For the love of goodness gracious, can we please stop assuming that plus sized people just flat out HATE skinny people? Can we get over this notion that I must look at every single skinny person I see and just want to strangle them? Because I don’t. Honest. I would have to be locked up for life if I strangled all the skinny people I encounter. 

There’s this article that is getting a lot of shit right now in regards to the article writer seeing a larger, black woman in her yoga class, and she goes into this thought process of being suddenly aware of her skinny, white girl body, and how she could feel the contempt from this woman behind her and how, surely, this woman was noticing how skinny she was and feeling resentment and judging her.

Of course the article writer is just ASSUMING all of these things because SHE NEVER ONCE EVEN ATTEMPTS TO TALK TO THIS WOMAN! “Oh wow it must be hard being the minority in class,” but instead of trying to welcome her or something she just goes on these mental tangents of being suddenly aware of her all white yoga class, how hard that must be for the big black lady, how she looked so afraid to be there, how it must be terrible to see all these skinny white bodies, and just… UGH!

O.K. Sure. I’m not saying that these aren’t thoughts that plus sized people have, but STOP MAKING ASSUMPTIONS! Don’t look at me in this, “Oh wow. Her looking at my thin frame must be hard.” No. Stop thinking that every time I walk outside and see skinny, white people, I’m suddenly miserable. And goddamn, lady, if you really do have this huge epiphany and feel bad for the only black, plus sized lady in your class struggling through class SAY HELLO TO HER! Give her some tips. Some encouragement on her first day. SOMETHING! And by the way, yoga isn’t easy in the first place. You’re not going to get it your first try, so who knows, maybe she’s looking frustrated because it’s hard, not because, “Oh god I’m so fat and black,” but you wouldn’t know that because YOU DIDN’T EVEN SAY ANYTHING TO HER! You just sat there and assumed, “I know she hates me, if I say something she’s going to hate me more,” just… wow. How do you go from feeling bad for the only black lady to being like, “Welp she hates me so I’m not going to say a word,” and just… NO!

Again, I’m not saying that these insecurities don’t exist, but she literally puts these insecurities on this lady she doesn’t even know. She looks at her and thinks, “Wow she must be horrified to be here. She must be feeling so insecure, and her looking at me isn’t making it any better.” What. The. Fuck! What, you think saying that you’re wearing a tastefully, tacky sports bra somehow makes you sound less attractive so we’ll feel bad for you? Like, “Oh jeez, she’s skinny but she’s not dressed well so she has flaws, too, and it’s unfortunate that this new woman can’t see past her skinniness to notice that.” Really? Really?! You just spent the article talking about how you assume this woman is feeling these things simply from looking at you. Not just the entire class, but you specifically. Your magical skinniness is what all the big black ladies envy, you know. It makes us feel bad about ourselves and we hate you for it. Hiiiiiiiss.

The article in question is here.  You have to love that title, right?  Here’s the article in question: For the love of goodness gracious, can we please stop assuming that plus sized people just flat out HATE skinny people? Can we get over this notion that I must look at every single skinny person I see and just want to strangle them? Because I don’t. Honest. I would have to be locked up for life if I strangled all the skinny people I encounter. 

There’s this article that is getting a lot of shit right now in regards to the article writer seeing a larger, black woman in her yoga class, and she goes into this thought process of being suddenly aware of her skinny, white girl body, and how she could feel the contempt from this woman behind her and how, surely, this woman was noticing how skinny she was and feeling resentment and judging her.

Of course the article writer is just ASSUMING all of these things because SHE NEVER ONCE EVEN ATTEMPTS TO TALK TO THIS WOMAN! “Oh wow it must be hard being the minority in class,” but instead of trying to welcome her or something she just goes on these mental tangents of being suddenly aware of her all white yoga class, how hard that must be for the big black lady, how she looked so afraid to be there, how it must be terrible to see all these skinny white bodies, and just… UGH!

O.K. Sure. I’m not saying that these aren’t thoughts that plus sized people have, but STOP MAKING ASSUMPTIONS! Don’t look at me in this, “Oh wow. Her looking at my thin frame must be hard.” No. Stop thinking that every time I walk outside and see skinny, white people, I’m suddenly miserable. And goddamn, lady, if you really do have this huge epiphany and feel bad for the only black, plus sized lady in your class struggling through class SAY HELLO TO HER! Give her some tips. Some encouragement on her first day. SOMETHING! And by the way, yoga isn’t easy in the first place. You’re not going to get it your first try, so who knows, maybe she’s looking frustrated because it’s hard, not because, “Oh god I’m so fat and black,” but you wouldn’t know that because YOU DIDN’T EVEN SAY ANYTHING TO HER! You just sat there and assumed, “I know she hates me, if I say something she’s going to hate me more,” just… wow. How do you go from feeling bad for the only black lady to being like, “Welp she hates me so I’m not going to say a word,” and just… NO!

