AIBU - two different rules for body weight

[AnnoyedinJanuary]

I am hopping not to get abuse for this one or have it that I am looking for sympathy because I am not. I am just fed up of the comments that I am receiving.

As background I am almost 6 foot tall and very slender - size 6-8. I don't have big bones and am generally a stressful person and have a young family and full time job so never get to sit down. Last year I was dealing with a number of issues which were very stressful and I did lose weight - I don't like it when I get too thin - but I thought once the stress went away it would go back on again, not so much. But the number of comments that I have had to face started off as tiring but now are getting really annoying.

These comments range from
(1) what do you eat? people ask me what I have had for my lunch - even though they can see me eating in the office - (I actually eat what is a largely balanced diet but I do love chocolate and so will always eat a bar during the day at work)
(2) what do I eat when I go home? people who are on diets in the office say they want to look like me - while others say "no you don't she looks ill / sick" (even when I am clearly within earshot) and
(3) my favourite - DO YOU EAT??? I've been told when going round to friends for supper and telling them not to go to any trouble - that no they want to cook for me to "make me fatter". I am always asked about my body morphology - have I always been like this etc.?

One of the other girls I work with also of a v slight build faces exactly the same comments. People will come up behind me and touch my shoulders or if we hug good bye say "there's nothing of you there" - if I complain I am cold it's because I am "too thin" almost every comment is brought back somehow to my weight.

Recently I got to thinking - why do people think that it's ok to say something like that to someone who is thin - when we wouldn't dare dream of offending someone who was on say the slightly heavier side. When was the last time you asked an overweight person unprovoked - what do you eat? or said something like - I mean you can't have woken up like that you must be eating the wrong foods or too much? or I see you've had a salad and diet coke for lunch - so do you stuff your face when you go home then? or if they say they are hot - then it must be because they are too fat and need to lose weight - or - come over to mine I can make you a salad so you get thin. Or hug them and say - wow there's rather a lot of you there isn't there? Or have you always been this fat? Or comment when we see them eating a chocolate bar? I mean we just wouldn't would we? Because it's not nice and you don't know what's going on in their lives or if they are happy or not with their weight and if not you wouldn't like to hurt anyone's feelings right?

Do people think that thin people have thick skins or something or because the world seems some how stupidly to glorify thinness that you must be ok if you are thin and therefore it doesn't matter what you say. All of this has made me stress even more about my appearance at a time when I am dealing with a huge and very stressful personal issue. I have started to buy clothes which are less fitting so that my true shape can't be seen in the hope that it brings me less attention.

On my FB feed almost weekly, I see articles about someone who posted a photo of themselves on Instagram or FB and got body shamed because some stupid person thought they were overweight and made some nasty comment and the article is usually about their put down, which is always deserved. We are trying to teach our young girls that it's ok to be whatever size they are so long as they are healthy and happy and comfortable in their own skin. We instil in our daughters the fact that they are beautiful and weight is just a number but yet for me it's not been like that. Because of all the comments I have faced over the years I have never ever commented on any other person's weight, I am extremely sensitive on this matter but it is none of my business what my friends or family weigh. And when I was brought up I was taught if you can't say something nice - don't say anything at all, but that's not what I am finding. It is starting to affect my own confidence now and I hate that. Does another other Mumsnet lady out there experience the same?

I completely agree that there is no need for anyone to make crass comments about another persons weight, I have to say as someone who has yoyoed all her life that comments against fat people are far nastier in the main. Yes I'm sure people say very hurtful and rude things when you are thin. When I was thin many people asked me if I was anorexic etc. I once had to miss a team meal because I had flu and I was told that people said I had gone home to make myself sick !these comments are stupid rude and ignorant but nowhere near as hurtful as getting laughed at / shouted at in the street which I did when I was a size 20. I'm not saying it's a competition OP and that you are not entitled to your feelings, but based on my experience I had it way way worse when I was overweight.

I disagree with people saying comments at thin people are meant as a compliment.

Being told I looked 'fucking disgusting' was not complimentary.

At 5'4 and a size 8 I was the right weight for my size.

It's always inappropriate to comment on someone's weight or shame them for their body size. I think the difference is that as someone else has said people almost always think being thin is a compliment so feel that they're not being offensive (even while saying clearly offensive things). It's also sometimes motivated by jealousy. When people make comments to people who are overweight they tend to be malicious. I just don't think it should ever be a topic for public discussion unless someone specifically decides they want to discuss their body size.

