#And the way fatphobia is so ingrained in it

[yoichichi]

I hate how so many shops now on Etsy just take general product images from other stores and use them in their store front so you have to scour the reviews hoping someone’s posted pictures so you can see images of the ACTUAL product.

And you never really know who the original producer/maker of the item is when there’s 5 other products with the SAME EXACT IMAGE all from FIVE DIFFERENT SELLERS

[overexciteddragon]

I need to fucking talk about this scene BADLY

The fact that DunMeshi actually depicts starving dwarves as ripped muscular anime boys is, to me, absolutely incredible. I can't stress how often fat people starving are depicted as either skin and bones or ✨️beautiful and healthy✨️ (the latter being a body shape that they are encouraged to maintain), it's straight up a trope in so much media for skinny people to be depicted as fat in the past as if it's some "dirty secret", or for fat people to be depicted as unhealthy/ugly until they starve themselves enough to become "attractive", and on top of that the depiction of the Dehydrated Adonis Protagonist has become more and more present in our day-to-day media

Meanwhile, it's becoming more widely known that this isn't how bodies work at all; that fat isn't inherently unhealthy and that ripped bodies aren't just impossible to maintain but often quite dangerous. All of that put together, the depiction of more actors and characters that are fat, chubby, large, etc and not used as comedic relief has been so, so important to really hammer home that lean, dehydrated muscular bodies aren't necessarily something to aim for

But especially, dwarves being shown to have the same physical features as these ripped muscly characters (lean, bulging muscles, sharp cheekbones, defined pecs and neck muscles, etc) when they're starved, and that being depicted negatively is such a huge deal. This is also coming from the same anime in which one of its male protagonists is the epitome of the hero-- an athletic tall man in a shining knight's armour with a big shiny sword-- and he isn't shredded, he's got a tummy, he's got soft arms, he's clearly strong and muscular but it's all protected by a healthy layer of body fat

I'm never gonna shut up about how Dungeon Meshi has been such an incredible vehicle of body diversity with neither insidious fatphobia/queerphobia/racism nor performative (and frankly harmful) allyship behind it. I'm excited for how many young people (and older too!) will be made to slowly but surely question their internalized and ingrained fatphobia or general medical misunderstandings about weight as they watch/read this series. These are such important details and not enough media addresses them in such subtle but clear ways.

Bless Ryoko Kui but also bless Trigger for not doing what a lot of studios do (thinning characters and lightening their skin colours)

[fatliberation]

If its ok to ask; how do you feel about fat kinks? I havent seen any fat acceptance blogs talk abt it. /genq

I know it's a sore spot for a lot of fat liberationists (and yes, I'm quite familiar with why so please do not take to my inbox), I think people are scared to talk about it. personally, I think it is crucial that people with fat kinks are able to access fat liberation spaces so long as they leave the kink at the door. I say this not only because the majority of them are fat people, but because that community is steeped in a deep shame and feeling of brokenness for taking delight in fatness and/or weight gain, which perpetuates rampant fatphobia. and fat liberation is what will heal those wounds. I don't understand it when fat activists tell kinksters/fetishists/feedists, whatever you want to call them to stay out of the fat liberation movement. because what is the alternative? do you want them against the movement? that doesn't make sense at all. I think people are so uncomfortable, disgusted, or afraid of this community they don't understand, that they just wish they wouldn't exist. they aren't going away. kink is akin to sexuality, to identity, to queerness. I think what people really mean when they say feedists should stay out of fat lib is, "kink should stay within spaces designated for kink." we aren't talking about kink when it comes to who can belong in a movement, we are talking about people. it is wrong to equate every person who has a kink or a fetish to a predator. it causes very real harm to those people, because they internalize that message that their kink makes them a bad person who is inherently worthless, who has to hide. if feedists aren't welcome in fat liberation, they aren't welcome anywhere.

I think that people who love fat people, love feeding people, love their own fat bodies, who see their fattest selves as their most satisfying selves, would be natural allies to this movement once they find their way to it and feel safe and accepted here. I want to make it absolutely clear that ANYONE is welcome on this blog as long as they aren't harassing or harming anyone. so many of my followers and biggest supporters are kink blogs. some of my closest friends and fat liberationist allies are feedists. I know feedists who are way more educated and passionate about fat lib and body politics than most people I've met. I don’t wish for anyone to feel alienated on my blog - especially fellow fat folks and fellow fat allies. we are 100% FAT POSITIVE AND SEX POSITIVE on this blog, babey‼️

