The Power of Fatness

I've been thinking lately about how powerful it is to be fat.

To allow yourself to be fat. To embrace it. To relish in it.

And how we live in a culture that will do absolutely everything it possibly can to prevent us from holding that much power.

See, to be fat is to be big. And we're supposed to be small. Especially women. Especially queers. Especially BIPOC. Especially trans folks. If you are a straight, white, heterosexual, cisgender man, then you can be as gigantic as you want! Stomp on everyone!! Scream at the sun!!! You will be rewarded for it!!!!!

But everyone else? It's our job to shut up and get out of the way.

Which is just like... what the fuck? Who signed me up for this??

I sure as hell didn't sign myself up. But I did adhere to it for many years. Of course, there was always some part of me that was trying to bust through the seams of this shitty hand I was dealt. I got in yelling matches with my brother and father, went off to college and chopped off all my hair, tattooed my body, pierced all sorts of things, became an angry feminist, started kissing girls, drank and smoked and fucked everything in sight... just to spite everyone. Just to throw it in their faces. Just to drown out the pain of having to cram myself into the tiny little space our society had allotted for me. Just to numb myself from the searing pain of a lifetime of being subjugated and abused by men who were allowed to take up the space I never could. 

But through all of the rebellion and self medication, by obsession with physical smallness remained. I starved myself and shrank myself and cut myself and tried to kill myself. I wanted to take all of it out on my body. I wanted to shrink into oblivion... I wanted to become so small that I no longer existed.

And yet.

In spite of it all... I am still here.

Which is pretty fucking amazing, honestly. My body has been strong enough to withstand hurricane after hurricane after hurricane and not break. After everything, after trying to force myself into the smallest emotional crawl spaces I could find for years on end... my body said, nope. We're done here. It's time to grow. 

And what an incredible gift that is. How incredibly beautiful, that my body has expanded beyond my wildest dreams. 

My body finally decided that it will not be smashed and it will not be caged. It will not be diminished or erased from the face of the earth. My body stared defiantly into the face of a world that wants it dead, into the eyes of the people who tried to kill it, and said OH YEAH? YOU WANNA FUCKING GO, DUDE?? LET'S DO THIS.

And guess what happened. 

I got fat.

What a miracle.

I survived. I started eating again. I fell in love. I went back to school. I set boundaries. I picked up all the shards of my shattered self, and started putting them back together again. I started to clean and dress my emotional wounds. I started to heal. 

And that's the thing about fatness. It is reparative. Because to be fat is to be satiated. To be well fed. To be comfortable. To be healthy. To be soft. To be whole. To be growing, instead of wasting away. 

The thing I keep thinking about is... they tell us from childhood that fatness is evil, lazy, grotesque, monstrous... you can fill in your own blanks there. We're all handed this idea that the worst thing we can be is fat, and we're expected to put that idea in our back pocket and hang onto it for the rest of our lives. At any moment, we might be quizzed - we might be asked, "What does it mean to be fat?" And we're expected to pull the card out and read it back, and say solemnly and diligently, "To be fat is to be evil, lazy, grotesque, monstrous, etc." And we receive a pat on the head, and stick our heads back in our salads, and stay hungry, and know that we are Good Citizens and Good People, and carry on living our small lives.

But like... what if we took the card out and fucking burned it? 

What if we ripped it up and spat on it? What if we bought a huge billboard in downtown LA that screamed in giant letters, "THEY HAVE BEEN LYING TO YOU!! BEING FAT IS FINE!! EAT SOME FUCKING FOOD!!!"

Like, how punk rock is that?!?

And that is what terrifies them. That is exactly what they're afraid of. We're expected to all make this bullshit agreement with one another and keep quiet about it, and the Powers That Be are absolutely terrified that someone is going to stand up in the middle of a crowded restaurant and holler at the top of their lungs that the agreement means NOTHING. That we can break it. That we never had to agree to it in the first place.

That's what I keep thinking about.

Getting fat means taking that power back.

It means buying the billboard. It means hollering in the crowded restaurant. It means laughing! I swear to god, it means laughing in the face of this ridiculous lie we're all told. It means sitting back on your lounge chair by the pool, pouring another glass of champagne, feeding your big beautiful mouth a grape, and laughing your fat ass off at the lunacy of the whole system.

To be fat is to say, fuck it.

To be fat is to rest. To be fat is to eat. To be fat is to give yourself a break. To be fat is to stop trying so hard to control everything. To be fat is to shoot the middle finger at every single system of oppression. To be fat is to shine your light into the darkness, to show others the path forward. To be fat is to love your body too much to hurt it. To be fat is to allow your body to just be. To be fat is to surrender to goodness, sweetness, softness, care, and abundance. Above all else, to be fat is to take. up. space. 

And you're trying to tell me that allowing my body to be fat means losing my power? That to be fat is to be weak?? Oh HELL no. To embrace my fatness in a world that wants me dead is to claim my power, not relinquish it. Like, can you even imagine? Can you feel the sheer audacity of it? The fearlessness it takes to defiantly allow your body to grow, against all odds??

I mean... no wonder being fat makes people so damn uncomfortable. People who are fat and happy are inherently disruptive to a system that most people are deeply attached to upholding. If you see me, and I'm out here in my crop top and short shorts, with my belly out, it's gonna hold up a mirror to the hatred you hold toward your own body, and your commitment to staying small. All of a sudden your brain says wait, if she can do it, why can't I? Why am I still hiding? Why is she allowed to wear that? To look like that? To smile like that? Why am I... not? At which time, you take the card out of your back pocket and recite the words you have so perfectly memorized. 

And you know what... I pity you for that. I really do. And I hope someday, you can shake off the shackles of fatphobia and step into the light as well. I hope you burn up the card. I hope you drive past the billboard. I hope you hear us hollering in the restaurant, and I hope you start hollering, too. 

In the meantime, us fat folks are still gonna be here.

We're gonna stay out in the sun, living our lives, swimming, eating, laughing, frolicking, making out, singing badly, stretching out on our couches, having great sex, telling our stories, taking up space, and just generally not giving a good goddamn.

It's not our fault if y'all can't handle it.

But you're welcome to join us when you're ready.