not a pre-requisite for respect.— Trust Your Body Project (@Whitneycatalano) June 11, 2019
The fact that people go out of their way to tear down plus size mannequins wearing activewear just goes to show that people don’t give a damn about a fat person’s health. They just don’t like fat people. pic.twitter.com/7gmyLcdDUg
— Jake Gifford, MSc (@thephitcoach) June 9, 2019
Wonder no more because I’m here to clear a few things up! Firstly I’m not surprised. There was no shock for me that people piled on or that it became such a big story. I live in a fat body every single day. Sometimes I share photos of that body on the internet. I know how it looks out there for us.
But post after post comes out denouncing this conversation about our bodies like we don’t know they hate us. We do. Believe me, we 100% do. And I know some of you might be surprised that’s still the case, you tried so hard to fit what they wanted you to be. Or you see women with hourglass figures on the runway or in magazines and think the problem is solved.
It’s not.
Not while there is an acceptable and a not acceptable body. Not while people feel so free to comment and critic a stranger (or in this case a piece of plastic). Even go so far as to make up a fake medical history for that plastic based on fear and learned prejudice. We are never going to be good enough for them. That’s why living our lives without thought or concern for them is such a victory: we, the unacceptably fat. The ones who SHOULD try harder, eat less, exercise more or get the surgeries. But dear lord, don’t sully the Nike brand doing (right, faceless internet?)
That’s why it’s not about thin women or brands whoring products under the body positive banner; Body Positivity is a movement shifting the prejudices people live with every day in their relationships, jobs and especially access to basic unbiased health care. Not about how many likes your underwear selfies can garner, your stretch marks or cellulite or if you can prove you move your body enough to be worthy of being left alone. It’s life and death for some people, try to keep that in mind next time.
I worry about the lack of emotion it stirred in me to see those words, targeted to shame and humiliate us.
Maybe I’m broken, I wondered? Did they finally push me over the edge into nothingness? Am I resigned to my fate in this world? But I’m determined that that not be the case. Perhaps after all this time, I don’t care what they think. Or more accurately, I don’t believe that ‘their’ opinion, filled with blatantly faux concern for fat people’s health, is more valid than my own. I know what my body does and doesn’t do. What it feels like and, when I can access adequate health care in an equally biased system, what my health is like.
And none of that, my ability to fit or perform in whatever category, changes for one second that I am a person. A person who deserves respect, or at very least, to be allowed to exist without hate and bigotry being my daily experience. That seems fair, right? I should be able to have that. Then why is it so sooooo hard?
Hi! I’m Melissa Walker Horn. Around here, they call me Suger. I’m the Chief Blogger and doer of all the things here at Suger Coat It. Blogging since 1901; I love a casual ootd, taking photos, and writing about things that irk or inspire me. I love wine and cheese, long days at the beach and spending time with my family. I make stuff for the internet over at Chalkboard Digital. You know, living the sweet life.