Skinny shaming is so accepted

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I know a lot of people will disagree with me on this, but skinny shaming is so wildly accepted and tolerated due to slim people being at an advantage due to their body size. As if it's acceptable, because they're slim. I've been body shamed my whole life for being slim. Right from when I was at junior school, to now at 30 years old.

I was relentlessly bullied at school and college. I am not an anomaly, I am a 5'5 size 6-8 female with a normal BMI. I don't need to be shamed about my body. The only people who have ever shamed or bullied me about my weight have been fat or obese people. And I'll be honest I'm trying my hardest not to judge them for their eating habits and size, but when it's a running theme I am starting to think that only fat people have a problem with slim people.

'Skinny privilege' shouldn't be an excuse to exempt bullying and shameful behaviour.
Stop trying to normalise skinny shaming just because it's the 'more desirable' image. It's not our fault that agenda has been pushed so much.

AIBU to think that skinny shaming is just as bad as fat shaming, and that slim people aren't to an advantage on this? I don't believe in the whole 'well at least you're skinny and being shamed.' Interested to know others thoughts.

I'm going in a similar direction myself. I used to think I could eat what I liked and not put weight on, but the truth is more nuanced. Yes, I ate some crap, but the reality is, I didn't eat a lot. I was also a perpetual 'mover'. I couldn't sit still, always jiggling my knee or something. At one point, I had a very physical job that didn't leave me a lot of time for eating.
I read a theory once about why it appears that some people can eat tons and not gain weight. The reality is, it isn't necessarily the case that they are eating a lot, and a lot of 'naturally' thin people are constant movers.
Post-menopause, I know I eat more and I definitely move less when at rest. I'm also a night-eater. When I can't sleep, I eat. And it's never anything healthy that I crave at 3 in the morning either.

It’s not that we think that these people are ‘naturally fat’, it’s that we appreciate no matter what they do, they can struggle to lose weight. The fact that you believe slim people can’t gain weight but not the other way round is absolutely fat phobic. And what fat people have to put up with all the time. And this is one reason why skinny shaming, as vile as it is, is not as bad a fat shaming.

I am literally the epitome of what @TinyRowboats describes. I grew up skinny (and experienced nasty comments too), then after pregnancy at 20, when I didn’t bounce back to my pre pregnancy shape, and it being the 90’s, my doctor recommended Slimming World. And to cut a very long story short, that was the start of a 20 year battle. I lost a couple of stone, regained it back with some extra. And repeated that cycle over the years. The time, money and sheer willpower I’ve put into doing it proves I’m not just lazy or greedy. I also absolutely wholeheartedly believe that if I had not started on that diet back then, I would not have gotten fat. I’m the only person in my family who has dieted and the only one who’s fat. Funny that.

And thin people don’t necessarily like being thin, ok? Nor is it as easy as eat more and put on weight. Again, some people, including myself eat lots and still can’t put on weight. You implied that thin people could easily put on weight but were choosing not to. That’s simply not true.

I don’t think thinness is revered. If it was, we wouldn’t have all these insults, nasty comments and passive aggressive ‘help’ and suggestions.

I would just assume it was because of their slower metabolism.

Yep! Totally agree

Who are you to wade in and make that assumption. The comments DO make you feel shit and upset, like myself and plenty on this thread. No matter how much you say they don't, they do. I felt like a shit mother before I was even one when I was accused of neglecting my unborn child by starving her. Those words hurt. Much more than 'being a bit pjssed off.'

Exactly

So are the thin people on the thread who say that they are naturally thin and completely unable to gain weight when they increase their calories lying or telling the truth?

And if they're telling the truth, do you also believe fat people who say they can't lose weight even when they reduce calories and increase activity? I just don't understand why someone would believe in the concept of being naturally thin but not naturally fat - I'd assume you'd believe in different metabolisms or you don't.

There is obviously more than just metabolism at play; there is also the role of hormones which regulate appetite and are dysregulated in obese people. If you think of how powerful hormones can be in, for example, pregnancy in affecting appetite- so if you had strong aversions or cravings in pregnancy and significantly changed your eating habits as a result then you will know how much hormones affect what and how you eat. It all gets a lot more complicated than just talking about different metabolism speeds - which don't stay constant throughout a person's life and are greatly affected by weight loss and other factors, I know, but keeping it simple and just focusing on metabolism then surely it goes both ways?

Either way, I'm very interested to know how someone can believe in natural thinness but not natural fatness; they seem like two sides of the same coin to me (and neither tell the whole story of a person's actual size and shape of course).

I am skinny and also been teased about it at school. It’s not that skinny people are naturally skinny, it’s just we have less appetite and are less focussed on food. In the same way a fat person has more appetite and is focussed on food!

what pisses me off is how women always talk about their diets as a social glue. They then look at me and invariably say, oh you’re so lucky you don’t have to diet. And then ignore me.

in 60 years NOT ONE person has asked me why I am skinny. What my secret is. I think it’s cos they know they don’t want to hear the answer…. The less I eat the skinnier I get.

It’s not that skinny people are naturally skinny, it’s just we have less appetite

So...naturally thin then, right?

By that logic, a fat person might be naturally hungrier and therefore naturally inclined to eat more and so naturally tending towards weight gain. And a thin person the opposite.

