Daily Archives: October 16, 2013

Fat Body Politics

16 Wednesday Oct 2013

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Trolling by Dude Bros™: Fat positive backlash in the spotlight

“If you weren’t already aware, this past week has been dubbed “Fat Shaming Week” by a small group of men who incorrectly assume that shaming will actually make fat women thin. Leaving aside that these dude bros have created a week to shame fat women as they are in tears over their lack of boners because fat women are fat. It sounds like a personal problem and the notion that fat people are unfuckable is unfounded (social construction anyone?). They spent the beginning of the week harassing every fat activist, news source and blogger they could find as an attempt to have their “campaign” get attention.

I was one of about five people who had been tweeted at on Monday when their “campaign” started and like everyone else ignored them until Buzzfeed thoughtlessly pick it up. While I’m happy that the few major sites who wrote something about the week framed it as being disgusting, almost all of them have centered the tweets they shared around the worst tweets that could be found in the hashtag. In the beginning of the week almost all of the tweets were directed specifically at fat women but quickly devolved into arguments about health, which shows how little fat shamers actually care about health and in reality are interested in promoting an ideal body type that they find to be physically / sexually pleasing.

A few other fat / body positive bloggers have written a response to the week and you can find them here, here and here (tw weight loss talk). I wanted to create a post that specifically outlines the kind of responses to this week I had as well as other people on twitter. While most news sources have focused on the hateful tweets by the creator and his numerous fake twitter accounts, the outpouring of people objecting to this week has been too big to ignore.

It says something about a man’s self worth when they have to organize a hate week to slander women. #fatshamingweek

— Amanda Levitt (@FatBodyPolitics)

October 10, 2013

Must be hard to comprehend that many women are not interested in conforming to heteronormative white beauty ideals. #fatshamingweek

— Amanda Levitt (@FatBodyPolitics)

October 10, 2013

Look how quickly #FatShamingWeek has changed to talking about “health” and not women being “fuckable.” Ya’ll are predictable.

— Amanda Levitt (@FatBodyPolitics)

October 10, 2013

One positive aspect of the reclaiming of #FatShamingWeek – I’ve found so many new fabulous babes to follow who have important things to say

— Haley (@haleycue)

October 11, 2013

i pity the trolls who think being called out on their misogyny and fatphobia constitutes #misandry & #bigotry #fatshamingweek

— Ari Burton (@atypewritersing)

October 10, 2013

#FatShamingWeek was prolly created by the same dirge of the earth that came up with the term “friend zone” & other anti-women rhetoric

— Ari Burton (@atypewritersing)

October 10, 2013

Losers posting stupid shit for #FatShamingWeek : for every post you make, we’ll give away a free gift & a coupon to a customer#FUfatshamers

— Re/Dress (@ReDressLuvsU)

October 10, 2013

#fatshamingweek is every week. luckily some of us have already found #HAES & #bodypositivity & #fatactivism.

— Dorianne (@headonist)

October 10, 2013

When you talk about obesity as a problem to be eradicated, be aware that’s an eliminationist and ignorant position. #FatShamingWeek

— Brienne of Snarth (@femme_esq)

October 10, 2013

Congratulations. #fatshamingweek is a real thing on Twitter right now. And we wonder why kids starve and kill themselves. #keepitupworld

— Meghan Tonjes (@meghantonjes)

October 10, 2013

Let’s face facts. Fat shamers lack self control. They’ve never shown the will power to limit themselves to a single serving of fat shaming.

— Brian Stuart (@red3blog)

October 10, 2013

Fat shamers say they are only bullying fat people on special occasions, but just look at them. They are bullying from dawn to dusk.

— Brian Stuart (@red3blog)

October 10, 2013

October is Bullying Prevention Awareness Month. This week has given even more proof that bullying is not something that only happens when someone is a child but continues on throughout their lifetime and is deeply rooted in different forms of marginalization. Read my post, Bullying It’s Not Just for Kids

This was also posted on my blog.”