We now return to your regularly scheduled programming.

This has heen discussed in the fatosphere lately, and I thought I'd mention it here because it's sort of relevent. In fact, I read a great post about it recently--was it you or maybe Meowzer who wrote it? I find myself bothered by the recent discussion of "good" and "bad" fatties. It's like having a "healthy lifestyle" means you're a good fattie. Like people feel justified in being fat because they eat "right" and exercise several times a week, but those who can't always eat "healthy" or who can't find the time to exercise are "bad." Lately, I have had some money issues and I can't always afford to buy fresh fruits and veggies (which is *always* thrown in when people are talking about "healthy eating"), and even when I do have the money, sometimes I just don't want to eat fruits or vegetables. So does that make me bad? I have a membership at a Curves, and for a long time I was exercising three times a week, but lately changes in my schedule made it difficult to make it over there (it's kind of far away). But I live literally right next to a river with a jogging trail. So, even if I can't make it to Curves, I could technically go walking. But I don't. Does that make me bad? Just what I need. More guilt.

**************
"A diet counselor once told me that all overweight people are angry with their mothers and channel their frustrations into overeating. So I guess that means all thin people are happy, calm, and have resolved their Oedipal entanglements."

As far as I'm concerned, Sarahbear, if you're not going around intentionally harming other people, your eating and exercise habits can't make you bad. And that's exactly the problem with terms like "healthy lifestyle."

No matter how much we praise the paper for printing it, I hope everyone mentions the ridiculous title they put on it and that they should have left it as it was. That's truly annoying.

MichMurphy, your last line almost sounds like channeling Dr. Phil ($hill) - "How's that workin' for ya'?" Heh.

Zero isn't a size, it's a warning sign. - Carson Kressley

Sarahbear, I think people are allowed to have priorities besides exercising. I think they're allowed not to always "eat their colors," or hell, to NEVER eat them if veggies make them gag. Even if they can afford them both time and moneywise. And certainly if you have time and/or money crunches there's no way in the world you are obligated to beat yourself up for not being enough of a goody-two-shoes. My loose change.

Excellently stated, Meowser. You've never heard that before, right?

Zero isn't a size, it's a warning sign. - Carson Kressley

Golly, Sarahbear, it looks like I've gone and triggered some ugly for you. I'm sorry. It wasn't my intention.

FWIW, Sarahbear, I sometimes call myself a bad fattie, but it's tongue-in-cheek because most people have gone out of their way to say they don't define other people that way And it's good for new people to be exposed to the possibility of exercise and eating good things if they want, without the pressure to lose weight attached to it. That's revolutionary for many people. Just knowing you can improve your health if you need to without losing weight. But don't sweat it. I seldom choose fruit myself, and a veggie is a potato lol. Or a salad with ranch and feta cheese when I actually want it. We're all in the same boat, IMO.

Zero isn't a size, it's a warning sign. - Carson Kressley

Hug accepted. Thanks.

Sarahbear, I absolutely agree with everything you said. As I've pointed out before, equal treatment should not depend on how much exercise you take or fruit and veg you eat. An individual's health should be no-one's business but our own, and each of us should have the right to make whatever decisions about our own health we see fit, without those choices being scrutinised by others. After all, thin people who don't live healthful lives don't have to justify themselves to anyone.

On the other hand I can very much understand how, with the desire to refute the lazy / overeating stereotype so frequently used to dismiss fat people and invalidate our experiences, the focus has been on those who go against those preconceptions; the ones who exercise and eat 'right' yet are still fat. It remains one of the biggest obstacles the movement must overcome - the perception that fat people choose to be so whether through action or inaction, and therefore deserve the consequences of that choice.

However increasingly I think there is a libertarian streak creeping into the movement - that justifying one's fatness by disassociating oneself from fat stereotypes is still in a way playing by their rules - and that even if being fat was a choice, it is (or should be) a legitimate one in a society that is otherwise generally tolerant of people's rights to live as they see fit provided this harms no-one else. And that for me is a step forward in itself that demonstrates how internal discourse is driving fat acceptance forward.

I liked DebraSY's piece, not least because having lost and "maintained radical weight loss (more than 60 pounds) for five years" through diet and exercise she could very easily have become the typical weight-loss evangelist of a hundred message board threads - 'I did it, so can you, eat less, move more, it just takes willpower...' blah blah. Her acknowledgment that these results are not typical and of the numerous obstacles standing in the way of most people who try the same are in complete contrast to the universality normally assumed.

And for what it's worth, I dislike the word 'lifestyle' intensely - it's a bland, magaziney term that has increasingly been adopted by the medical community to cover, and condemn, every allegedly 'sinful' type of behaviour imaginable. it's up there with 'wellness' as far as I'm concerned.

