"Fat girl rodeo,pull a pig games and banter shags."

[Darkesteyes]

Spotted this article in my Twitter feed today.
Its made me sad and very very angry. Feckin RAGE.

its really vicious mysogny and an awful way to treat people. Was so angry it had me in tears. (anger tends to bring them on sometimes)


www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/fat-girl-rodeo-and-pull-a-pig-games-the-banter-shag-lads-need-to-grow-up-8531278.html

[BeyondTheLimitsOfAcceptability]

Not surprising :(
I know men like this, luckily for me most of them are former acquaintances.

[AbigailAdams]

Oh wow! That was much worse than I initially thought from reading your OP. So it's "awesome" to assault a woman (possibly sexually, it wasn't clear) for the purpose of humiliating her. Vile vile men.

[whimsicalmess]

I bet a lot of bigger women will be very wary off 'attention' now.

[DeafLeopard]

How utterly vile. Where does such hatred come from?

[VerySmallSqueak]

I am utterly speechless.

[Darkesteyes]

Its absolutely horrific what they are doing. Im a size 20 and i would be wary.
They are relying on the women not saying anything because of the humiliation and embarrassment aspect.
I can just imagine how it would go if a woman complained to a bouncer or manager of a club.
Woman ....This guy grabbed hold of me and said he would like to rape me and wouldnt let me go.
Bouncer ......is this true.
Mysogynist......Of course it isnt true. Look at her. Do you really think id want to rape THAT.
And im guessing that this scenario runs through these ladies minds when they consider reporting it so they dont because of the embarassment.
Bastards.

[MummyPigsFatTummy]

Some of the comments are almost worse than the behaviour the article is discussing. And loads of them come down to - well, so what, they're fat, they deserve it - which incidentally is not a million miles away from the judgmental attitude displayed about fat people on here.

I fail to understand the reason for the vitriol levelled at fat people and how they are such fair game. Fat people as a group may cost the NHS a lot but so do smokers, drinkers, and people with risky lifestyles - motorcyclists, for example. People do criticise all of those other groups for their behaviour but not in the same hate-fuelled way they attack fat people.

I am fat - I eat too much - I like cakes. I also work and have a good job, pay tax and have not taken out of the NHS more than many people do (well, I may have done but only because I had cancer as a teenager (non-fat related)and some of the ongoing repercussions of that may have been a bit pricey). However, the fact that it is hard to find fashionable clothes in my size is my problem, no-one else's. I am not throwing myself at thin, beautiful men demanding they look at me and take me out. I don't sit on non-fat people to make them suffer. I can't infect people with my fatness. So why the hatred? Fat is the fat person's problem. Not anyone else's. Why don't people look at themselves and worry about their own problems ? Apologies about going off-topic a bit, but the fat-hating comments make me so mad.

[Darkesteyes]

Totally agree with you MummyPig.
Overweight people are the "safe prejudice"

Even highly intelligent people are affected by these messages that society perpetuates.
Im thinking of when Hilary Mantel wrote an article for the Guardian website explaining why shes overweight.
That she felt the need to justify it in the first place makes me very sad.
She is an extremely talented woman.

[Schooldidi]

That is truly awful. I don't think I know anyone who would participate in games like that, and I don't think I knew any when I was younger either.

I'd like to say I can't believe people would behave like that but I can and it's very sad.

[MummyPigsFatTummy]

I agree with you entirely about Hilary Mantel, Darkesteyes. It was also telling that when she wrote that piece which was misinterpreted as a criticism of Kate Middleton, the DM andothers suggested she was jealous of how slim and beautiful Kate is. The DM had a particularly vicious little side-bar on the topic of her weight struggles, if I recall.

In relation to your point about the message one gets about fat, my DB used to be overweight and a smoker. He has recently lost serious amounts of weight and is constantly (and rightly) complimented on how well he looks. He is still a smoker. That will probably kill him if he doesn't give it up but he won't (well, I hope he will eventually but he won't for the moment) because being a smoker does not bring the social opprobrium being fat does. The corollary, of course, is that giving up smoking does not bring anything like the level of congratulation and ego-boosting that losing weight does becuase you can't see the effects of smoking the way you can see the effects of cakes.

[bleedingheart]

How can threatening a woman with rape be classed as banter? I'm so upset at the idea that a woman should be thought grateful of this attention! How dare they?!
Agree about prejudice against people who are overweight. I see/hear it a lot.

[whimsicalmess]

is this like a new thing happening?

[CoalDustWoman]

I remember the (male) rugby/football teams doing this in the early 90s, so not new.

[Darkesteyes]

Wonder how many members of those rugby teams are overweight themselves now twenty years later.
Bet they wouldnt like the same attitudes being shown to them. Overweight men arent treated with the same vilification that overweight women are though.

Eric Pickles gets slated because of his weight but he is a man in the public eye.
As that article shows women dont need to be in the public eye to experience vitriol because of their weight.
They only need to walk into a nightclub or pub. Or even just walk past a pub in the daytime.

[CoalDustWoman]

As I said on another thread earlier this week - women make a big mistake when they underestimate how much a significant minority of men hate them.

[whimsicalmess]

I agree that women are treat worse, fat men are often treat as a bit of a lad, but then again men are more likely to be called 'fat tony' by mates etc , that just wouldn't happen in a group of lasses, well not one that valued their lives

[Darkesteyes]

I think if a man approached me in a social setting now i would just walk away. Self preservation would come first.

[Kirk1]

I'm glad I searched first, I was going to post about this. It popped up on a friends Facebook stream. She's a large woman (also disabled, so exercise is a problem.) I can't see that humiliation is "attention so they love it" I can't think of any attention I'd want less than some drunken wanker sexually threatening me. And no, it isn't new, but perhaps it's time to shout about it, say "enough, it's not clever or funny"?

[PrincessUnderpaid]

I read an article about this at DPs this evening!
Banter mentaility
Bloody disgusting.

[PrincessUnderpaid]

Sorry ipad spelling.

[whimsicalmess]

Its disgusting, but tbh this isn't something that's entirely new.

I often got my arse grabbed at school purely because it was large etc, their was one lad who would wait until it was something like fire drill, queing up to fondle my arse in front of everyone and it was humiliating but I was more surely if you have just groped someone as ugly as me the joke is on you? ....what goes in a mans mind eh.

[NoTimeForS]

I don't know anybody who would behave like this, nor think it funny.
The author of the article clearly needs a drastic friend-cull.