Fat, Pretty, and Soon to be Old

We each relate to the world based on our experiences and appearances and the ways in which we choose to show ourselves—even though some stories have been elevated, honored and others are barred, or at least discouraged, from being told. Diverse experiences add to human knowledge and perhaps compassion too.” Our specificities are critical and magnificent.

Shadow on a Tightrope: Writings by Women on Fat Oppression, edited by Lisa Schoenfielder and Barbara Wiesner

Remember, there is no part of human culture that was not created by humans, and we have the power to change policies and politics. Cultural trends are generally a reflection of widely held beliefs.

Moreover, I’m interested in how privilege comes to feel normal to people—so invisible; they don’t even see when others are not privileged.

She didn’t actually need to do anything in order to be worthy of respect and positive attention in the world, and neither did I. We were already fine people, just as we were. Even as she put me down, she did not deserve my put-down. How much lower can we agree to feel? No lower. No more.

Stress is culturally assigned based on appearance and especially vicious if one’s physical appearance is deemed to be one’s own fault.

When it comes to those power structures, it matters how we talk and behave, what we wear, and which norms we challenge in small ways, day after day after day. We are creating culture even as it creates us.

I’m not against the savvy application of social knowledge. But let the application of social knowledge be this: artful manipulation of privilege, not a daily quest for privilege that leaves existing power structures unchecked.

The mechanisms that reproduce inequality have become invisible. I believe that through storytelling we can reveal them again.

The startling paradox here is that love and connection are the most comforting things humans know. Yet most people are daily reinforcing capitalist divisions that keep us alienated from the love we might otherwise feel for one another’s bodies and for the beauty of human diversity.