Again, I’m not saying that these insecurities don’t exist, but she literally puts these insecurities on this lady she doesn’t even know. She looks at her and thinks, “Wow she must be horrified to be here. She must be feeling so insecure, and her looking at me isn’t making it any better.” What. The. Fuck! What, you think saying that you’re wearing a tastefully, tacky sports bra somehow makes you sound less attractive so we’ll feel bad for you? Like, “Oh jeez, she’s skinny but she’s not dressed well so she has flaws, too, and it’s unfortunate that this new woman can’t see past her skinniness to notice that.” Really? Really?! You just spent the article talking about how you assume this woman is feeling these things simply from looking at you. Not just the entire class, but you specifically. Your magical skinniness is what all the big black ladies envy, you know. It makes us feel bad about ourselves and we hate you for it. Hiiiiiiiss.

Here’s the article in question.  It is getting a lot, and I mean a LOT, of shit. Most of the notes I scrolled through (I stopped after a while because there are over 2000 in the span of 2 days) pretty much make the same points I do, to the point that there are even spoof articles out there for this article. 

I just… please stop making assumptions about me being this sad, plump black girl who looks at all the white, skinny girls of the world and cry myself to sleep at night. And by the way, starting your article with, “It’s the new year so my class is getting the resolution crowd who are going to give up after a month,” is NOT a good way to segway into, “Suddenly there was a large black woman behind me.”

Man I thought I was done ranting!  It’s Sunday morning!  

But a friend on Facebook posted this to make a great point so I’m going to do the same.

I dislike it when I see things like this (which is the point she was making, too).  I dislike it when someone decides to support someone who is plus sized by bashing skinny people.  That’s not supportive.  Skinny people have done nothing wrong.  And furthermore, what kind of example is that to set?  We want people to support us, but then we bash the people we want support from in the same breath? 

I have nothing against skinny people.  At all.  I have skinny people in my life and I’m not jealous of them or making snide comments about them, because they love me for me, and I love them for them.  But I think this is a thing that happens to show support for someone who is plus sized and it’s not cool.  And I will admit that, back in the day, I use to laugh at stuff like this and had this whole, “Skinny girl just needs to eat a sandwich,” mentality, like waaaaaaaaaaaay back in high school, but looking back… how terrible is that?  Especially if your friends are skinny, or even if they’re plus sized but smaller than you.  My partner is smaller than me.  So is my mother.

The point of this whole plus sized acceptance thing is to show that you shouldn’t make fun of us because of our size, NOT that we’re BETTER because of our size, but that size shouldn’t be a factor period in defining who someone is.  This whole idea irritates me with all… are these battles?  I don’t really want to call them battles.  But, you know, when you’re trying to support a group and you decide to do it by saying mean things about another group to do it?  Or you decide not to include them?  For example: I have heard (on tumblr) people in the GLBT circle bashing the likes of Macklemore and telling him to stop singing about things he doesn’t understand (i.e. his song, “Same Love.”) 

First of all: it’s a song SUPPORTING US.  AND IT’S IN MAINSTREAM!  Do you know how blown my mind was when I heard that song on the radio?  Do you realize how amazing that was?  A song that hit number one status that has a positive GLBT message?  And it wasn’t like I needed to read between the lines, no, it was flat out about us.  

Second of all: who is it that we want support from?  Straight people, right?  So there’s one, right there, being supportive.  Why is this a bad thing?  For the most part people in the GLBT family are supportive of each other (I said “for the most part” because I know there’s people within groups who bash each other and that happens in every group but I’m not going to dwell on that), we aren’t outside yelling about equality to appease each other, but to show people outside of the group that we should be in this, too.  So when someone outside of the group is like, “Yes you’re right,” the correct response should not be, “You’ll never understand so stop speaking for us,” it should be, “Thank you.”

Third of all: he never said that he understands where we’re coming from, he never said, “I can relate because I’m gay too.”  He’s not gay.  But just because someone isn’t something doesn’t mean that they don’t have feelings about the issue.  Otherwise, who are we even talking to in regards to this battle for equality?  I mean should we bash Beyonce for tweeting things like being for same sex marriage?  Should we be like, “No sweetie you don’t understand, shut up.”  

Good people understand that bashing someone or denying their rights because of race/gender/sexuality/size/whatever is wrong, and that everyone deserves the same rights and the same common courtesy.  They’re on our side, so let’s not step on their toes.  Let’s not be like, “Oh man I love a lady with curves skinny girls are a waste of anyone’s time.”  And I’ve heard that in regards to my cosplay, and honestly, your compliment loses meaning when it’s, “You’re beautiful, way better than this person.”