Friday, October 17, 2008
Thursday, October 16, 2008
If you don't insist on absolute moral victory, the terrorists win!
So, all that stuff I said about not taking shit from anyone and never backing down? I'm about to (possibly) make myself a filthy liar.
On the subject of backing down, walking away, quitting and the like, where does one draw the line? See, I'm in this terribly uncomfortable situation (I can't give too many details, but trust me when I say it sucks) where I desperately want to Stay the Course! and Be the Bigger Person! while, naturally, Proving Them All Wrong! The problem is that it's going to be unfuckingbelievably stressful to do so. It would probably be smart to just walk away.
But if I back down, there are a couple of problems. First, I'd be walking away from an otherwise enjoyable situation/place because of these very unpleasant people. Second, if I leave, then the bullies win. Intellectually, I know it's silly to place so much value on a "moral victory" over people that I don't even like. But my tendency to stand my ground didn't come naturally-it's been an uphill battle most of my life. I spent my childhood and adolescence being trampled on constantly, so my adulthood has been spent overcompensating for that. If I walk away from a painful situation, I feel like I've failed, like I just couldn't hack it. I have to stick it out to prove to myself, more than anyone else, that I'm Strong Enough, Smart Enough, and generally Good Enough. Besides, like I said, I don't want the big stupid meanies to ruin an otherwise good situation for me.
I just don't know how long I can really keep Standing Firm! before I get worn down. Then after that point, how much shit do I take before I just call it a day?
*headdesk*
On the subject of backing down, walking away, quitting and the like, where does one draw the line? See, I'm in this terribly uncomfortable situation (I can't give too many details, but trust me when I say it sucks) where I desperately want to Stay the Course! and Be the Bigger Person! while, naturally, Proving Them All Wrong! The problem is that it's going to be unfuckingbelievably stressful to do so. It would probably be smart to just walk away.
But if I back down, there are a couple of problems. First, I'd be walking away from an otherwise enjoyable situation/place because of these very unpleasant people. Second, if I leave, then the bullies win. Intellectually, I know it's silly to place so much value on a "moral victory" over people that I don't even like. But my tendency to stand my ground didn't come naturally-it's been an uphill battle most of my life. I spent my childhood and adolescence being trampled on constantly, so my adulthood has been spent overcompensating for that. If I walk away from a painful situation, I feel like I've failed, like I just couldn't hack it. I have to stick it out to prove to myself, more than anyone else, that I'm Strong Enough, Smart Enough, and generally Good Enough. Besides, like I said, I don't want the big stupid meanies to ruin an otherwise good situation for me.
I just don't know how long I can really keep Standing Firm! before I get worn down. Then after that point, how much shit do I take before I just call it a day?
*headdesk*
Fun Facts!
And by "fun" I mean "ranty," and by "facts" I mean "crap that's on my mind right now."
I've been thinking a lot lately about "adult bullying." To me, that seems like an oxymoron. I would think that if one is an adult, i.e. "fully developed and mature," one would not engage in bullying, correct? Then I remember that physical adulthood has no necessary relationship to mental or emotional maturity. At that point, I usually find it necessary to bang my head against something until the stabby feeling goes away, but I digress....
According to dictionary.com, when we talk about a bully, this is what we mean:
bul·ly
[boo
l-ee]
noun, plural -lies, verb, -lied, -ly·ing, adjective, interjection
–noun
–verb (used with object)
–verb (used without object)
–adjective
–interjection
This particular definition leaves out the meat-and-cattle related meanings of the word. Clearly, "bully" can mean a lot of things. Let's narrow it down a bit.
–noun
–verb (used with object)
–verb (used without object)
In 1, what I feel to be the key is the use of the word "habitually," as well as the phrase "smaller or weaker people." You can be mean to someone once, and it's not necessarily bullying-just being kind of an asshole that particular day. What makes it bullying is when it becomes "business as usual." The "smaller or weaker" part is what I feel needs some clarification. Some cases of bullying are clearly a stronger person picking on a weaker one. The classic television portrayal of a bully, like Nelson on The Simpsons, fits this category. Sometimes the "strength" is that found in numbers-several people can gang up on one, thereby intimidating the single person. Social status can also be a powerful source for the bully's "strength," as anyone who attended high school can tell you. In any case, bullying is not so much about actual strength or weakness as it is about making the victim believe that they are weak and the bully/ies is/are strong.
I'm pretty sure that most people have been the victim of bullying at least once in their lives. Whether it was twenty years ago on the playground, or yesterday at the office, someone has likely tried to impose their will upon you in a hurtful and terrifying way. That's a hard situation to face, regardless of your age. It's easier for some than for others, but it's a rare person who can face down a bully without even the slightest bit of apprehension.
At this point, the subject matter starts to tie into my recent fascination with the fat acceptance movement. On one site, I found some references to the experience of fat hatred (which is just bullying by a different name, in my opinion) both past and present, and how the discussion participants would love to be able to talk to both their younger selves and their bullies. Many of them posted what they would put in a letter to their younger selves. I think that's a fantastic idea. Whether your bullying experience is current or years in the past, what would have helped you (or is helping you) deal with it? Did you merely survive the bullying, or did you thrive in the face of it? If you were bullied for being "different," did you assimilate to try to make it stop, or did you continue to flaunt your uniqueness? What would you say to your past bullies? To a hypothetical bully now that you're older and (theoretically) wiser? Also, can you make a list of things about yourself that you love or just refuse to change, but for which you have been bullied or criticized? (In a rare display of love for feel-good lingo, I'm calling it an "empowerment list.")
