Damned if you do, damned if you don't

Speaking (recently) of being a "sexy feminist," let's talk about the phrase. I, of course, do not use the word "sexy" to contrast with or qualify the word "feminist," but rather in reference to the fact that you all already know--feminism is way sexy.

However, let's talk about an area where I frequently feel conflicted: weight loss.

I know you're all thinking, "Where's the conflict? Up with positive body image!" Well, of course. But there's this trend, particularly among young, liberal, well-educated people, to sneer at women who have a negative body image. I often feel that, in certain circles, there is a bigger stigma against dieting than there is against being fat. A conscious stigma, that is--we've all still internalized cultural ideals, so the message seems to be: "Be skinny...but don't try to be skinny." Deviating from either dictum invites a lot of shame. The fact is, most of us have it drilled into our heads that we need to be skinnier, and it is really hard to get totally free of that. This new stigma is well-intentioned, as it attempts to counter all those negative messages, but it often feels that diet-dissers doth protest too much. Smart people have fat prejudices, know they shouldn't, and get haughty about weight loss in compensation. I, personally, am tired of feeling guilty for eating a doughnut, and tired of feeling guilty for feeling guilty.

America, that schizophrenic country of ours, obsesses over thinness while breeding obesity. We're puritanical and hypersexed, extremely diverse and extremely egocentric, and we hurtle towards extremes like negatively charged ions. How do we reconcile? Where's the spectrum? I want to love myself, and fuck the patriarchy...but I also want to lose 10 pounds. Preferably 15. Okay, 20. So Sleater-Kinney's "#1 Must Have" has been going through my head in a loop, and I listen to Lily Allen just for that lyric that goes "I want to be able to eat spaghetti bolognese/And not feel bad about it for days and days and days." I WANT to be attractive to the opposite sex, and I KNOW I shouldn't want that.

We're all guilty of blaming the victim. We even ridicule overly skinny celebrities--ok, mostly the vapid ones, but often we view them as vapid BECAUSE they're so skinny. Why can't we work on removing the fat-shame in the first place? The people who look down their noses at calorie-counters are usually the same ones who casually insult fat people behind their backs. So how 'bout instead of scoffing at that Diet Coke your friend ordered, tell her she's beautiful? (And just so she believes you, maybe tell her so when she's NOT stressing about her dress size.) I've long had an unofficial policy, and as of now I'm making it official: if a friend of mine ever calls anyone fat--strangers, celebs, whatever--I'm calling them out on it. I don't want to hear it. It's destructive, unattractive, and WORST of all not particularly funny*.

Hate the unrealistic standard, y'all, not the people feeling oppressed by it.

*Which is, of course, the greatest sin of all.

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