I find myself more often than not describing myself as a "good fattie" in the dating world. I don't know how many of y'all have been doing this online dating they have nowadays, but even though the idea is to win someone over with your personality first, there's also that other hurdle of appropriately describing your physical self without being misleading.

I'm always straightforward with my size, but I do have to add that quantifier - "good" or "healthy" - because I honestly think I am. I excercise regularly because I like to, and I eat healthy foods, because I like to. I truly enjoy leading a "healthy lifestyle." The result is I have the bloodwork of a star athlete...and I'm still 318 pounds, which is unnerving, but I accept it.

I see myself as fat, I see myself as active, and fitness is one of my key hobbies - just like music and reading Larry King Live transcripts. So I advertise myself as such, because I don't want anyone to assume that because I'm fat, I'm probably housebound and wrist-deep in alfredo sauce, which I'm sure we can all agree is one of the prevailing stereotypes of fat people. And that's not my stereotype - that's theirs, the non-fats. I've never wanted to fit into their stereotypes because I simply don't. None of us do.

So, I guess what I'm trying to say is that I can see how people can fall into the trap of using good v. bad labels. I do it to sell myself, because I do still have shame for my size; being the only fat person in a thin family, I was raised on it.

I don't know...I've probably ticked someone off by saying some of this stuff. It's just how this topic affects me.

On the other hand I can very much understand how, with the desire to refute the lazy / overeating stereotype so frequently used to dismiss fat people and invalidate our experiences, the focus has been on those who go against those preconceptions; the ones who exercise and eat 'right' yet are still fat. It remains one of the biggest obstacles the movement must overcome - the perception that fat people choose to be so whether through action or inaction, and therefore deserve the consequences of that choice.

I also can understand the desire. But in addition to thinking that our eating and exercising habits should not determine how we are treated by others (and honestly, I never have seen ANYONE in FA advocate that it should) I have another reason for disliking the focus on "good" fatties, namely that the concept of good/ bad fatties is an oversimplification of complex behaviors. For example, while I did not exercise regularly for the last six months or so (I just restarted) walking and biking were still my main forms of transportation during that time. I am one of the fat people who actually do overeat since I am a binge eater, and I sometimes eat huge amounts of chocolate, ice cream, or whatever other sweet food, but at the same time I love fruit, vegetables and whole grain products and always have done so, in fact I have been a vegetarian for almost half of my life. So what am I, a good or a bad fatty? People's judgments (and I am talking about people outside of FA for the most part) largely depend on the information they have been given.

I think the word lifestyle is fine and appropriate in most cases, the problem that I feel needs to be addressed is redefining the word health. People call things unhealthy that are not (fat) - people misunderstand that many people during the first round of cancer chemo GAIN a lot of weight. I had a friend that people told she was getting fat during this stage of her chemo. It was sooooooooo sickening. They knew she had CANCER but were still okay making comments about her weight.

This is a prime example of f***ed up priorities, and bad definitions of health.

A fat person with no other ailments is NOT living a more unhealthy lifestyle BY DEFAULT than a thin cancer patient.

A healthy lifestyle is possible, sure. Just like being green, though, there are billions of shades of grey. If you have an SUV but have solar panels on your house...well...you're doing something and that's great. If you're fat but eat nothing but lettuce and vinegar...you're still a fattie and just aren't doing enough. I'm not saying anyone should eat just lettuce and vinegar, it's just a gross analogy LOL

@secondhelpinglaura Most of my life has been in-person dating because the Internet found people with fetishes finding me, and my primary goal of dating wasn't to make someone feel hot and dirty...but that's just me. When I was participating in online dating sites, I make sure to put head to toe pictures. If someone has a problem with the way I look I'd rather have them gagging at their computer than asking me over the phone or the IM so I'd have to tolerate the eight hundred minute pause before seeing or hearing, "oh."

This entry over at Cute Overload seemed to fit the current discussion I thought.

Click here

@ Jennifer G - Ha!

I get what you're saying about internet dating, but I just want to slip in there, that I don't do it for the "hot and dirty" factor. I'm fairly apt at weeding out fetishists, and I don't believe in casual sex; thus the people I end up with are good for me, until they're not. I don't settle.

I have always detested the word 'lifestyle', it seems to reduce people to nothing but a narrow set of habits, like 'obesity', I never think of people having a lifestyle, I think of them as having a life.

As for the good fatty thing, it's tricky, on the one hand, fat people that keep saying they exercise and eat lots of veg (by the way, if you do it for pleasure, is it a moral act?!), are undermining the premise of the causes of 'obesity' whilst at the same time supporting the idea that fat people have to answer for themselves.