I actually plan to post my responses to a lot of the questions I've asked here. First, my empowerment list. I'm going to write it in big pink letters, because that makes me happy.
I am not "girlie," I am womanly. I value my femininity, but I don't feel the need to behave a certain way to validate said femininity. I don't have a specific standard of beauty to which I believe the whole world must adhere. I don't giggle.
I will not participate in "fat talk" or general cattiness. Women are too cruel to one another, and I will not contribute to that. I would love to have more female friends, but many of my personal rules have thus far interfered with that. Unfortunately, many women just don't seem to "get" the things that I value or believe in.
I identify as bisexual, but am currently in a hetero relationship. That doesn't mean that I want to sleep with anything that moves, or that I make out with girls when I'm drunk to impress boys. It does mean that I love and desire whoever I happen to love and desire, and I don't worry so much about what gender they are.
I may be in a committed relationship now, but I haven't always been. Before this relationship, I sometimes liked to have sex with someone without feeling the need to immediately start calling them my boyfriend/girlfriend. I am a sexual being, and my sexuality does not conform to many people's standards of acceptability. This is not to say that I inappropriately boasted about my sex life at any time. However, information has a way of getting out sometimes. When it did, I didn't bother to lie or rush to "legitimize" my experiences. To some people, that makes me a "slut." To me, it just means that I value honesty and integrity.
I am loud. I do not have a small voice or a small personality. I can modulate my volume when it is situationally appropriate. However, I will not stop laughing heartily or turn my everyday speaking voice into a whisper just because "nice girls should be more quiet."
I care what people think of me. That doesn't mean that I will change myself to please someone else, simply that it hurts when someone has a very negative opinion of me. It is human nature to desire acceptance and affection. I happen to feel that part of human nature very strongly. This is why bullying has always affected me so deeply.
I do my best to not take shit from anyone. This is probably why, when I've been bullied, it typically gets worse before it gets better. Someone pushes me around, I push back (or at the very least stand firm and refuse to let them push me over), they push harder, rinse and repeat. Most of the people who have tried to push me around in my adult life have either given up or found themselves on the receiving end of legal action. I have been the one to back down once or twice, but I usually try to tough it out.
I am highly emotional. Of course, this has its drawbacks at times-my emotions can sometimes interfere with my logic, I've been known to overreact to some situations, et cetera. However, by and large I think my capacity to feel contributes hugely to my fantastic personality.
I think I'm beautiful just the way I am. Sure, I've had some conflicts with my body. I think most women have. But when you get right down to it, I've always been blessed with an unusually high level of body confidence. I am 5' 3" and weigh close to 170 lbs. I'm about five pounds away from being medically classified as "obese." My c-section scar means that, unless I starve myself and/or work out obsessively, I will never have a flat stomach even if I were to lose weight. My breasts sag a little from having breastfed for nearly a year. I have insanely crooked teeth-one of them sits nearly sideways. My hands are calloused from a combination of hard work and playing string instruments most of my life. My fingernails are extremely short, and I usually don't polish them. When I wear makeup at all, it's because I think it's fun, not because I think I need to.
I eat what I'm hungry for, when I'm hungry. I use full-fat dressings because I think they taste better, and 1% milk because I don't like the way fattier milk feels going down my throat. I eat in public. I sometimes go to a restaurant alone and don't bring a book or a project to make myself look busy. I just enjoy my meal.
Above all, I am real. This is, I think, what scares people the most about me. I don't bullshit about anything, really. I don't lie to spare people's feelings, though I may try to be tactful in how I say things. I don't play "fake nicey-nice" with people I don't like, though I will make every effort to be civilized and interact with them in an adult manner when necessary. I may tone down certain aspects of my personality or refrain from talking about certain subjects when "polite society" or "appropriate behavior" requires, but I will never change who and what I am to please anyone but myself. If you don't like me, it might actually make me sad for a while, but in the end it's really not my problem. To pretend to be what I'm not would be to lie to myself, and I don't deserve to be lied to.
There are a thousand more things I could probably put here, but these are the ones that are most significant to me at this very moment. These are the things that have "invited" the most pain into my life recently, the things that have offended the sensibilities of the most people, and I think it's about time I took a real stand and claimed them.
I've been thinking a lot lately about "adult bullying." To me, that seems like an oxymoron. I would think that if one is an adult, i.e. "fully developed and mature," one would not engage in bullying, correct? Then I remember that physical adulthood has no necessary relationship to mental or emotional maturity. At that point, I usually find it necessary to bang my head against something until the stabby feeling goes away, but I digress....
According to dictionary.com, when we talk about a bully, this is what we mean:
bul·ly
[boo
l-ee]noun, plural -lies, verb, -lied, -ly·ing, adjective, interjection
–noun
| 1. | a blustering, quarrelsome, overbearing person who habitually badgers and intimidates smaller or weaker people. |
| 2. | Archaic. a man hired to do violence. |
| 3. | Obsolete. a pimp; procurer. |
| 4. | Obsolete. good friend; good fellow. |
| 5. | Obsolete. sweetheart; darling. |
–verb (used with object)
| 6. | to act the bully toward; intimidate; domineer. |
–verb (used without object)
| 7. | to be loudly arrogant and overbearing. |
–adjective
| 8. | Informal. fine; excellent; very good. |
| 9. | dashing; jovial; high-spirited. |
–interjection
| 10. | Informal. good! well done! |
This particular definition leaves out the meat-and-cattle related meanings of the word. Clearly, "bully" can mean a lot of things. Let's narrow it down a bit.