YANBU. I'm 5'8 and size 6-8 as I have an overactive thyroid. According to the other women in my office, I am "lucky". I'm bony, cold, shaky and even had to quit coffee because of the palpitations. Lucky, my arse.

I'm slim too. I hate the comments, so much so that it generally makes me abrasive and unsympathetic to larger people simply because of the amount of times they've sprayed crumbs at me whilst scowling "Are you anorexic?" or "God, you must live on lettuce" or "Your face is haggard." I haven't yet replied with "Fuck off, lardy" but I'm close.

Even in online discussion where people are 'trying' to be polite you'll eventually have someone creeping in with "well frankly it's impossible to be slim unless you skip meals and eat very little..." Yeah, again, fuck off lardy.

I slimmed from an 8 to a 6 and the comments just RAMPED up, because I was at the gym preparing for a powerlifting competition and so eating a lot. Eating a lot and looking slimmer - blew their minds. They practically went into overdrive - eating disorders! Look, look, she's eating eggs! EGGS I SAY! She claims she eats porridge but we know she's a liar! Look at those horrid muscles, ew ew, I'd never want to look like you!

I actually rather enjoy it, in a dark little way. That's right, tubs, work yourself up into a frothy lather...

Anyway, you can construct your own go-to put-down - "Wow, it's so rude to comment on people's weight!" is more polite than mine.

What BigBagofJelly said

Saukko

Comfort yourself in the knowledge it's all pure jealousy. There's no way people make obvious derogatory comments like that unless to drag others down. They'd love to be slim and you and they know it.

Erm, I am size 6, eat loads the whole day but no one has ever made any unflattering comments about my weight. If anything, people occasionally voice their incredulousness but not in a sarcastic or mean way. Not sure why my experience is so different from others.

No, it is not right to put a thin person down for their weight any more than a fat person.

Saukko

Your comment .."That right , tubs.." makes you just as bad as they are surely? You can't complain about someone commenting on your figure and then do the same thing.Well , your choice I suppose but it undermines the argument.

When you start appearing that thin that people comment then maybe it's time to start wondering if perhaps things are getting out of hand.

Years ago I became seriously underweight, combination of newborn and going through a divorce and eating was the last thing on my mind. The pounding and relentless anxiety ensures that I never felt hungry and survived on very little.

Had it not been for somebody making a comment which literally made me stop in my tracks, I'd never of realised just how dangerous things had become. It took effort to build my appetite, to feel hunger again and that meant eating when I wasn't hungry,and I am so glad that the person made that comment and gave me the shake up that I so desperately needed!

On reflection I'm probably guilty of remarking on people being skinny. Hand on heart I've never meant to upset anyone. People who struggle with their weight find it difficult to see it as anything other than the greatest compliment imaginable! That said I really do think it's different to remarking on someone being overweight. The reason as far as I'm concerned is glaringly obvious. Current culture dictates that thinness, even to an extreme extent, is something to be strived for. Size 10 women look at themselves in the mirror and decide to go on a diet because they can see half an inch of spare flesh. The reverse just doesn't happen. Size 12 women do not look at themselves and think 'these curves are just starting to take shape. A few more hundred calories a day and they'll be amazing'. Thinness is attractive. That's the message we're bombarded with constantly from every media. So yes, hands up I've remarked on people looking skinny once or twice. But bear this in mind; with society's obsession with thinness, everyone who's ever called me fat KNOWS I'm going to feel hurt. Whereas any time I may have remarked on someone being thin I've hedged my bets on making them feel a million dollars.

I have been overweight my entire life and i agree with you completely. Skinny shaming is just as big a problem as fat shaming.
Similarly it annoys me that people assume you can only have an eating disorder if you're slim, and it only involves throwing up or starving yourself. Compulsive over eating and binge eating disorders are a valid eating disorder too and can cause morbid obesity, but instead of sympathy for being genuinely ill with a mental health problem you're just labelled greedy and lazy.

MissVictoria that's very true, I have a friend with compulsive over eating (stemming from childhood sexual abuse). People either assume she's lazy (works full time and volunteers for a mental health charity a few days a month) or stupid (she has a PhD) and start explaining to her about "calories in Vs Calories out".