In fact I feel really glad when I see fat kink/feedism blogs engaging with my content bc it means that person is putting the work in to understand systemic fatphobia, how to be an ally to fat people (if they aren't fat themselves), but also healing their community through education and acceptance. and HOT TAKE, BUT: when it does happen?? when feedists aren't shrouded in internalized fatphobia, shame, and isolation, and instead start embracing this innate, powerful appreciation for fatness, it's literally so fucking beautiful? and so very queer?

choosing to gain weight on purpose as an act of self creation. because it feels Right for you. gaining weight to affirm the relationship you have with your body. getting fatter because you feel so much of your identity (even gender presentation!) is attached to your fat body. feeling sexiest when you're fat. someone else worshipping that about you. giving unlimited permission to nourish yourself and/or others - and taking carnal delight in it. releasing food rules and food guilt through centering pleasure. food and fatness as an erotic and sensory experience. finding feedist partners who also have this ingrained love of fatness that can't be replicated, partners who are willing and eager to support and adore your fat body, NOT merely tolerate it. reclaiming tropes used against you through kink, and turning a loving gaze inward. saying "fuck you" to the system and choosing to take up more space in a world that consistently tries to shrink you. never denying yourself pleasure even though everyone is telling you you don't deserve it. feedism is such an interesting facet of the endless spectrum of human sexuality and I think that once people in that community find liberation and heal their relationship to the kink, it can be one of the most radical forms of self acceptance and exercising complete bodily autonomy.

I already know that a love letter to feedism coming from a fat lib blog is gonna piss people off. I'm going to lose a lot of followers, I'm going to get a lot of hate. but. kink in general is SO demonized and SO misunderstood and as liberationists we should also be open to sexual liberation. so much of this discomfort around feedism comes from a lack of education and understanding about kink in general. feedism doesn't = fatphobia in the same way that bdsm doesn't = misogyny or abuse. quite the contrary, if practiced ethically, with informed consent. every community has assholes. especially when those communities are small, ostracized, and so young that there are next to zero resources for self acceptance, safety, education, and accountability. in fact, the assholes are the ones that you're going to SEE because every respectful person is staying away and out of your business. if you've been harassed by someone with a fat kink, that is so shitty and I'm sorry that happened to you. I know it happens a lot. try to remember that what you experienced was abuse, not kink.

what consenting individuals choose to do with their bodies is entirely their business and there is nothing wrong with kink. (and I will not stand for sex-negative, puritan bullshit in my inbox, thank you very much.)

reminder: fat pleasure is fat liberation.

[57sfinest]

What do you think about Evrart Claire? You mentioned you think about him in one of your tags I think.

okay i will first direct to you to trusted mutual @sydmarch for the most in-depth evrart thoughts with the appropriate warning for nsfw lmfaoo

but like. evrart is one of those characters where you have an initial knee-jerk reaction to them and then you kinda have to reevaluate after all is said and done because you get a LOT more context on them as you go.

most shallowly, you're meant to see evrart as the slimy "fantastically corrupt" union (mob) boss who sits in his office embezzling and making others do his dirty work (the hardies as his enforcement, you as his little errand dog, you get the point). however, a first point i want to make is that comparing a justified labor or civil rights advocate group to a "mob" is such a ubiquitous piece of capitalist/bigot rhetoric that it should automatically clue you in to the fact that something else is going on here. also taken in context with the fact that kortenaer poses as a scab to break the strike, further framing the union as a lazy, entitled, unreasonable splinter faction of stupid socialists-- obviously we know that the people who made this game are leftists, so it's not just Ough Unions Bad. there is Something Else Going On! because we are seeing this union strike filtered primarily through the lens of someone who is, consciously or not, a moralintern lackey! even at his most self-aware, calling himself the moralintern's bitch, harry does not have enough awareness of the world and his role in it to recognize how he is being manipulated by the various agendas at play here, and that affects our perception of it.

i think evrart presents as corrupt and weaselly on purpose! again syd has said a lot of this already & i've added some stuff in their tags, but i'll reiterate here for convenience. he is aware of the rhetoric people can use against him and he uses that to his advantage. he's using his personal reputation as misdirection. we see in dialogue that even joyce, an ultraliberal diehard capitalist who obviously dislikes the union, concedes that it was respectable in and of itself before the claires came in:

and we can infer that a lot of that might be because the union was *less effective before the claires took charge*. of course a capitalist will respect an ineffective labor union! but on top of this, the claires' open "corruption" give anti-union people an easy target for criticisms that serve to legitimize the union itself. oh, they say, well, the union is alright, it's just the claires that are ruining it. it's misdirection and it's genius. evrart's reputation isn't a concern if the union is doing its job, right? and here's another thing: i think people will trust open corruption more than they'll trust altruism that seems to good to be true. especially in a world with something like moralism, where this organization has killed millions and will kill *millions more* for a "greater good" that is literally just the status quo. if evrart's corruption is an open secret, as joyce puts it, people feel they can trust him *because* he's transparent about the bad things he supposedly does or supports or whatever. at least he's honest, right?