–noun
| 1. | a blustering, quarrelsome, overbearing person who habitually badgers and intimidates smaller or weaker people. |
–verb (used with object)
| 6. | to act the bully toward; intimidate; domineer. |
–verb (used without object)
| 7. | to be loudly arrogant and overbearing. |
In 1, what I feel to be the key is the use of the word "habitually," as well as the phrase "smaller or weaker people." You can be mean to someone once, and it's not necessarily bullying-just being kind of an asshole that particular day. What makes it bullying is when it becomes "business as usual." The "smaller or weaker" part is what I feel needs some clarification. Some cases of bullying are clearly a stronger person picking on a weaker one. The classic television portrayal of a bully, like Nelson on The Simpsons, fits this category. Sometimes the "strength" is that found in numbers-several people can gang up on one, thereby intimidating the single person. Social status can also be a powerful source for the bully's "strength," as anyone who attended high school can tell you. In any case, bullying is not so much about actual strength or weakness as it is about making the victim believe that they are weak and the bully/ies is/are strong.
I'm pretty sure that most people have been the victim of bullying at least once in their lives. Whether it was twenty years ago on the playground, or yesterday at the office, someone has likely tried to impose their will upon you in a hurtful and terrifying way. That's a hard situation to face, regardless of your age. It's easier for some than for others, but it's a rare person who can face down a bully without even the slightest bit of apprehension.
At this point, the subject matter starts to tie into my recent fascination with the fat acceptance movement. On one site, I found some references to the experience of fat hatred (which is just bullying by a different name, in my opinion) both past and present, and how the discussion participants would love to be able to talk to both their younger selves and their bullies. Many of them posted what they would put in a letter to their younger selves. I think that's a fantastic idea. Whether your bullying experience is current or years in the past, what would have helped you (or is helping you) deal with it? Did you merely survive the bullying, or did you thrive in the face of it? If you were bullied for being "different," did you assimilate to try to make it stop, or did you continue to flaunt your uniqueness? What would you say to your past bullies? To a hypothetical bully now that you're older and (theoretically) wiser? Also, can you make a list of things about yourself that you love or just refuse to change, but for which you have been bullied or criticized? (In a rare display of love for feel-good lingo, I'm calling it an "empowerment list.")
I actually plan to post my responses to a lot of the questions I've asked here. First, my empowerment list. I'm going to write it in big pink letters, because that makes me happy.
I am not "girlie," I am womanly. I value my femininity, but I don't feel the need to behave a certain way to validate said femininity. I don't have a specific standard of beauty to which I believe the whole world must adhere. I don't giggle.
I will not participate in "fat talk" or general cattiness. Women are too cruel to one another, and I will not contribute to that. I would love to have more female friends, but many of my personal rules have thus far interfered with that. Unfortunately, many women just don't seem to "get" the things that I value or believe in.
I identify as bisexual, but am currently in a hetero relationship. That doesn't mean that I want to sleep with anything that moves, or that I make out with girls when I'm drunk to impress boys. It does mean that I love and desire whoever I happen to love and desire, and I don't worry so much about what gender they are.
I may be in a committed relationship now, but I haven't always been. Before this relationship, I sometimes liked to have sex with someone without feeling the need to immediately start calling them my boyfriend/girlfriend. I am a sexual being, and my sexuality does not conform to many people's standards of acceptability. This is not to say that I inappropriately boasted about my sex life at any time. However, information has a way of getting out sometimes. When it did, I didn't bother to lie or rush to "legitimize" my experiences. To some people, that makes me a "slut." To me, it just means that I value honesty and integrity.
I am loud. I do not have a small voice or a small personality. I can modulate my volume when it is situationally appropriate. However, I will not stop laughing heartily or turn my everyday speaking voice into a whisper just because "nice girls should be more quiet."
I care what people think of me. That doesn't mean that I will change myself to please someone else, simply that it hurts when someone has a very negative opinion of me. It is human nature to desire acceptance and affection. I happen to feel that part of human nature very strongly. This is why bullying has always affected me so deeply.
I do my best to not take shit from anyone. This is probably why, when I've been bullied, it typically gets worse before it gets better. Someone pushes me around, I push back (or at the very least stand firm and refuse to let them push me over), they push harder, rinse and repeat. Most of the people who have tried to push me around in my adult life have either given up or found themselves on the receiving end of legal action. I have been the one to back down once or twice, but I usually try to tough it out.
I am highly emotional. Of course, this has its drawbacks at times-my emotions can sometimes interfere with my logic, I've been known to overreact to some situations, et cetera. However, by and large I think my capacity to feel contributes hugely to my fantastic personality.
I think I'm beautiful just the way I am. Sure, I've had some conflicts with my body. I think most women have. But when you get right down to it, I've always been blessed with an unusually high level of body confidence. I am 5' 3" and weigh close to 170 lbs. I'm about five pounds away from being medically classified as "obese." My c-section scar means that, unless I starve myself and/or work out obsessively, I will never have a flat stomach even if I were to lose weight. My breasts sag a little from having breastfed for nearly a year. I have insanely crooked teeth-one of them sits nearly sideways. My hands are calloused from a combination of hard work and playing string instruments most of my life. My fingernails are extremely short, and I usually don't polish them. When I wear makeup at all, it's because I think it's fun, not because I think I need to.
I eat what I'm hungry for, when I'm hungry. I use full-fat dressings because I think they taste better, and 1% milk because I don't like the way fattier milk feels going down my throat. I eat in public. I sometimes go to a restaurant alone and don't bring a book or a project to make myself look busy. I just enjoy my meal.
