Bibbidi Bobbidi Boo —

If you’ve been reading Fierce, Freethinking Fatties for a while now, you know we’ve written a lot about “The Biggest Loser.” I mean, a lot.

The reason is that “The Biggest Loser” encapsulates, in a single show, everything that we despise about weight loss culture and the emphasis on radical transformation over pragmatic health changes. Of course, it’s those same radical transformations (at the risk of the contestants’ health) that have made TBL such a hit.

In short, TBL has become the ultimate expression of “The Fantasy of Being Thin“.

The contestants arrive miserable, self-loathing and desperate to lose weight. Four or five months later, they depart, full of confidence and zeal, thin and attractive, and demonstrating (seemingly) to a diet-desperate nation that the fattest of the fat could lose the weight if they’d just set their minds to it.

Throw in a few reunion shows to emphasize the ongoing “success” of a few specially chosen contestants and you get a self-perpetuating testament to the power of transformation!

A few weeks back, I had the displeasure of being face-to-face with TBL at the YMCA for the second-to-last episode of season 11. I think that when I watch TBL with captions, I have a tendency to notice things that I wouldn’t otherwise notice.

In this case, it was the language of transformation that pervades the entire first half of this episode (it was two hours, I believe, but I only witnessed the first hour and couldn’t bring myself to watch the second when I went back to transcribe).

And in between all of this mystical, magical transformation language, videos of the stripped-down contestants at their starting weights, then the contestant would be spun around as each revolution is a video taken from one week of the show. I wish I could find an image of it on YouTube to share because the imagery is unmistakable: like clay on a pottery wheel, “The Biggest Loser” has transformed these contestants from lumps of unsightly goo into visions of perfection.

Ignore the weeks of intensive training and daily four-hour workouts… the visual says it all: work hard enough and you can mold yourself into the body you want.

But the changes won’t end at physical transformation… oh no!

Not only can TBL change disgusting piles of flab into perfect specimens, the removal of fat tissue has an even more profound effect on who you are and how you enjoy life.

The following are all quotes from Week 20 of TBL. Unless otherwise indicated, these are all quotes, separated by paragraphs, from contestants:

We were so lost and broken, we were sad. We made a pact. We would change our lives. That was our most important thing. I can’t wait to live out the rest of our lives. We’re just gonna live out our dreams because we can. And because we had this time to change and we did.

To me the whole physical part is not really the big deal. I feel like I’m a completely different person now than I was walking in here.

Knowing that my life is gonna change when I go back is kinda scary.

Bob Harper: Do you know how much more fulfilling your life is going to be now? The possibilities that are out there for you, for a person who is so well-rounded now. That’s a big deal. You are gonna go home and grab everything that you want out of your life. It’s all yours now. Anything you want.

Thank you for changing my life.

Allison Sweeney: Since you first arrived here five months ago, you have changed every facet of your lives.

Jenny-O will also send the guest of your choice to fitness camp for a two week stay so you can help someone you love to get the transformation they need to.

I don’t think you realize that moment changed my life… and that was just one of many moments here that have completely changed my life.

It was what I let those pounds do to me. I let them totally rob me of a life and of my smile and a laugh, and relationships and who I really am and what I have to offer to world. And when I think about those 12 years in that dark place. I will never ever go back to that place.

I know if I keep losing weight I’m gonna feel better and better.

Despite the tears, incredibly joyful that I get to live my life like this. I put my money on joy and boy am I glad I did.

Bob Harper: You have grown so much. You are no longer that victim. You are no longer that reactive woman. You are no longer that woman.

Thank you for changing my life.

The difference between week 1 and 20 is that I’m confident in my body, confident in my athleticism. And that’s something I’ve never felt before.

I’ve won my life back and this is the greatest gift I could have ever been given.

Folks, if you have felt like being fat put you in a “dark place” it’s not because the accumulation of fat tissue sentences you to a life of joyless self-loathing and depression. It is because you have internalized the social message that fat people should not be happy until they “do something” about their fat.

The contestants of TBL spent several months isolated from their family and friends, pushed through a period of intense humiliation and asceticism, and culminated with the final four “successful” contestants being repeatedly praised and rewarded for sticking through to the end.

So yeah, you’re going to feel “different” than you did when you first started. But removing the fat had very little to do with that change. Removing the fat did not make it possible for you to suddenly pursue your dreams. Removing the fat did not boost your confidence. Removing the fat did not save you from that “dark space.”

You know what did? Losing the stigma of being fat.

You’re still the same person, but now you see yourself differently since other people treat you differently.

Well guess what: Fat Acceptance offers you the opportunity to lose the middleman. With Fat Acceptance, you can learn to see yourself differently regardless of how other people treat you.

And throw in a little Health at Every Size, and you’ve got a healthier, happier person who doesn’t need to endure a dehumanizing campaign of “transformation” to make that a reality.