this makes the juxtaposition of evrart with joyce SUPER interesting, too. i think they both have that 'honest about their bad traits' way of going at people- joyce with her self-aware but relentless ultraliberalism, evrart with his intentionally misrepresented agendas. of the two, i think people tend to like joyce a lot more, despite her and evrart using pretty much the *same exact tactics*, and i think that tendency is largely explained by the intersection of gender and fatphobia and ingrained capitalist rhetoric, but i digress.

yes, the way evrart's little tasks are presented makes them *feel* slimy- you're evrart's peone, you're a little bitch dog running his errands to get a gun you never should have lost to begin with, he knows how to help and he's toying with you- but it's on purpose!! you can be joyce's little bitch dog too and it's not framed anywhere near as scummy. It Is On Purpose. because if evrart pretends to be the "socialist" mob boss, maybe it really does get martinaise the youth center, or enough money to, you know, fix the crumbling buildings that could kill the tenants at any moment. there are genuinely good things he is sincerely trying to accomplish. he is curating his image exactly as he needs it to be to get things done and that's partly why joyce hates him *so much*.

and of course this isn't to say that the claires never do anything wrong. contracting dros to kill the previous union head, for example. if i had to pin evrart's major sin, i think he's an "end justifies the means" type of guy. the other union head candidate needed to die for progress to be made. the fishing village will have to go so we can build martinaise up properly. some people, if not willingly cooperative- like harry- need to be used for their status regardless. we see the union at the opposite end of "for the greater good" as moralism: where moralism wants to stall the world, the union represents ruthless progression. why else the red-vs-blue juxtaposition of the union vs the moralintern and its financial interests? the red banners draped over shipping containers?

[cecils-dragons]

Fatphobia is really ingrained in our society and it's something you need to actively unlearn, your reply really shows that you have never critically thought about fatphobia or how it might affect your thoughts or actions. I am not accusing you of horrible crime I am just pointing out that this is something you still need to work on if you want to be safe person for fat people around you.

My apologies that it came across that way but what part of my response came across that way? I of course acknowledge and try to not go to societies biases, especially as someone who has health issues and have been on the other end of the stick when dealing with health services.(I've been denied health services a few times because I looked fine[underweight and afab]). Of course I'm not saying it's the same(just saying my own experiences and noting how doctors have literally told me their biases), I'm just relating it and saying that society is very broken but because I'm an apologetic soft person it does not mean that I am going with it's whims. I'm dealing with stress so this is the last big response I have in me at the moment until I recuperate a bit more. I'm not here to debate, just further my mind and explain if need be, I do not mean to be rude saying this, my health just does not need more stress reasons at the moment.

[hometownrockstar]

i think people on tumblr have good intentions but it does irk me sometimes when they say stuff abt fatness that perpetuates incorrect ideas, even if they mean it in a good way this time... just thinking abt the tags on a certain post that's going around lately, the tags sometimes conflating exercise with weight loss, and like exercise builds muscle, lots of athletes are bulky and fat also, same like how diets dont cause permanent weight loss, either. But both misconceptions are ingrained into society as "basic scientific facts" so i get why people repeat them, despite there being evidence that diets cause weight to regain 95% of the time within 5 years... the point im making here is that weight is complicated and not easy to change, much less change permanently. It's affected by genetics and different kinds of disabilities sometimes and perpetuating the idea that it can be changed with lifestyle changes (not even considering the implications of changing lifestyle for poor people) goes directly into feeding fatphobic mindsets of "they should have just worked harder and ate less to change their bodies, so they can't call out fatphobia bc being fat is a choice"

[anaalnathrakhs]

oh god ed reddit is having the “uwu anorexia isn’t rooted in fatphobia my mental illness is not abt you” talk again please god help me

fatphobia doesn’t mean “being a meanie to fat ppl” i’m begging you to use critical thinking skills for five seconds and apply what you know about literally any other form of oppression to this situation.

people’s point isn’t that you having anorexia makes them feel bad and therefore you’re a bad fatphobic person.

they’re pointing out how the deeply ingrained fatphobia our society upholds, from misconceptions about health to moralization of looks and weight, including yes being jerks to fat ppl’s faces bc they’re fat, is affecting what you think about your own looks, weight, health, body, clothes, eating habits, etc.