Above all, I am real. This is, I think, what scares people the most about me. I don't bullshit about anything, really. I don't lie to spare people's feelings, though I may try to be tactful in how I say things. I don't play "fake nicey-nice" with people I don't like, though I will make every effort to be civilized and interact with them in an adult manner when necessary. I may tone down certain aspects of my personality or refrain from talking about certain subjects when "polite society" or "appropriate behavior" requires, but I will never change who and what I am to please anyone but myself. If you don't like me, it might actually make me sad for a while, but in the end it's really not my problem. To pretend to be what I'm not would be to lie to myself, and I don't deserve to be lied to.
There are a thousand more things I could probably put here, but these are the ones that are most significant to me at this very moment. These are the things that have "invited" the most pain into my life recently, the things that have offended the sensibilities of the most people, and I think it's about time I took a real stand and claimed them.
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Yay, me!
I'm trying NaNoWriMo for the first time. They say telling everyone you know that you're doing it helps keep you committed to it when it gets tough, so...I'm telling everyone. :D
Saturday, October 11, 2008
"But Rebecca, you can't be part of the FA movement. You are TEH EBIL THIN GIRL."
I love Fat Acceptance. I really do. Yes, I have railed against it in the past, but it turns out I was mistaken about the actual purpose of the movement. Recently, in my quest for more general self-acceptance, I have come to understand what it's REALLY about. (Also, I'm fat now.) If you're currently saying to yourself "that's why she's suddenly so pro-fattie. Easy to support something that works for your own agenda" or anything of the like, kindly FUCK OFF. I'm not that fickle. It just happens that in my search for information on general mental health issues, I came across legit FA information and chose to dig more deeply into it, since it now potentially applies to me. I was never "anti-fat," I just misunderstood certain agendas, as will become clear later. Alternatively, if you're thinking "serves her right, skinny bitch finally sees it from OUR SIDE," you can fuck off too. This has never been about "sides," as will also become clear later.
First, some background. Some of you may remember one or more of these points, but I'll review all of them.
Until recently, I was always naturally on the thin side. As a child I was even thinner than I should have been because my mother deprived me of food. When she was investigated by child services because the school nurse suspected that was happening, she lied to all the doctors and psychologists we were sent to and had them "extensively monitor" me because I "seemed to be developing an eating disorder." The woman is crazy, but not stupid-she knew that if she went in there all weepy, claiming that I wouldn't eat no matter what she tried, saying that I was being rebellious and blaming her and I wouldn't tell the truth to anyone, the blame would shift to me. Nice how her ass was so well covered. So my false anorexia diagnosis messed me up for a long damn time. I had trouble accepting my natural tendency toward thinness for a very, very long time.
Something that didn't help that difficulty in any way was when I had a serious "falling out" with more than one friend over the subject of weight. Now, it was never explicitly stated that weight and body image was the reason for these breakups, but it was. One case in particular was when I happened to be the thinnest girl in a certain social group. This was not planned. I don't buy into the "fat friend" system-the idea that if you're friends with girls who are bigger than you, you'll look better by comparison. I'm friends with who I like. The other girls in this group didn't believe that for a second. It seemed to be automatically assumed that I was only friends with them because it made me feel good about myself. As a result, most of our outings deteriorated quickly into skinny bashing. Shopping trips were hell because these girls would grab something off a rack, start talking about how "only anorexic bitches would look good in this," and then suggest that I try it on. Then they'd all laugh. Mealtime was worse. If I ate something low in sugar, low in fat, or otherwise "healthy" (which I do to take care of my diabetes, NOT to look a certain way) I was bombarded with cracks like "no wonder you look like that, you're just like all those other scrawny skanks that don't eat."
I'm sorry, are you suggesting that I jeopardize my health to pander to your insecurities?
I tried to point out to these girls that if I were to speak to them the way they spoke to me, but using "fat" in place of "skinny," it would be Not Okay. And by extension, it should be Not Okay for them to speak to me that way. So far, I've lost numerous friendships because other women can't see the logic in that.
And then there was "The Fat Blog." Remember, the one I had to make private on MySpaz because I was getting hate mail? (If you didn't see it, you're not missing much. I was venting on the subject of skinny bashing. I had recently been through some hell at the hands of "friends" like the ones discussed above, and the whole "skinny model" issue was all over the news, so it seemed like an opportunity to rant.) Okay, so I went a little far. The "heifer" comment in particular was probably uncalled for, though I did attempt to clarify it. My vitriol was aimed at the self-hating fat people whose thought process operates as follows:
"I'm fat and I hate myself. I don't actually want to try to lose weight, but I don't like being fat either. Accepting myself or changing my circumstances would both involve effort that I don't want to expend, and I've already alienated most of my social circle with my whining. Oh, look, a skinny person. YOU ARE TEH ENEMY AND MUST DIIIIIIIEEEEE WHARBLEGARBL."
The problem was that I thought these crazy women represented the Fat Acceptance movement. "Their kind" talks big, but the truth is that a huge part of FA is self-acceptance. If you haven't taken steps to accept your own fat and you're still angry at the world because you don't like yourself, you're not doing any good for FA. The message of FA is, at its core, about not judging people based on size. Got that? DON'T JUDGE PEOPLE BASED ON THEIR SIZE. Not "don't judge people who look like you," not "the only good shape is your shape," but ALL SHAPES AND SIZES ARE GOOD. Size, food, and other such "weighty issues" (lawlz) are not moral issues.
Turns out, the people at the heart of the FA movement are really about self-acceptance. They have accepted their fat selves, and they want others to do the same no matter what their size. I was so scared of the whole concept because my only exposure to people claiming to want fat acceptance was through fringe crazies who wanted fat people to be allowed to torment "average" people. All I had seen was women who wanted the rest of the world to accept that they were just naturally fat, but couldn't accept other women being naturally thin. Women who didn't really like themselves that much, but were looking for outside validation in the form of persecution of anyone who weighed less than they did.