I think it's important to clarify this because a lot of moral value gets attached to body size. And if you tell yourself that fat people are greedy - as opposed to, a fat person's body might be working differently to a thin person's - then you end up in a situation whereby you can tell yourself fat shaming is deserved and thin shaming is not deserved, rather than accepting neither is justified. And we've seen a lot of that on this thread, and a lot of rhetoric on the basis of 'fat people just don't try hard enough and that's their fault'. Which ends up as a justification for treating them badly.

It’s not that skinny people are naturally skinny, it’s just we have less appetite and are less focussed on food

But a lot of the skinny people on this thread have told us that even if they eat unlimited calories they can't put on weight.

I agree your analysis is more accurate.

The number of people who could chomp through family bars of chocolate and multi packs of crisps every day and not put on an ounce is absolutely minute.

It’s not that skinny people are naturally skinny, it’s just we have less appetite and are less focussed on food

I totally agree with this. I do not believe that people are naturally thin, or indeed naturally fat.

My husband eats a fuckton and doesn't gain weight but he is insanely active. He can't ever just sit still. It's that constant activity I think that does it.

But that is natural thinness; it's a physical difference in appetite and hunger. Someone naturally less hungry will eat less and be naturally more thin than someone whose appetite is naturally greater meaning they'll eat more.

Ok I guess that we will have to agree to disagree with the language used. I never describe myself as being naturally slim/ thin. If probed, I always just say that I have a small appetite. To imply that some one is "naturally fat" would mean in theory, I guess, that they should maintain their weight no matter how little they eat. It is nonsense.

I'm not sure I agree that thin is revered, except maybe in the fashion industry. The ideal figure is generally slim and shapely - "too thin" is reviled, not revered. Comments like "real women have curves" and "men don't like skinny women" aren't exactly positive towards the skinnier woman.

PS I speak as a fairly average 10-12 with big boobs!

No, no its not natural - by that I guess you mean they were just born like that, so have no choice.

Look at photos of crowds in the last century, fat people are few and far between, So its not natural.

Skinny people do have less appetite ...but personally I think its because of how they was brought up, nurture not nature. Personally we ate sensibly and had a sensible relationship with food. My mum didnt stock lots of sweets in the cupboard, neither did she bang on about diets and we didnt have a scales in the house - I have brought my daughter up the same and fingers crossed she keeps those behaviours, because any behaviour becomes a HABIT. Thats where the weight issue lies.

Skinny people do have less appetite ...but personally I think its because of how they was brought up, nurture not nature. Personally we ate sensibly and had a sensible relationship with food. My mum didnt stock lots of sweets in the cupboard, neither did she bang on about diets and we didnt have a scales in the house - I have brought my daughter up the same and fingers crossed she keeps those behaviours, because any behaviour becomes a HABIT. Thats where the weight issue lies.

That’s exactly how I was brought up. I still ended up fat. Because I dieted.

I know a family...two sisters living with their single mum....one is very overweight and the other is thin with a small appetite. They have different dads who weren't around.

I also remember a thread on here a while ago where a poster said something that her mum had brought her up...the mum had a small appetite and was thinking but she had a huge appetite and struggled with her weight....she eventually met her dad years later and discovered he was also very into food and was overweight. Sorry to that poster if I confused any details but that was the rough jist of it.

In fact studies have showed when twins are separated at birth and brought up in different environments their body shape and weight are often discovered to be very similar.

Fat people have always existed - go look at some old portraits over the centuries. Babies are born on all the centiles; people exist across a spectrum of shapes and sizes. People carry weight differently too and have different patterns of fat distribution which they can't change through diet and exercise. It's dictated by the body's internal systems. Think about weight loss drugs - they are hormones which change a patient's appetite and satiety. People report that they feel 'like thin people feel' when it comes to hunger and fullness. Some people naturally have hormones which regulate that system differently to others.

In general, humans have grown bigger over time (height and frame, not just fatness) and the incidence of obesity has obviously increased with modern lifestyles especially recently. There are clearly a whole lot of factors going on in that weight gain, some of them physical/genetic/medical, some of them psychological and some of them social. But I think it's self evident that some people are just inherently disposed to be bigger than others. It doesn't mean they will be obese, but I mean - people are patently not all the same? And there will always be outliers.

Correct - and if they ate 10,000 calories a day they absolutely would! Because that’s how our bodies work.

calorie deficit - lose weight.
calorie surplus - gain weight

Or we can ignore that (overly) simplified approach, and go with blind ignorance, so we don’t have to face reality and hurt our feelings.

My mum was overweight for as long as I remember, when I look at pictures of her family they all were, even in the 1940s or 50s, well before UPFs, they didn't have a car etc.
She was often on a diet but the thinnest I remember her was a size 14 (she was 5ft)

I was horribly bullied at school and college for being very (naturally) skinny. So much that I still don't wear skirts, unless they're ankle length. I'm nearly 50 now.

know a family...two sisters living with their single mum....one is very overweight and the other is thin with a small appetite. They have different dads who weren't around.

Yes so those sisters reacted differently to their childhood/upbringing. I guess some people lean on food and others dont, but its not their genes,