Fat/Size Acceptance

Equal rights and equal opportunities means the strong giving the weak a leg-up, in my understanding. 'Empowerment' is not a buzzword for the pointless; it means taking, using and building power so as to share power.

Far too many women designate themselves not very bright and not powerful etc. This is an issue at the heart of feminism.

Hear hear.

Interesting "clever, powerful and active are not universal traits of women. some people are none of those three things. "

This is an issue at the heart of feminism. Far too women designate themselves not very bright and not powerful etc. Wwe need to ask why? Have their families conditioned them to a life of cleaning and service and how can we change things so that many more women would quite like to lead the country, run companies and the like. These are the real issues for feminism and the mind set of women. Are they sitting home scrubbing floors stuffing themselves with biscuits precisely because they have ende dup in a dead end housewife situation? Are women who work slimmer? I suspect so because their lives are more fulfilling, they are richer rounded lives.

Oh Xenia banging the same old drum no matter what.

I don't think I've said women who don't work are more worried about their looks although now you'ver raised it if you live off male earnings then part of the deal is if you dont' stay looking thin and sexy enough he'll leave for a younger woman and as he's the meal ticket you can't risk that. That illustrates why the housewife model is so pernicious. If you out earn h im 10x then the same issues don't apply.

Englishwomen and men have been known for their eccentricity and not always caring that much what people think. I think that's a lovely aspect of being English so more women perhaps should consider adopting it rather than having to fall in with some shallow vein herd of women.

There is nothing to stop anyone now this second si mply changing their mind set to think so what if someone thinks I look XYZ , I am happy as I am.

What feminism also means is women take a responsibility for themselves and don't go round saying XYZ is the fault of others. We are powerful clever active women who can determine not only our own thoughts but our earning power and careers and lives, rather than being cast at sea having to do what vacuuous magazines might tell us.

The feminist issue is the way women seem to give their looks so much significance. It's not even traditionally morally right. It is what we do and how we treat others that counts. If you have no work or are bored you might well be fussing about how you look but that's not a good way to spend mental energy.

We also need people not to feel pressued by others. Why are some of us in a sense not caring of what people think and others aren't? Are some of us just born more able to resist peer or societal pressure than others? If you're content in yourself then you make the choice about what you wear, how you look etc

(BMI works for a lot of people . At my height a healthy BM Is from about 8 stone to 10 and a half stone. Most women aren't muscled and body builder fit so if they have a BMI over 25 they are overweight. Doctors often use a waist measurement instead though - if you're over 32 inches, bit of a risk, over 35 inches much more)

Yes definitely. I enjoy food loads more now. I relish all of it because I feel hungry and I make sure the calories I have actually count in enjoyment terms. The idea that dieting makes you miserable isn't true. There's loads of yummy healthier stuff. And there's nothing I can't have anyway. I just have a bit less because too much makes me feel sluggish. None of this good food/ bad food/ food as a sin nonsense.

sAF, thanks. I've always felt that you are less likely to overeat if you savour each mouthful. Can you tell I like to cook?

I think what disturbs me most in all of this is people being made to think they need to lose, or put on weight when they don't.

we need to let go of the body facism in any direction and focus on health, focus on well being and the functionality of our bodies and seeing food as fuel and exercise as positive and pleasurable. imo.

Exactly.

But one needs to be careful with the food as fuel thing. You (collective you) don't want people demonising the enjoyment of food.

stripey! The blog I linked to must have caught a virus. I'll report my post.

It's a difficult one. The FA lobby has a lot to fight back against, in terms of rejecting the mainstream (media) portrayal of attractive=thin. However, I agree that the "big is beautiful" line is just as perverse,only in reverse.

Similarly, i think they're on a losing streak trying to persuade society that being extremely overweight doesn't carry health problems when it's fairly apparent that it does.

All that said, we as a society HAVE to get over the demonisation of fat people. It's one of the last bastions of acceptable discrimination. Many people who are extremely overweight will never get within the BMI 20-25 range. There are so many complex factors at play in terms of why people get fat and stay fat that it's simply not realistic in a society with an abundance of calorific food to expect the number of overweight people to fall significantly. It's just not as simple as "If you fancy a snack, don't have a cupcake, have a carrot".

I would like to a situation where body size is just a fact. The government is just wasting money on all these obesity initiatives, and persecuting people for a bit of extra padding is hardly the sign of a civilised society.

I always think that if the aliens came down and saw how much time we spend worrying about our collective weight they'd turn to one another and say "Jeez, these guys really need to sort out their priorities"

sAF, exactly! I used to be much bigger due to ADs and general unhappiness. I got off the ADs and out of the situation I was in. I started to move more because I was happier and then gave birth to my DD.

I had previously hated my body for its looks, but now every time I think like that, I remind myself that I carried a baby for nine months and birthed her well. My body's functioning there was pretty awesome. The result? I'm probably the healthiest I've ever been.

The key though is that I didn't do it by punishing myself. I looked at the situation I was in and changed that.

No I'm not doing therapy - not a great believer in it apart from a few specific exceptions tbh. I had PND after ds and had therapy and it just led to me dwelling on things I couldn't change. It's probably my personality. The 2 main causes for me to be so miserable in recent years have been sort of dealt with. One is resolved (I had the much yearned for dc3) and the other (dh's chronic illness and inability to work - I've mostly learned to accept). But enough about me :)

Interesting to compare weight loss with stopping smoking and attitude of other smokers. Although it's interesting I've had no negativity from any men, overweight or otherwise.

I couldn't have got into a place where I'd have successfully lost weight if I hadn't been feeling better about myself so I definitely think the vilifying of women for being fat makes matters worse in every way. But at the same time accepting I was meant to be obese would have probably killed me.