What really helped drive it home for me was when I saw the things this fantastic woman had to say. She's used sentences like "thin people are not our enemy." She emphasizes that FA is not about superiority, it's about accepting oneself and refusing to be discriminated against. She also says "no one is too thin for FA."
So, I was wrong. Go ahead, link to this page in case you never get another chance to hear that from me. :P I do want to make it really clear that I was never "anti-fat" or "a fat-hater" (which are some of the more polite things I was called). I just want women to stop torturing each other over their weight- in either direction. Let's all do our own thing and be the sizes we want to be. Apparantly, my use of hyperbole, sarcasm and general bitchiness failed to get that point across, so I'm trying something completely out of character and using sincerity and feel-good lingo. Let's see if that helps.
First, some background. Some of you may remember one or more of these points, but I'll review all of them.
Until recently, I was always naturally on the thin side. As a child I was even thinner than I should have been because my mother deprived me of food. When she was investigated by child services because the school nurse suspected that was happening, she lied to all the doctors and psychologists we were sent to and had them "extensively monitor" me because I "seemed to be developing an eating disorder." The woman is crazy, but not stupid-she knew that if she went in there all weepy, claiming that I wouldn't eat no matter what she tried, saying that I was being rebellious and blaming her and I wouldn't tell the truth to anyone, the blame would shift to me. Nice how her ass was so well covered. So my false anorexia diagnosis messed me up for a long damn time. I had trouble accepting my natural tendency toward thinness for a very, very long time.
Something that didn't help that difficulty in any way was when I had a serious "falling out" with more than one friend over the subject of weight. Now, it was never explicitly stated that weight and body image was the reason for these breakups, but it was. One case in particular was when I happened to be the thinnest girl in a certain social group. This was not planned. I don't buy into the "fat friend" system-the idea that if you're friends with girls who are bigger than you, you'll look better by comparison. I'm friends with who I like. The other girls in this group didn't believe that for a second. It seemed to be automatically assumed that I was only friends with them because it made me feel good about myself. As a result, most of our outings deteriorated quickly into skinny bashing. Shopping trips were hell because these girls would grab something off a rack, start talking about how "only anorexic bitches would look good in this," and then suggest that I try it on. Then they'd all laugh. Mealtime was worse. If I ate something low in sugar, low in fat, or otherwise "healthy" (which I do to take care of my diabetes, NOT to look a certain way) I was bombarded with cracks like "no wonder you look like that, you're just like all those other scrawny skanks that don't eat."
I'm sorry, are you suggesting that I jeopardize my health to pander to your insecurities?
I tried to point out to these girls that if I were to speak to them the way they spoke to me, but using "fat" in place of "skinny," it would be Not Okay. And by extension, it should be Not Okay for them to speak to me that way. So far, I've lost numerous friendships because other women can't see the logic in that.
And then there was "The Fat Blog." Remember, the one I had to make private on MySpaz because I was getting hate mail? (If you didn't see it, you're not missing much. I was venting on the subject of skinny bashing. I had recently been through some hell at the hands of "friends" like the ones discussed above, and the whole "skinny model" issue was all over the news, so it seemed like an opportunity to rant.) Okay, so I went a little far. The "heifer" comment in particular was probably uncalled for, though I did attempt to clarify it. My vitriol was aimed at the self-hating fat people whose thought process operates as follows:
"I'm fat and I hate myself. I don't actually want to try to lose weight, but I don't like being fat either. Accepting myself or changing my circumstances would both involve effort that I don't want to expend, and I've already alienated most of my social circle with my whining. Oh, look, a skinny person. YOU ARE TEH ENEMY AND MUST DIIIIIIIEEEEE WHARBLEGARBL."
The problem was that I thought these crazy women represented the Fat Acceptance movement. "Their kind" talks big, but the truth is that a huge part of FA is self-acceptance. If you haven't taken steps to accept your own fat and you're still angry at the world because you don't like yourself, you're not doing any good for FA. The message of FA is, at its core, about not judging people based on size. Got that? DON'T JUDGE PEOPLE BASED ON THEIR SIZE. Not "don't judge people who look like you," not "the only good shape is your shape," but ALL SHAPES AND SIZES ARE GOOD. Size, food, and other such "weighty issues" (lawlz) are not moral issues.
Turns out, the people at the heart of the FA movement are really about self-acceptance. They have accepted their fat selves, and they want others to do the same no matter what their size. I was so scared of the whole concept because my only exposure to people claiming to want fat acceptance was through fringe crazies who wanted fat people to be allowed to torment "average" people. All I had seen was women who wanted the rest of the world to accept that they were just naturally fat, but couldn't accept other women being naturally thin. Women who didn't really like themselves that much, but were looking for outside validation in the form of persecution of anyone who weighed less than they did.
What really helped drive it home for me was when I saw the things this fantastic woman had to say. She's used sentences like "thin people are not our enemy." She emphasizes that FA is not about superiority, it's about accepting oneself and refusing to be discriminated against. She also says "no one is too thin for FA."
So, I was wrong. Go ahead, link to this page in case you never get another chance to hear that from me. :P I do want to make it really clear that I was never "anti-fat" or "a fat-hater" (which are some of the more polite things I was called). I just want women to stop torturing each other over their weight- in either direction. Let's all do our own thing and be the sizes we want to be. Apparantly, my use of hyperbole, sarcasm and general bitchiness failed to get that point across, so I'm trying something completely out of character and using sincerity and feel-good lingo. Let's see if that helps.