the logic isn’t “you became anorexic because you hate fat people so much you never wanted to be fat yourself (and that makes you a bad person)” it’s “fatphobia is a prism that transforms the root cause of your ed into disordered thoughts, behaviors, and patterns (and unlearning fatphobia will help you with recovery and harm-reduction)”

like. it’s not for no reason that anorexia is a disorder that disproportionatedly affects women. it’s not for no reason that there’s sky high comorbidity rates for eds and ocd. it’s not for no reason that people who need control in their lives so badly that they develop a mental disorder abt it get obssessed with being skinny and not with being a sumo. it’s not for no reason that ppl who feel the need to retract to childhood due to trauma envy things like being skinny light and frail, instead of being a tubby baby. it’s not for no reason that there is an incredibly common anorexic thought pattern (internal and self-directed, don’t make me say what i didn’t say) that associaties restriction and weight loss with moral goodness.

for each of these there IS a number of exceptions, but you can see case by case how the root cause (trauma, need for control, for self-destruction, growing up poor, whatever you think is “unrelated to fatphobia” basically) is processed through the prism of the fatphobic culture we’ve all been raised in. some people just, voluntarily or not, deal with those root causes in different way, which might or might not be healthy. but it’s a consequence of ambiant fatphobia that “i should starve and be skinny about it” is a statistically pretty common response to this distress.

the point isn’t “it’s fatphobic that you don’t deal with your neuroses in a body positive way uwu” the point is that no matter how cool you are with fat people on like, a personal level, you’ve been (like the rest of us) bombarded with fatphobic thought patterns your entire life basically, both directly fatphobic things and reactions to this fatphobia. maybe spoken to you directly, maybe not. maybe about you maybe about other people. you live in a society that places moral values into looks and health, and also pushes some deeply rooted falsehoods about how those things tie into each other. you have a disorder defined by obsessive behaviors. maybe, just maybe, deconstructing the logic that those obsessives behaviors are based upon will help you deal with this disorder. and recover or reduce harm.

basically, anorexia isn’t “getting skinny disorder” it’s “obsession disorder”, obsession with looking attractive, or pleasing your family, or going back to being a kid, or being healthy, or being fit, or being driven and capable, or being worth saving, or having your suffering known, or having control over something, or whatever. the fatphobia that is omnipresent (and i repeat, omnipresent, nobody is singling you out as a bad fatphobic meanie, or even talking about your behavior towards other people around you) in our society picks the direction in which many many people will express that disorder.

of course if you live in a society that tells you “being fat is morally bad” at every turn, when you start developping an obssessive pathological need to control things, without another factor weighting in, most people’s default reaction will be anorexia. food is a regular fixture of everybody’s life, everyone wants to be morally good, and even if we know/understand/believe to an extent the flaws of that “fat = bad” logic we know the world around us still believes it, and nobody wants to be treated like shit. we can think it’s stupid and fight against fatphobia and work to treat fat ppl better in our lives and support body positivity, but in any case, one always judges oneself on different metrics than they judge others, cuz we control our self-improvement. that’s natural. just it doesn’t mesh well with a pathologically obssessive need for control above self-preservation.

[desire-mona]

for those that are blissfully unaware, tiktok is becoming the new 2014 tumblr in terms of eating disorders and trends that revolve around trying to make people insecure about normal human body parts. can't pinpoint exactly when it started, im theorising around when y2k started to come back in fashion. but it's gotten to a point where people are outright putting a heavy emphasis on the fact that being skinny is superior? i guess?

influencers are posting about their horrendous diets in the form of "what i eat in a day" videos, but some go as far as to outright talk about their disordered eating in a glamorous way while doing their makeup and showing off their body.

the parts of the body that these people deem as ugly are frankly shocking for lack of a better word. people have been making up insecurities about the most mundane, essentially universal features of the human body. im not even sure how to word this because it's so ridiculous to explain out loud (im using voice to text rn). to name a couple: nose gap, which is the space between the bottom of your nose and your top lip (there should be a space there, by the way.) strawberry legs, which are the dots on your legs where the hair follicles are? im not even entirely sure because its just something on my body that ive never paid attention to.

the "micro insecurities" have gone so far that somebody essentially made the "toothpasting" of the modern day?? LMAO 

during a rant video, @ superkeara made up (what was intended to be) a hyperbolic version of one of these pseudo-insecurities, dubbed "vuvuzela arms." vuvuzela arms are when the top of your arm is bigger than your forearm, also known as how an arm works, that was the joke. but people took it seriously, not in that they straight up missed the joke, but more the fact that shit in this vein is so inherently ridiculous that it fit in with its more genuine counterparts. and i would find it much more funny if it weren't something that people actually found a way to be insecure about. i generally like tiktok as a platform but its main user base is becoming concerning.

to add: people also make videos saying that "we need to normalise (whatever pseudo insecurity they're talking about)" or "(whatever pseudo insecurity they're talking about) is sexy" which i suppose is vaguely better because they're encouraging people to like these parts of themselves? but at the same time, please stop making a thing of something that is nowhere even close to the blast radius of a thing.

