Fatness and the Fear of Death.
Fatness has always been linked with sin. Gluttony = fat, gluttony = not just sin, but one of the 7 deadly sins, therefore fat person = sinner = worthy of hate.
However, after watching a documentary on the fear of death, I want to share my thoughts on fatness and the fear of death.
Flight from Death is an interesting documentary I watched that explains the very natural, very human fear of dying. It includes interviews with psychologists and professors on the fear of dying and how it affects people’s actions and makes them combative and, sometimes, even violent.
People obviously can’t live for ever… yet. So, humans struggle to live forever spiritually (an afterlife) or through symbols (think countries and organizations one is affiliated with).
For example, a person who believes that you have to stand on your head 24/7 or you won’t have a happy afterlife is naturally going to be more combative when faced with another person who believes that you have to balance on one foot 24/7 to have a happy afterlife. Why? Because in their minds, one of them has to be wrong and the one who is wrong will not get to live happily ever after, spiritually.
So, how does this all relate to fatties? Here’s what I think.
The media connects fatness with death on what seems like a daily basis. Therefore, in the minds of most people, fatness is connected with death. So, when people are happily walking around, I think a fatty can totally trigger their fear of their own mortality.
When you combine Puritan ideas connecting fat to sin, the discrimination knowingly or unknowingly taught, and the fear of death, fatties are bound to be looked at in a bad light. But no matter how subconscious the influence, there is no excuse for treating someone badly. I am not here to remind anyone of their fears; I’m here to live.
This is just something I’ve been thinking about. It’s not backed up by anything but my own reasoning and isn’t meant to offend anyone. I’ve just been thinking.
Big Smiles!
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Wow, what an interesting analysis: fatties as walking mortality symbols. That is so intriguing, I bet it would make a solid thesis for a graduate student. I’m going to be pondering this for a while. Thanks for giving me something to think about.
Peace,
Shannon
The ideas of sin and mortality morph and wrap themselves around a culture like a Gumby doll. Historically, it’s been thinness that has given an impression of mortality (being ill or starving, barely keeping body and soul together), while fatness suggested fertility and abundance. It’s odd how these ideas have gotten turned on their heads.
Isn’t it also interesting how gluttony as personified by fat, is the only deadly sin that most people take seriously (in a moral way) these days? Consider some of the other sins on the list:
Pride and vanity: The bread-and-butter of ladymags and a few men’s magazines, too.
Envy and greed: Where would the advertising industry be without these old reliables?
Sloth: Only a sin as far as it’s conflated with laziness. It is more akin to depression, despair and apathy, which are now seen as diseases. It used to be considered minor in relation to other sins, since it is one of omission rathr than commission. Today, it’s second only to gluttony.
Lust: The stuff of movies and novels and human train wrecks. Quite forgivable in a person who isn’t fat.
Wrath: Can be seen as admirable when associated with decisiveness and action, rather than a more cautious attitude of deliberation.
I am sure that students of religion out there can give a more nuanced interpretation of these. My point is that fatness has been distorted to fit with whatever’s BAD (disease, wickedness, ugliness) and be as distant as possible from whatever’s GOOD (health, beauty, virtue).
Beyond even mortality, we’re considered as embodiments of what people hate most about themselves - that is why our logical arguments don’t make as much of a dent as they should.
I actually wrote about this recently for FFF and I think you just about have it right. The only correction I would make is with lust. I don’t know if it’s even a sin anymore. Some might call it a virtue, since it’s so liberating and artistic and all.
I am really impressed by your line of thinking LexieDi. It would explain some of the needless outrage directed at us at times. I also think it may somehow be linked to the “end of times” mentality that is so pervasive these days
I think lexiedi has something here, and Mulberry too. It would make sense that both their explanations are why fat-phobes are so virulently anti-fat and refuse to listen to science and logic (you can’t reason with someone who’s thinking with their lizard brain, and I think the fat-phobes who are rabidly afraid of death are thinking with their lizard brain and not the logical, human part of their brain).
Vesta, your comment is far too generous by assuming these people even have a brain.:)
Asshole has a new IP?
G-d, don’t you have anything better to do? Piss off.
CC,
He’s got a Perma-Ban goin’ on, so if I don’t get to it right away, you know I’m just around the corner. I check our stats to see where we’re getting traffic from and he must come here two or three times a day from his blog. It’s ridiculous. He’s got a big, ol’ crush on Fierce Fatties and doesn’t know what to do with himself.
Peace,
Shannon
He used to flirt with my blog too, until I enabled comment moderation. Now all comments have to be approved by me before they get posted on my blog. They come to my email acct, I see who they’re from, I read the comment, and then decide if I’ll approve it for posting or not. If the comment is from that douchecanoe or one of his many aliases, it doesn’t even get read, I just set it as spam and delete. Not even going to deal with his crap, at all, ever again.
Is that the one that followed you from blog to blog?
I knew he had a lot of free time, but still…
Hey, guess what I I just found out! He’s trolling my blog too!
My SECOND troll! Aw, look how cuh-yooooot he is!
Delete.
He left a cute little comment bomb on my blog (which isn’t even about FA primarily, it’s about autistic issues) too. He’s probably too old for me to rub his nose in it and yell BAD TROLL, though. Or he might like that. Ew.
Somebody needs to get laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaid… he’s mad crushin’ on all of you.
Peace,
Shannon
Before I found my way to fat acceptance, I went through a Genesis with my thinking about my eating and my size. I knew for whatever reason that try to lose weight just doesn’t work for me. I was emotionally and spiritually exhausted from trying. So I made a decision that I was going to eat whatever I wanted whenever I wanted.
I said to myself and to my close loved ones that I know that this way of eating will probably cause me to die sooner. I accepted that I probably was going to lose a few years, maybe more than a few, because I decided to not work at restricting my food.
So I personally made a choice to let go of all the drama attached to try to lose weight and accept the possibility that it would cost me years of life. As I became more familiar with the facts and the science I realized that being that doesn’t automatically mean less years of life.
So today when I am discussing the concepts of size acceptance with someone in my life who is genuinely interested, the conversation always seems to go to that ticking time bomb metaphor.
All my “indicators” of health, (blood pressure, cholesterol, liver function, etc.) are ideal and better than my stepbrother who’s my age. Yet I inevitably hear from my inner circle loved ones the word “yet” when discussing my health problems.
A lot of the time I hear that the good news about health statistics doesn’t apply to me because I am on the highest ends of the spectrum of weight. So in this sense I still think to myself that I probably will not live as long as I otherwise could have if I was able to diet and lose weight. Actually I can do that I’ve done it many times. It’s the inevitable Gini of the week back that I haven’t figured out how to prevent.
Until recently I spent most of my life buying into that fat is good to kill me kind of thinking. Why haven’t escaped that kind of thinking 100% of the time, I do now know that there are much better ways for me to make efforts towards good health and dieting.
So while it crushes my heart to know that my stepbrother uses me as an example for his children a what not to be and what not to do and instills the fear of being fat in those two young boys you don’t want to turn into your uncle Ivan, I know that the fear of dying and the fact that I am a poster child for an unnecessary early death in their minds is one small part of my nephews upbringing.
I didn’t get a chance to thank everyone for their comments earlier (because of my lack of a computer). So, thank you!
Except for that one guy… Whoever he is. SOMEBODY obviously needs huggles.
He’s flirting with my blog too. *sigh* Isn’t it a burden to be so loved?
Lexie,
Just delete him. He’s a spineless troll and not worth the trouble.
Peace,
Shannon
O yeah. I moderate my comments. He can make them, but they’ll never see the light of day.His little love-notes are only seen to be deleted.