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Jamie Lynn and dumpster babies...
I'm really disgusted with Western society right now. I mean, more so than I usually am. There are a lot of people screaming that Jamie Lynn Spears is glamorizing teen pregnancy. And maybe, to some degree, she is. But that's a side effect of her reality. This kid has lots of money. She has been working in TV and movies for several years now, and has amassed some serious cash. So yes, when she got knocked up there wasn't some big panic for her of "oh my god how am I going to pay for this baby?" She was able to just have the kid and carry on. Good for her. It's not as if she's saying that all sixteen year olds should rush out and get pregnant. And now there are people freaking out that in an interview with OK magazine, she says that being a mom is "the best feeling in the world." Apparantly she's supposed to hate her life, hate her baby, and be miserable for the rest of eternity. Apparantly by saying that she loves her daughter and is extremely happy to have her little family, she is singlehandedly bringing about the destruction of childhood in North America.
FUCK YOU, ASSHOLES.
As a "teen mother" (god I fucking hate that phrase, more later) I can tell you that there is nothing glamorous about getting knocked up young. And the reality is that for us normal folks, having to provide for a child is HARD FUCKING WORK. Some girls are lucky enough to have immense support from their families-they continue to live at home rent-free, their parents babysit while they're in school/working/just continuing to be normal young women, they get huge amounts of financial support...and to those girls I say "stop whining you spoiled cunts, you get all the good parts of having a baby with none of the hardships." If anyone is "glamorizing teen pregnancy," it's these completely average young women whose parents continue to support them AND their children. They have no extraordinary circumstances (such as celebrity and wealth) yet they continue to have perfectly normal lives while procreating at extremely young ages.
Some of us don't get that help. I have survived innumerable hardships and done everything short of prostitution or theft to provide for myself and my son. Having him so young made my life harder than it really needed to be. But does that mean I should love him any less? Should I wallow in misery and self-hatred for the rest of my life? Should I start some sort of movement advocating mandatory abortions or adoptions for anyone who gets pregnant before they're 20? Should I tell young moms that their lives are over and they may as well just give up?
This is why I hate the phrase "teen parent." It carries such negative connotations. While I was in the hospital after Ronin's birth, recovering from an emergency c-section, I got a harsh introduction to the world of "teen parenthood." I woke up from a nap the day after the birth to be told by a nurse (possibly the only decent human being working on the maternity ward...mat nurses are by and large cuntsmears) that the hospital social worker had been down to NICU (Ronin was quite premature) to "check up" on my baby. This didn't sit well with me. As some of you may be aware, you just don't fuck with The Beckstar. So, in spite of my still oozing incision, residual fuzziness from the anaesthetics, and the fact that I hadn't walked on my own since the surgery, I figured I had to deal with this. I plopped my bloody, stoned self into a wheelchair and headed off to the social work office on another floor of the hospital. When I confronted this woman with questions about why she had been down to "check on my baby" without my permission or even knowledge, while I was having a nap and recovering from fucking SURGERY, she responded with, "It's policy. All children born to mothers under the age of 18 receive a routine welfare checkup." When I asked why parental consent for this "checkup" wasn't required, she told me that "when the parent is under 18, it doesn't really count."
Excuse me?
So, a HEALTHY baby is born to a HEALTHY mother, albeit prematurely due to TRAUMA RECEIVED IN AN ACCIDENT, not by any defect or fault of the mother, and because the mother is under 18 you can just waltz in and poke and prod the baby, looking for a way the mother may be unfit, and her consent "doesn't really count?" What the fuck country is this, lady? I'm sorry, I thought I was in Canada, with a Charter of Rights and Freedoms or some shit like that. I raised quite a fuss about this little incident and informed the self-righteous cunt sitting across the desk from me that either I received an apology in writing or the Human Rights Commission and every media outlet in the province received my story in writing. The end result? I got a letter from DSS apologizing for my "being upset by the behavior of their employee," and stating that they "regret her decision to perform the inspection without my knowledge, but it is department policy to conduct said inspection, and parental consent is not required where the welfare of the child may be at stake." Basically, they didn't need my consent for the same reason they don't need the parent's consent when allegations of abuse arise. If you are under 18 and give birth in Saskatchewan, you are automatically under investigation for child abuse. Now, this may have changed in the past eight years, but that's what the policy was "in my day."
Let's recap. Western society says that if you have a baby when you are a teenager, you WILL be a bad parent if left to your own devices, you probably already have abused your child somehow before they are born, and your life is effectively over. Therefore, you must do penance by hating both yourself and your child forever, and you are not allowed to enjoy the experience of parenthood. You must instead don sackcloth and ashes anytime you are seen in public with the child, go on welfare for the rest of your natural life and refuse to even attempt to better yourself, because you are a Teen Parent and the best you can hope for is meager survival.
People, this is why things like the "prom baby" happen. Granted, girls who do shit like that are probably a little fucked up to begin with, and it's utterly wrong. I'm not excusing their behavior. What I am saying is that when we bombard young women with these ideas that if they get pregnant they're completely fucked (ha ha) and then expect some sort of contrition in place of celebration from the ones who do have babies, we create a culture of fucking dumpster babies. I have pulled Ronin out of a daycare centre because the owner had the balls to make a distinction (while I was in the room) between "teen moms" and "real moms." I have said very unpleasant things to complete strangers who have made comments like "don't you think you should have at least had the decency to give that baby to someone who can take care of it properly?" I have gotten into a physical altercation with a girl who told me that I shouldn't be happy to be a mother at my age. You just don't fuck with The Beckstar. But not every young mom can be me. The reason these attitudes are allowed to continue is that many young moms don't feel they have the right to stand up for themselves as women and as mothers. And unfortunately, in many parts of our community, the stereotype of the undereducated young mom is true, so these girls don't know how to defend their family the same way I have. (With a few notable exceptions, I tend to believe that the pen is mightier than the sword. But when you mess with my family you'd best believe that I will fucking gut you with that pen and write a letter to my MLA in your blood.)