i've known about the re-rise of eating disorder culture and fatphobia on tiktok for a bit over a year now, but i wasnt actually aware of how deeply ingrained its become, especially among kids. even with ozempic specifically, i thought it was a lot less mainstream and stayed within the sphere of LA influencers with podcasts. but no, random teenagers (and potentially younger) are trying / wanting to go on blood thinners to get skinnier.

if any of my following spends a majority of time on tiktok and sees these videos as something to take to heart: please don't listen when beauty influencers tell you that a part of your body is something that needs to be fixed. if you thought it was normal your entire life, and now somebody is making up a term to tell you that it isn't, youre probably the right one in this situation. a gap between your nose and your lips, dots on your legs, and whatever the fuck vuvuzela arms are, theyre all fine and should not be put on the same level as wisdom teeth or an appendix. 

and before anyone points it out, i know that fatphobia has never fully gone away, that much is obvious. but there is certainly a lot more now compared to 3-5 years ago, especially on tiktok, and ESPECIALLY targeted towards kids.

[oldcoyote]

Understand that I'm trying to say this as gently as possible, but fatphobic culture and diet culture normalises a lot of very unhealthy ways of relating to food. Calorie counting and dieting and skipping meals are normalised methods of disordered eating, even if they don't constitute a full Eating Disorder. Frequently weighing yourself too is a normalised way of developing self hatred for nothing, because it doesn't serve any purpose other than to flagellate yourself--and even if it was a useful corollary for health, it would still be concerning compulsive behaviour. If you were frequently measuring your blood pressure, or your heart rate, or some other easly monitored indicator of health, that would be concerning too, because it would be clear that it takes up an outsized amount of your focus. The fact that you (deliberately?) purge is above and beyond even that.

I don't want to preach to you, but it might be helpful to consider why you do these things, and how it would make you feel if tomorrow you just stopped doing these things. Could you stop? Could you just stop weighing yourself and counting calories and throwing up? Do you think these things are actually health promoting, and if they are do you think they're worth the harm they do? You don't have to answer these to me, but you should think about it.

I know learning about all the garbage lies peddled by fatphobia has been a struggle for you. I really wish the best for you.

thank you so much for worrying love, it's very kind of you. i am reading over this a few times to take all of it in and understand.

i definitely can stop (and have many times) but it tends to be detrimental for me to do so. when i stop weighing myself every day and stop calorie counting, my weight shoots up very fast. i've gained 20kg (44lbs) in the last year because i stopped and tried to let my body just be as it is, and now everything is a lot more frustrating and difficult because of the gain. my chronic pain is worse, and i can't afford to replace the clothing/equipment that's no longer suited to my rapidly expanding frame

i struggle very deeply with the fatposi movement because my internalised fatphobia is so intense. i have zero fatphobia when it comes to anybody else, and i'm so proud of so many people i know and see for letting go of that life and living authentically and loving who they are now - i envy them. i just know in my soul, i can't do that. in the same way i am unfathomably cruel to myself over little mistakes and accidents that aren't even my fault, how i can be so outright abusive to myself, i know at the same time that i could never by any stretch of the imagination be that way to another person that's not me. the only person i can ever deliberately hurt is me, because i am not worth anything, so it doesn't matter

the same goes for the fatness rule. i am proud of, and happy for, everybody else accepting their fatness. it just can't be me.

i don't know how to let go of the ingrained, rock-solid belief that seems etched into my very being that i will finally be happy and worth something when i'm thin. the things i would agree to if someone could just snap their fingers and make me thin in exchange are absolutely horrifying. i want it more than anything. it has been my whole life's desire for decades and at this point, i don't know how to not want it so much. i just want to be worth something more than anything in the world and i don't know how to uncouple my worth from thinness. i don't see thinness as worth or fatness as a lack of worth in any other human being, so i don't know why i can't escape it when it comes to me

i will say that i cannot stop doing these things again, at this stage, i have to keep doing them to keep control over the situation before it escalates and gets even worse. i know these things are horrible and probably will lead to a full blown ED if i don't watch out, but the alternative is something i just cannot afford. i am so so grateful to everybody for trying to help. i just need to figure out some kind of balance. <3

[juniebgroans]

so for like months i've been struggling with the why of why I get so personally frustrated and annoyed with all the people labels on tiktok/instagram/short video content. This isn't like gender and sexuality labels. No, I'm talking labels like "water girlie" and "clean girl" and "almond mom" and however many other "boy" and "girl"/"mom" and "dad" labels that have been created.