They are after an exemption from judgement, don't hate me, hate the bad fatties, when of course noone should be hated.

I suppose they're going to come back for the rest of us losers when they storm the citadel of the enemy!

I've never understood why some people read so much into it when others in the size acceptance movement mention that their habits don't match the stereotypes. When people do that, they are not doing it to be "good fatties." They're doing it to bring attention to the fact that, like thin people, fat people have a wide variety of "lifestyles."

Nobody cares if you think you're "bad." Nobody is trying to exclude you. It doesn't mean "don't hate me, hate them instead." It isn't about you. You're the one judging yourself. The people you label "good fatties" aren't the ones calling you "bad" or calling themselves "good." You are. Why do you think of yourselves that way? Why are you making that value judgment and then projecting it onto others?

Stereotype busting isn't the only, or anywhere near the most important thing we do. If you feel that you're stereotypical and therefore stereotype-busting isn't your thing, then work for decent medical care for fat people. Fight social injustice. Try to get size and weight added to the anti-discrimination law in your jurisdiction. There are so many important things that need to be done.

I can't speak for anyone else, but it was intimidating to me at first too, DeeLeigh. Not that anyone was labeling me, but I was wondering at first if there wasn't any other fat person who didn't eat what would be considered at large a "healthy diet" or do a lot more exercise than I do. My diet isn't what would be considered "bad" and it's not a very large number of calories, but I tend to avoid fruit in particular and a veggie is a potato. Then most of the big bloggers specially addressed this and said it didn't matter - that FA was about accepting all fat people - whatever they ate or did. So I figured it didn't matter; but I still don't mind using the term "bad fattie" in a tongue-in-cheek, or outright joking way. But, as has been said about other intersecting prejudices, perhaps it helps to just listen to the people who feel, for whatever reasons, that they are marginalized even within the movement? Instead of telling them to stop being so sensitive? Just a thought.

Zero isn't a size, it's a warning sign. - Carson Kressley

Its interesting, whenever I see people talking about how they don't fit the stereotypes about fat people, it seems to devolve into a plethora of people reiterating how they, too, don't eat 'that way' or aren't sedentary 'that way.' It gets tiring to wade through that, and that is one of my beefs with the fact that some fat people feel compelled, over and over again, to talk about their food choices and their exercise habits, and in a weird way, seems not that far away from the diet talk that is banned at most SA websites.

Also, it sounds at times a little too much like the same rhetoric we hear from thin people who go on and on at length about what they do to maintain their 'healthy lifestyle.' I am not threatened by anyone's eating, exercise, or health practices, and I'm not projecting any discomfort or self-hate onto others when I get annoyed and frustrated with this type of talk. It bores me, and I think in the long run it is counterproductive because I think we need a whole new vocabulary and a whole new point of view to describe our lives as healthy, happy, valuable fat people who deserve equality with thin people in terms of employment, housing, access to health care, education, and so on.

I say this because it is the one thing that I find so off putting about fat rights today, because the people who use health against us fat people are using it as a cover, pure and simple. They don't really care about our health, they just think it gives legitimacy to their prejudice, and as long as we go along with this, we capitulate to an argument we'll never win, and we'll never be able to draw up the playing field we're being forced to compete on. If you want to focus on your rights as a fat person, go back to the governmental charters of whatever country you live in, and if you see anything there linking equality and rights to health, let me know. Otherwise, lets think of ways to subvert and repel the health arguments and the 'good fattie' vs. 'bad fattie' debates that distract us from more effective social justice activities.

Disclaimer: I haven't read the article this post links to, so it isn't directed at that. I also understand why examples that counter stereotypes are important, but to hear these proclamations within fat pride community, directed at each other within the community, instead of against the fat haters, is too much, in my opinion. I accept, though, that my opinion is most likely well within the minority, and so I rarely critique others whenever they want to discuss what they eat and how they exercise and how they minimize their carbon footprint and so forth.

It's absolutely true that the place to aim the stereotype-busting stuff is outside of the movement. I, too, find hearing about people's personal habits boring. But, I just stop reading.

We all agree that eating and exercise habits aren't moral issues, right? Maybe what this is really about is social class. We've got upper middle class people in the movement who've been treated like absolute crap by their families and peers because of their weight (because I think the worst weight prejudice is probably in that class - it has to do with the idealization of perfect control). They're waving their arms at the people in medicine and the media saying "Hey! I'm basically just like you. I've got the same kind of background. I eat the same way you do, and I go to the gym like you do. Stop looking down on me." Then, there are people who have either rejected that whole system of thought or who were never part of it in the first place saying "You're just like them! You probably look down on me, too." And, that may or may not be true, depending on whether or not they're snotty upper middle class people. But, the issue isn't "good" or "bad" at all. It's about class and social acceptance.