Let's educate these teen moms, you say? Open special daycare centres and programs for them?
Let me ask you something, my friend. ARE YOU FUCKING HIGH? Have you paid any attention to today's lesson at all? Better yet, have you ever set foot in one of those "special programs" for teen moms? Go ahead, try it. I fucking dare you to see how long you can take being spoken to as though you're a five year old sociopath before you just give up and flush all your kids down the WalMart toilet.
What we need is for people to pull their heads out of their asses and treat mothers like mothers, regardless of age. Discrimination against young parents is a form of human rights violation that is not only still legal, but in fact sponsored by our government. Yes, educate children about sex, pregnancy, birth control and everything that entails. I am a huge proponent of reality-based education, and telling young women that if they have a baby before they are truly ready it will be HARD AS FUCK. What I want is for girls who do get pregnant to be told that they can still accomplish anything they choose, they might just have to work a little harder for it. We need to get rid of these "daycares for children of teen parents" and "teen parent programs." In fact, I wholeheartedly applaud the Saskatchewan Party for abolishing that den of government-employed fuckstains that used to operate on Avenue M South. I have struggled in my life with depression and suicidal thoughts, but never so strongly as I did after my only visit to that building during my pregnancy. Looking back now, I kind of want revenge on the government health nurses and counsellors who psychologically fucking raped me that day, but at the time I walked home KNOWING that my life was effectively over and that I would truly be better off throwing myself in front of a passing truck than ruining my life and dooming my unborn child to the worst kind of hell on earth by having the audacity to have a child at that age.
We as a society need to start treating parents like parents, no matter their age. I am a better mother than many women twice my age. Good or bad parenting does not depend on one's birthdate. I am all for support programs for parents, but they must be all-inclusive. It is extremely psychologically damaging for a young pregnant woman to have to face a distinction between herself and a "real mother." We cannot segregate parental support based on age-it must be done based on need. And regardless of age, a woman who chooses to give birth to and raise a child MUST be allowed and encouraged to see the joy in her decision, and to love her child the way nature has dictated. If we tell young women they shouldn't be happy, love their children and enjoy being mothers, they very likely won't. And that leads to poor parenting and a repeating cycle of poverty, abuse and misery in a far more direct way than age ever can.
I celebrate my child. I have walked a hard road because of my decision to keep him, and I celebrate that too. It has made me who I am today, and this child has brought me more joy and more learning opportunities than anything else in my life. Anyone who says that young mothers shouldn't celebrate their children the same way older mothers do should be sterilized on the spot, because they obviously have some deep seated hatred of children if they advocate parental apathy like that. And if this celebrity controversy can raise public awareness of this travesty, I'll be thrilled. Unfortunately, what it seems to be doing is giving these hateful, discriminatory fear-mongers a platform for their filth. And that makes me a sad panda.
FUCK YOU, ASSHOLES.
As a "teen mother" (god I fucking hate that phrase, more later) I can tell you that there is nothing glamorous about getting knocked up young. And the reality is that for us normal folks, having to provide for a child is HARD FUCKING WORK. Some girls are lucky enough to have immense support from their families-they continue to live at home rent-free, their parents babysit while they're in school/working/just continuing to be normal young women, they get huge amounts of financial support...and to those girls I say "stop whining you spoiled cunts, you get all the good parts of having a baby with none of the hardships." If anyone is "glamorizing teen pregnancy," it's these completely average young women whose parents continue to support them AND their children. They have no extraordinary circumstances (such as celebrity and wealth) yet they continue to have perfectly normal lives while procreating at extremely young ages.
Some of us don't get that help. I have survived innumerable hardships and done everything short of prostitution or theft to provide for myself and my son. Having him so young made my life harder than it really needed to be. But does that mean I should love him any less? Should I wallow in misery and self-hatred for the rest of my life? Should I start some sort of movement advocating mandatory abortions or adoptions for anyone who gets pregnant before they're 20? Should I tell young moms that their lives are over and they may as well just give up?
This is why I hate the phrase "teen parent." It carries such negative connotations. While I was in the hospital after Ronin's birth, recovering from an emergency c-section, I got a harsh introduction to the world of "teen parenthood." I woke up from a nap the day after the birth to be told by a nurse (possibly the only decent human being working on the maternity ward...mat nurses are by and large cuntsmears) that the hospital social worker had been down to NICU (Ronin was quite premature) to "check up" on my baby. This didn't sit well with me. As some of you may be aware, you just don't fuck with The Beckstar. So, in spite of my still oozing incision, residual fuzziness from the anaesthetics, and the fact that I hadn't walked on my own since the surgery, I figured I had to deal with this. I plopped my bloody, stoned self into a wheelchair and headed off to the social work office on another floor of the hospital. When I confronted this woman with questions about why she had been down to "check on my baby" without my permission or even knowledge, while I was having a nap and recovering from fucking SURGERY, she responded with, "It's policy. All children born to mothers under the age of 18 receive a routine welfare checkup." When I asked why parental consent for this "checkup" wasn't required, she told me that "when the parent is under 18, it doesn't really count."
Excuse me?