and I got so side tracked about the gender aspect of it. Because there is something to be said there, right? about having to label behavior and appearances and actions as belonging to an entire gender, which is both very bioessentialist and also very "this group is a monolith" blah blah blah

but then. but then. I saw a tweet about Dune, a movie/book that I have not read nor watched and have about -2% interest in doing so. But. the tweet was like "Dune is not about the dangers of men with savior complexes, it's actually about the dangers of boy moms". And while I have -2% interest in this story, it is currently the hyperfocus of my husband, whom I love dearly. So I know a thing or two about Dune. And there is a point to the tweet, i.e., one of the themes of the story is about the hidden political power of women in this sci fi society that is male dominated, and the problems that come with that set up to society, both in terms of men with messiah complexes and yes, women who enact their political desires by raising or aligning themselves with certain men with messiah complexes.

and then it hit me

the labels annoy me because they focus on the person and not the systemic issue. Right? Like Dune isn't about "boy moms" it's an examination of how women without the same agency as men might use certain aspects of their assumed gender roles (nurturing, motherhood, etc.) to achieve the agency they desire. So it's not about the person ("boy moms") it's about the society/system (science fiction world that reflects the extreme patriarchy and adherence to gender roles of the 60s, when the book was written).

All this to be said. Because I'm done talking about Dune because fuck Dune lol. Stop making up labels for people, when a label for the society issue/problem that they are engaging with almost certainly already exists. Take a different example - almond mom. It's focused entirely on the criticism of the mom, the person. But it's really just that you had a mom who was fatphobic and believed in whatever weird strain of diet culture most resonated with her and her deeply rooted insecurities that were ingrained in her that she then took out on other people, most likely her children, in a traumatizing way. Unfortunately that does mean that that "almond mom" becomes a real person with real issues that we can almost feel sorry for and sympathize with, even though, y'kno, fatphobia and diet culture are horrible and need to be demolished and don't blame your kid for all your imagined failures.

So all in all - these labels blame the person and not the system. Which both makes it easier for us to get caught up in hating people and furthering disconnection. And it obfuscates discussion about real world systemic violence being committed on a societal, national, international level - because we're too worried about Christine the Boy Mom, instead of the toxic masculinity and rape culture that she has encouraged her son to embrace.

[reversewerewolf]

hey could you not reblog posts calling people fat? its kind of offensive

I am a fat person. Calling someone fat in a derogatory manner is rude, yes, but sharing a resource and support post that uses the term "fat people" and addresses them in a positive way is not.

I'm genuinely sorry that you've been taught that fat is inherently a bad word. Fatphobia and shame around our bodies are deeply ingrained in society, so I do understand this as a gut reaction, but it's okay to be fat and it's okay to share resources that are meant for fat people and say as much.

[greenreticule]

Details on Dexter Jettster in The High Republic!

HE’S BACK, AND HE’S A REOCCURING CHARACTER IN The High Republic Adventures COMICS, STARTING NOVEMBER 30th, 2022!

[ID: Dexter Jettster, a four-armed alien with a boney crest on his head, a wattle on his chin, and a huge mustache, dressed in a long-sleeved white shirt with a tan cape, black pants, and four blaster holsters, on a stage sharing a rousing tale with an audience. End ID.]

From Daniel José Older (the writer)’s Twitter:

And here, of course, is the one and only Dexter Jettster. In this era, we meet him as a master storyteller — a side of Dex you had probably intuited from his too brief on camera moment, but I wanted to see more of. He travels the galaxy having adventures and telling tales 

also MUSTACHE!!!!!

was very happy to be able to include him as a full part of the team and not just a walk on cameo. It’s a big ass team, in part because I kept coming up with new guys and also getting the legacy guys I asked for, so that’s wild, but they need all the help they can… 

Also a note on Dex: one thing I try to be mindful of in my writing is how we represent different body types, particularly fat ones, because of the long history of getting it wrong.

But the issue with slimming down a fat character when they’re younger wasn’t on my radar until [another twitter user, unsure if they want to be mentioned here] tweeted about it in a thoughtful thread a few weeks ago. I went to look at how we’d repped Dex in issue 1, which was already done at that point.

And I really wasn’t sure if we’d done that. The folks I checked with weren’t sure either. Decided to err towards getting it right and reached out to my excellent editor Matt to discuss, and we agreed to ask Toni [the artist] to make sure Dex looks properly fat in the upcoming issues

the in-story premise being that he’s wearing some body armor in the first two issues that he finally gets to take off later. Don’t usually go this in depth on issues that haven’t come out yet, but I think it’s important to be up front about these things.

critique is a sign of a healthy community.

There are many ways to do it, many ways to receive it, many variables in the equation. But this to me is a really good opportunity to be up front about process and the things we can miss. 

Doesn’t really matter what the intentions are when it’s a comic that thousands of people will read. The effect is what matters.

