We have knives….

Fats Acceptance or Acceptable Fats?

I think it’s safe to say there’s a fat acceptance movement going on at least in the West, at least in the United States, at least according to google. It is defined (by Wikipedia of course) as such:

“The fat acceptance movement, also the size acceptance movement or fat liberation movement or fat power, is a grassroots effort to change societal attitudes towards individuals who are fat.”

thus allowing for a wide range of interpretations and tactics in how best to deal with those interpretations of discrimination against size and body politics. The convenient truth then is that fat liberation [sic] is whatever we as individuals want it to be, and whatever we as a haphazard community allow it to be.

What does that have to do with the good fats vs. bad fats debate? Consider this. Good fats are those which ascribe to a certain diet or exercise routine. Remember Marilyn Wann’s Fat!So? that hit shelves to ooh’s and aah’s the fatosphere over? She did quite a few hula-hoops in which she described her own healthcare regime, making it very clear that she herself was a good fat and followed the prescriptive behavior pattern of exercising multiple times a week and still being fat. Oh good! She can has fat. Hey you with the donut – PUT IT DOWN! You can not has fat.

I wonder then if we’ve mis-labeled our movement. Are we a fat acceptance movement, allowing space for all sizes and shapes regardless of how they got there, or are we an acceptable fats movement, making space for those who earned it? I wonder.

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