So, a HEALTHY baby is born to a HEALTHY mother, albeit prematurely due to TRAUMA RECEIVED IN AN ACCIDENT, not by any defect or fault of the mother, and because the mother is under 18 you can just waltz in and poke and prod the baby, looking for a way the mother may be unfit, and her consent "doesn't really count?" What the fuck country is this, lady? I'm sorry, I thought I was in Canada, with a Charter of Rights and Freedoms or some shit like that. I raised quite a fuss about this little incident and informed the self-righteous cunt sitting across the desk from me that either I received an apology in writing or the Human Rights Commission and every media outlet in the province received my story in writing. The end result? I got a letter from DSS apologizing for my "being upset by the behavior of their employee," and stating that they "regret her decision to perform the inspection without my knowledge, but it is department policy to conduct said inspection, and parental consent is not required where the welfare of the child may be at stake." Basically, they didn't need my consent for the same reason they don't need the parent's consent when allegations of abuse arise. If you are under 18 and give birth in Saskatchewan, you are automatically under investigation for child abuse. Now, this may have changed in the past eight years, but that's what the policy was "in my day."
Let's recap. Western society says that if you have a baby when you are a teenager, you WILL be a bad parent if left to your own devices, you probably already have abused your child somehow before they are born, and your life is effectively over. Therefore, you must do penance by hating both yourself and your child forever, and you are not allowed to enjoy the experience of parenthood. You must instead don sackcloth and ashes anytime you are seen in public with the child, go on welfare for the rest of your natural life and refuse to even attempt to better yourself, because you are a Teen Parent and the best you can hope for is meager survival.
People, this is why things like the "prom baby" happen. Granted, girls who do shit like that are probably a little fucked up to begin with, and it's utterly wrong. I'm not excusing their behavior. What I am saying is that when we bombard young women with these ideas that if they get pregnant they're completely fucked (ha ha) and then expect some sort of contrition in place of celebration from the ones who do have babies, we create a culture of fucking dumpster babies. I have pulled Ronin out of a daycare centre because the owner had the balls to make a distinction (while I was in the room) between "teen moms" and "real moms." I have said very unpleasant things to complete strangers who have made comments like "don't you think you should have at least had the decency to give that baby to someone who can take care of it properly?" I have gotten into a physical altercation with a girl who told me that I shouldn't be happy to be a mother at my age. You just don't fuck with The Beckstar. But not every young mom can be me. The reason these attitudes are allowed to continue is that many young moms don't feel they have the right to stand up for themselves as women and as mothers. And unfortunately, in many parts of our community, the stereotype of the undereducated young mom is true, so these girls don't know how to defend their family the same way I have. (With a few notable exceptions, I tend to believe that the pen is mightier than the sword. But when you mess with my family you'd best believe that I will fucking gut you with that pen and write a letter to my MLA in your blood.)
Let's educate these teen moms, you say? Open special daycare centres and programs for them?
Let me ask you something, my friend. ARE YOU FUCKING HIGH? Have you paid any attention to today's lesson at all? Better yet, have you ever set foot in one of those "special programs" for teen moms? Go ahead, try it. I fucking dare you to see how long you can take being spoken to as though you're a five year old sociopath before you just give up and flush all your kids down the WalMart toilet.
What we need is for people to pull their heads out of their asses and treat mothers like mothers, regardless of age. Discrimination against young parents is a form of human rights violation that is not only still legal, but in fact sponsored by our government. Yes, educate children about sex, pregnancy, birth control and everything that entails. I am a huge proponent of reality-based education, and telling young women that if they have a baby before they are truly ready it will be HARD AS FUCK. What I want is for girls who do get pregnant to be told that they can still accomplish anything they choose, they might just have to work a little harder for it. We need to get rid of these "daycares for children of teen parents" and "teen parent programs." In fact, I wholeheartedly applaud the Saskatchewan Party for abolishing that den of government-employed fuckstains that used to operate on Avenue M South. I have struggled in my life with depression and suicidal thoughts, but never so strongly as I did after my only visit to that building during my pregnancy. Looking back now, I kind of want revenge on the government health nurses and counsellors who psychologically fucking raped me that day, but at the time I walked home KNOWING that my life was effectively over and that I would truly be better off throwing myself in front of a passing truck than ruining my life and dooming my unborn child to the worst kind of hell on earth by having the audacity to have a child at that age.
We as a society need to start treating parents like parents, no matter their age. I am a better mother than many women twice my age. Good or bad parenting does not depend on one's birthdate. I am all for support programs for parents, but they must be all-inclusive. It is extremely psychologically damaging for a young pregnant woman to have to face a distinction between herself and a "real mother." We cannot segregate parental support based on age-it must be done based on need. And regardless of age, a woman who chooses to give birth to and raise a child MUST be allowed and encouraged to see the joy in her decision, and to love her child the way nature has dictated. If we tell young women they shouldn't be happy, love their children and enjoy being mothers, they very likely won't. And that leads to poor parenting and a repeating cycle of poverty, abuse and misery in a far more direct way than age ever can.
I celebrate my child. I have walked a hard road because of my decision to keep him, and I celebrate that too. It has made me who I am today, and this child has brought me more joy and more learning opportunities than anything else in my life. Anyone who says that young mothers shouldn't celebrate their children the same way older mothers do should be sterilized on the spot, because they obviously have some deep seated hatred of children if they advocate parental apathy like that. And if this celebrity controversy can raise public awareness of this travesty, I'll be thrilled. Unfortunately, what it seems to be doing is giving these hateful, discriminatory fear-mongers a platform for their filth. And that makes me a sad panda.
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