---

I cannot tell you how delighted I am that we not only get Dexter Jettster as a reoccuring character, we also get him as a reoccuring character by a team who are explicitly looking to avoid fatphobia in their work.

Just... holy shit WHAT JOY!!! It’s the thing I have wanted most from a Dex story, and honestly the thing I was never expecting to get, because fatphobia is so ingrained and acceptable.

Now if only Older and Co. can confirm him as demi-panromantic asexual transmasculine... :P

(Hey, a book earlier this year got away with coding Obi-Wan Kenobi as aroace so like IT’S POSSIBLE)

---

For more general details on The High Republic Adventures comic:

The lead character of this run of The High Republic Adventures is Sav Malagán, a Jedi Padawan who sneaks out of the Jedi Temple on Takodana to party with the pirates in Maz Kanata’s castle.

[ID: Comic panels of a young, scrawny alien girl with green skin. Though a Jedi Padawan, she is pulling on distinctly piratey clothes, arming herself with a blaster. Her final outfit is a wide-brimmed metal hat, a poncho that nearly drowns her, and trousers that spill out of boots that are just a bit too big for her. She is ready for adventure! End ID]

Sav shows up for a few issues as a Jedi Master in the 2021 run of The High Republic Adventures. This upcoming 2022 run with Dex acts as a sort of prequel to the 2021 series. However, the upcoming run focusing on Sav’s Padawan years is supposed to be available to newcomers as well, so you can start off your High Republic journey with Dex, Sav, and the rest of Maz’s pirates.

But if you want more Sav (because she is awesome), please read the first run of The High Republic Adventures - available in full now - as well as the manga The High Republic: Edge of Balance, where she is a major character in Volume 2.

[maddsmallow]

cw talking about weight/my body image and my struggle with not viewing myself thru the lens of fatphobia that's been ingrained in me

had a pic taken of me today and just. it's just so easy to see how much fatter i am now than when i still lived in the US with my family. and im trying so hard to not care and just live my life, because they say body neutrality is the first step to body acceptance, but man. i think about my friends seeing me on my snapchat story and seeing my lack of a defined jaw and the way you can see my rolls thru my hoodie and judging me for it, and i just. im so disgusted with myself for how i look, and then that just makes me even more disgusted with myself because why am i feeling that way just because i'm fat!!!! i shouldn't have those thoughts!!! what does that say about me?? it says im still seeing fatness as ugly and undesirable even though ive been working so hard for YEARS to unlearn all the dumb fucking fatphobic bullshit that's been ingrained in me since day fucking one, and that just makes me so mad at myself. i see other fat people and genuinely think they are gorgeous and sexy but then i look at my own self and i'm like. god no ew. why?? im just so angry about it

and like i cant even send the pic to my own mom because the first thing she'll say is that she wishes i would work out to lose weight. which is the first and only thing she said to me when i sent her a pic of me with my husband and some friends of ours at their wedding having fun together. like that's all she saw, that i was even fatter than i was before i moved. and that just really fucking hurt. i dont want people to only see that about me. i dont want people to think im ugly and undesirable like i think i am. i just hate it and i dont know how to deal with it. ugh

anyways

[geopvnk]

always such a special experience to see a post about how fatphobia is so ingrained in our society and the consequences of it and to glance at the comments and see someone be like "well have you considered that being fat is bad" like . oh wow the entire post . sailing right over your head . and not a single word landed on the way . huh .

[growingfeedeeinfrance]

Bonjour Porcelet!🐷 As the feedee gainer community tends to be most prominent in the Anglosphere it's always delightful to encounter those from other cultures & countries discovering the delights of feedism & making it their own! It just shows our innate desire to get fat is such a truly universal impulse for aǁ of us! But I'm curious to ask how you as a French gainer girl view your experience striving to grow fatter with all of France's differing cultural attitudes to diet body-image & cuisine?

Ouch tough question😅 [TW: fatphobia, ED, suicide] I think my story is similar to those in the anglosphere but I can still share x)

The first thing I have to talk about is fatphobia. I was put on a diet at FIVE years old. I wasn't even allowed to go to Bday parties because of the sweets.

So I came to discover feedism at the same time as I began to struggle with eating disorders. I was 10/11 years old, anorexic and already fascinated by fat girls stuffing themselves online. I used to actually have a journal were I would write every synonyms, idioms etc related to being fat, repeating them all in my head to myself before falling asleep.