Yah know, I think sometimes people talk about food and exercise for no moral reason at all, but because it is a common human denominator. We all gotta eat. With a few exceptions, we all gotta move and exercise is also a pretty mundane and noncontroversial form of recreation.

We spend about a third of our lives asleep, but we can't remember what happens then, and if we do we don't know what to make of it. So we don't talk about it. With a few exceptions, we all have sex (though some are still waiting and others are on hiatus), but we're not supposed to talk about that. Not everyone likes the theatre (though I don't get that), variations in music tastes can be most uncomfortable (I really don't know how to continue a conversation when I learn someone is a Toby Keith fan). Some people don't read much, and that embarrasses them, so we don't usually start by bringing up the books we've read recently. Some people don't like baseball or football or soccer (True confessions: I'm not a sports fan). Some people don't like dogs, for crying out loud! (I find a way to make my exit when I learn that.)

So, what do we have left to talk about with strangers and near strangers? Okay, weather. Now, what? Boring as it may be (though I don't find it boring), we're left with food, recreation (often exercise), family (NO! That can open a can of worms). Uhm, so we're back to weather, food, recreation . . .

We gotta find a way to enjoy talking about it.

When people who enjoy thin privilege talk food with fat people, it's dicey, though. Everyone is entering the conversation with baggage. Here's this common denominator about which we all can find something to like. However, it has had a radically different influence on our physical personas, and so many voices in the diet world and media have told us that (tips hat to Kate Harding) it's our "personal responsibility" how our bodies have evolved, and yet we all know it's so much more complicated than that . . . even the thin person knows this, though she likely hasn't studied it to the degree we here at BFB have. So the talk turns to "good fattie" talk to make the thin person feel like she is on common ground.

Another message I'd like for fat people to internalize is that, if you have dieted, the dieting itself has caused physical, chemical, likely permanent changes to what foods your body tells you to acquire and eat. After a single phase of starvation, we know from research that all starvers (fat, thin, whatever) crave, long after starvation has ended, more sugar, high-fat food, develop "sneak eating" and hoarding behaviors than "average" people for at least years.. It's normal. It's right. It's a reliable message from your cells to have such an appetite and follow it, to shift your behaviors guaranteeing for your continued existence. (which, despite what size bigots will tell you, IS a good thing)

These behaviors may not be entirely curative of your starvation history, and it may or may not go away at some point in the future, but it must be healthful now, or your body wouldn't be telling you to do it day in, day out. You can trust those messages and relax into the behaviors they demand of you. (fighting them takes up too much time and energy, anyway). It may be true that in a non-starved population, eating sugar and over x grams of fat isn't healthy, but in the chronically or acutely starved, it actually is healthy. That the urge exists is the proof--you don't have to wait for a scientist to get off her but and prove it's so (though if they bothered, they would find it.)

Having guilt about that reaction to starvation (particularly repeated starvation over decades of life) is like having guilt because some doctor prescribed a carcinogenic medication you never needed in the first place and now, years later, you have cancer. Was that a "lifestyle choice" that you took the medication or go to doctors (which I don't, but does that make me morally superior? ludicrous to think so) as part of your lifestyle? Well, I suppose that it is part of your lifestyle, but so what? If it's an inevitable side effect to an event that is in the past and therefore unchangeable in the present,, that's what it is,a predictable and replicatable physiological result, and no moral values should adhere to it.

Nor, do I think, that any moral values should adhere to eating sugar or beets or cockroaches if it were simply a matter of volition, of choice of what to eat. But it really isn't purely a choice. It's not only culture and childhood habits, It's a physiological imperative to eat certain things. To try to override these imperatives is like trying to sleep two hours less per night than you, individually, work best on because you think it's a "better" lifestyle to sleep less: undersleeping will harm you. In hunger, sleepiness, wanting to rest or move or visit the toilet or breathe at so many breaths per minute, it's not appropriate to apply front-brain sorts of processes. Eat what your body tells, relax about it, and understand that other people who obsess about it have a mental illness that you don't need to catch.

I would just like to say how much I love this group. It's full of intelligent people who discuss important concepts and engage in insightful and thought-provoking dialogue, built on a foundation of common sense and necessary humor.

This thread encapsulates all of those traits very well (as so many on BFB do). The conversations and sense of community here so transcend most of the muck on the internet, it's heart-warming. Thank you. You are all wonderful.