In the media, there are constant reports of people belittling others on account of their weight. 99 percent of the time, all you hear about are people that are called out for being overweight. While in no way is this acceptable, why don’t we ever hear about people being called out for being “too skinny?” This happens just as often and has the same affect on self esteem. I want to make note that in no way am I undermining or justifying fat shaming, I just want to bring attention to the other end of the spectrum as it is just as much an issue.
All my life I’ve been a smaller framed girl and I’ve constantly been told “you need to gain some weight.” While at first this didn’t bother me much, hearing it over and over again, particularly by friends and family, really started to take a toll on my self esteem.
During my senior year of high school, I was feeling really stressed out all the time. The pressure of figuring out where to spend the next four years of my life was taking its toll on me. I’ll be the first to admit that I stress out an excessive amount over little things, but this time was different. The stress was manifesting itself physically, and I dropped 11 pounds in a little over a month. This was when the comments got really bad.
“You look so unhealthy,” “Did you lose more weight?” “That dress is falling off of you,” “Oh you’re one of THOSE that can eat anything and not gain a pound” or the one I’ll never forget that I heard my freshman year of college: “Either put a shirt on or eat a burger” as I was changing in my dorm room. Why are these remarks considered acceptable? Would you tell an overweight person, “That dress makes you look fat”? Probably not. Plain and simple, these comments are just as hurtful as telling someone that they need to lose weight. What a lot of people don’t realize is that weight is mainly hereditary. Sometimes you don’t have total control over your weight, be this that you gain or lose weight sporadically. Everyone’s metabolism is different and that's something people need to keep in mind.
Coming from a long line of small framed women, some would say I lucked out. Yes, I can pretty much eat whatever and no, I rarely set foot in the gym, but that doesn’t mean that I don't want to set goals for myself regarding exercise and diet, which brings me to my next point. Everyone has those “I really need to start going to the gym and eating better” conversations with their friends. But for me, every time I even mention wanting to work out or eating better I get pelted with “Shut up you don't need to go to the gym” or, “You’re so annoying you don’t need to watch what you eat.” But what if I want to? What if I want to workout and feel better mentally and physically? Why should anyone downplay someone’s desire to better themselves even if in their personal opinion they think that they “don’t need it.”
While sometimes you may think that telling someone they’re “so skinny” repeatedly is a compliment, I wanted to draw attention to the fact that this is usually not the case. Through reading this article, I hope everyone gains some insight and understanding as to why skinny shaming is just as hurtful as fat shaming. While I’m sure this article will be met with much disagreement, I want to say again that IN NO WAY am I downplaying fat shaming. NO ONE should be ridiculed for their weight, be that overweight, underweight or anywhere in between. Skinny is beautiful. Fat is beautiful. Curvy is beautiful. Having no curves is beautiful. Everyone has a right to feel comfortable in their own skin, and it’s about time everyone recognized that.