My teens years were hard because I tried so hard to suppress this kink, I was so ashamed of it, and of my body. Even though I was super fit and skinny. I basically tried for 10 years to get rid of this desire, a form of self-made "therapy conversation" rooted in the shame my mother's fatphobia (and society's) had ingrained in me. I guess the fact that everything was in english online made it a bit more "distanced" and easy to deal with? But I did have the same feelings toward that one episode from the Totally Spies ;)

It was only when I was 20, that I finally opened up to my partner about my kink because I just felled so sad and lonely. I had tried making connections in the online feedism community but I always failed 😅 Along the way I realized that the french langage didn't carry as much attraction and seduction to me when it came to feedism. Like I'm sorry you all but talking to me in french about feedism stuff is just almost always "anti-sexy" 😅

It wasn't for them so I didn't start anything IRL. But after my 2nd attempt at suicide, and during the 1st pandemic lockdown, I started gaining weight (because of some medications + lockdown I guess). I just had to ask myself what I wanted in life and who I wanted to be.

So I realized I was trans (I'm enby!) and that I wanted to pursue this kink in real life as much as I could. So I slowly started to center pleasure in my food habits, and tried to let go of the shame and the guilt (still trying). I have a malformation that makes it impossible for me to stuff myself (I throw up really easily) but I still tried to gradually increase my capacity.

I still feel sad and lonely because I fear that I will never meet someone in real life to share this kink with me. In all the spheres of my life (education, friends, activism...), I'm the fat one now. Which kind of drives me crazy because I'm not even that fat?!? And I'm just like "where are the other fat people?!?"

Even in diverse, kinky and sex positive places, feedism is always new to people and most of those spaces centers thin people. (I'm not "masc" enough to go to bear places 😅). Fatphobia is really pervasive in every spaces, and it's really hard to live through. For instance, EVERY transmasc spaces will center "thin/fit" bodies as the GOAL for transition. Like I want a more masculine body but I don't want to be thin. I want to keep my boobs and have less hips to reduce the "hourglass" body I have. It's super hard (almost impossible) to find cute, masc clothes that fit me. All of the environmental groups I'm in put big importance in highly physical activities and put fitness forward all the time. There is no relaxing or enjoying our bodies. WE HAVE TO BE FIT and want it. Public transport is also hard because the seats are so tiny (same in education). And fatphobia is still intense in medical places (like I went to see a cardiologist because my mom has heart issues and she told me my heart was super healthy but I still had to lose weight. why? no idea), and in familial settings (it's just for your heath etc etc).

Gaining would be soooo much easier if society wasn't so fatphobic. I hate it so much because I still have those moments where I feel I should try to lose weight because I fear I'm becoming "too ugly" (especially as a transmasc person) and I'll end up alone. And I've decided to center the relationships I have in my life and I don't want my partners to be disgusted by my body. That's why I never share my videos/photos with them and I only post on Tumblr. Thank you all for the feedist community online, I don't know where I'll be without it.

For the cuisine, having spent some times in the US, I have to admit that France's diversity in food makes gaining all the more enjoyable. And while yes, a lot of the food is centered around thinness/healthyness, most traditional dishes are much more hearty and fattening!!! (and delicious!!) And my sweet tooth is just in looove with french pastries!!! But I admit I like my twice a week american fast food x)

I don't know if I've really answered your question, don't hesitate if you want more details about some specific aspects of my experience in France!

[bisexualhobi]

there's so much iw ant to say about the fatphobia issue but i don't know how to organize it. i hope it's ok to put this here instead. if not, feel free to disregard this thank you. a couple things to point out:

- i have been fat my whole life. even then, i cannot speak for every fat person and their opinions may not be the same as mine.- haechan, by definition, is not fat. he wears standard sized clothing. he has the average (he's even on the smaller, thinner side) body size of korean males his age. not fat.

- jokes are only jokes when it's funny for both parties. otherwise that's just an insult, especially when made at the expense of the receiving end.

- anyone can be fatphobic. even i have internalized fatphobia that i work on actively rejecting every day because it is so ingrained in my (southeast asian) culture.

- anyone who calls someone big, fat, 'muscular', 'chubby', says they take up too much physical space, etc then laughs it off, is fatphobic. that's not a neutral tone. again even when i sigh and complain that i'm getting 'too fat', it still stems from shame and internalized fatphobia. and it's not ok.

thanks for this. i am not fat and have never been considered fat, i don't wanna speak over fat people. but i do find it very confusing to hear people try to defend this behavior by saying that "if you get offended by them calling haechan fat you're being fatphobic because you're taking fat to mean an insult." i do not think being fat is bad or should be considered an insult, but it's undeniable that when these kpop idols use that word they 100% mean it as an insult - simply because of the way their culture is heavily fat shaming (among other things) and them having grown up with these ideas. i hope they can leave haechan alone and that any fans of the group that feel targeted by this and that feel shamed by this can protect their own mental health. no group is worth subjecting yourself to shame