It amazes me how people can be so ignorant to the very meaning they are trying to convey. A while back a couple pictures constantly showed up on my facebook feed. Most of these pictures showed two women, one on the heavy end and the other very skinny - the message was that the heavier woman was a lot more attractive because she had more weight. The comments on these pictures were ridiculously bias and hurtful. I constantly saw references to how men like "real" women with curves and not "bones." A lot of people said very hurtful things about women who were below their weight standard of "beauty." I found it surprising how so many people could say that "fat-bashing" was ridiculous and wrong and that the woman was beautiful despite her "excess" weight, and yet at the same time made a comment about how "gross" it was to be skinny. I don't think they saw the irony in their statement. Let's stop "fat-bashing" and start "skinny-bashing"? What?
I've come to the conclusion that no matter how much you weigh, you are going to get judged and malicious insults thrown your way. About 500 times moreso if you are female. I'm not even going to call it fat or skinny bashing because it doesn't matter if you are considered one or the other - people judge everyone for all weights, there really doesn't seem to be a middle ground. Besides that, fat and skinny are such relative terms that it's impossible to really determine.
I have a theory that this weight bashing shows up because of the way we were raised and the society we grew up in. I don't know if this is as common in other countries as America, but I imagine it would with any well off country, and likely a lot less in third-world countries. Growing up we are taught that our bodies are pretty much disgusting. Think about it, as youngsters we had no problem running around naked with no shame. We were told to wear clothes and if we ran around naked while guests were around we might even get in trouble. Then as we get older we run into even more complicated problems. If women especially wear revealing clothes they are subject to sexual insults, harassment, and even going as far as being blamed if they are raped. Because blaming the victim makes sense, right? And if you ever went to a public school there was a good chance you were the focus of some bully. I was constantly bullied by two girls in middle school who would tell me on a daily basis that I was ugly. As I walked home one day a person even made a comment "It's not halloween you don't have to wear a mask!" Because that is hilarious and original. My self-esteem was shitty because people around me were insecure about themselves and throwing it around. It wasn't until late high school that I learned how beautiful I really am - on the inside and out. Why should I care if someone thinks I'm ugly anyway? No one is beautiful to everyone. If the standards of beauty were that cut and dry the world would be boring and everyone would eventually look the same after centuries of reproducing.
Every site I have looked at has shown the sexual crime rate in naturist colonies to be non-existent. The simple answer to "why" is that the people get so used to seeing everyone else naked that it doesn't bother anyone. Seeing naked bodies is just part of everyday life, it's normal! Our society pushes naked bodies and partially naked bodies on us as always sexual - and so we learn that. Naked bodies = sexual. But that's because of the way we were raised, not mother nature doing her thing. Otherwise naturist colonies would have a much higher sexual crime rate!
This whole mentality only makes us feel even more insecure about ourselves. If we don't ever see other regular people naked as we grow up, how are we going to feel about ourselves and our bodies? The naked bodies we are exposed to are photoshopped in magazines, websites, or porn sites. This is not a realistic expectation of what people look like. This is a main cause of self esteem issues in my opinion because we attempt to compare ourselves to the pictures of people that society says is attractive and of course we don't look like them, so we then feel like we are the only ones who don't look like this unrealistic expectation of human flesh. Men think their penises are small, women think their boobs are wrong, and also that their labia looks wonky. Then of course our weight.
I think the message should be "everyone is beautiful!" not "this girl is beautiful because she isn't a skinny model standard!" Come on guys, we can't just get better at one side and then get worse on the other. The reason people have eating disorders is because of our unhealthy mentality of the naked human body, the natural human body. Health does not factor into how much you weigh at all and due to different medical reasons, body types, and metabolism anyone can be any weight no matter how much they eat or exercise. The whole "It's unhealthy" argument just goes out the window when you have any actual understanding of health and weight.
According to these contradicting people on the internet I am a sickly looking, curve-less, ugly skinny girl who no guy could ever find attractive. Oh, I'm also unhealthy too. All I have to say to this is that I am healthy, my body type is small anyway and I can eat a LOT of food. My boyfriend also finds me very attractive, along with other people who have made passes at me without knowing me. So either I am defying the laws of nature, or the mentality of these people is incorrect. Beauty is not based on weight. Don't judge someone if they don't weigh enough or weigh too much for your standards of people. And if someone is telling you that you are too "fat" or too "skinny" then you know what? Get rid of them and find someone who respects you for you and not your body. You shouldn't have to change for someone, if they are your friend or your significant other they should be there for YOU.
Oh and another thing I found kind of funny. My dad would tell me and my brother constantly that we needed to eat more and get more "meat on our bones." If I could go back in time and change my reaction, I would have told him that I was beautiful just the way I was and that if he wanted me to change he could find a new daughter. I'm proud to be who I am. If you have a problem with me because of what I look like, that's too bad because I am not going to change it for you. If we change our views and realize that everyone is different, maybe we can stop the weight bashing and raise peoples self esteems.
