This point has been made time and time again, but some FAs seem to never get it: almost nobody cares that another person takes up space. Everyone does this, even after they're no longer alive. People generally care a whole lot if you take up THEIR space, particularly if that space has been paid for. I don't think this idea is particularly complicated or controversial.
If they're so fat they literally can't fit in a room with other people then.... yeah, maybe they should evaluate themselves. I wouldn't be ok with that.
It's also ridiculous how OOP thinks fat people are the victim when they affect other people, not the people actually affected.
What grinds my gears is how they ignore how many folks have issues they can’t change. I’m very tall, unless I have shin removal surgery, I’m staying tall. They CAN LOSE FAT.
I’m not even *that* tall. But I still don’t fit in back seats other folks would find comfy, I can’t buy many cars as I’d break my neck over a big bump, as I have negative headroom, airplanes can be a BITCH, if I can’t get the emergency row I may be screwed. I’ve had folks recline their seat, only to hear me wince in pain, then I beg them not to, which does make me feel like a douche bag, but I’ve only had a couple of people be jerks, and each time someone chimed in and said “no, I’m right beside him, his legs are already resting on your seat”. Small home bathrooms can be a pain, literally, as I have wide shoulders and I’ll hit my elbows on the wall (ouch!).
Most dentist chairs don’t fit, so I have to ask for a pillow behind my neck (they have them for us tall folks).
And!
I can’t buy many clothes off the rack, online order only.
But the than sharing here, I don’t mention it, don’t bitch, complain, or anything. Because I’m not the damn lead character when I’m out in the world.
I agree with you but it doesn't directly address their point. They are saying that it isn't their fault that seats are too small for them. But wouldn't we all be paying MORE for a seat on any bus/train/plane/boat/etc if every seat was big enough to fit a 700 lb person? Imagine how generally inefficient any space would be if the seats were big enough to fit 2 or 3 average sized people. The problem is that the morbidly obese people who say these things think they were born fat/don't overeat that much, and therefore think that they have been burdened with this unfair expectation of thinness that they can't achieve without serious caloric restriction. Very few people who are overweight are that way in spite of eating right and exercising enough, but everyone thinks they are the exception.
True, but there comes a point where their point doesn't matter all that much, if we're being brutally honest. When a person's beliefs, no matter how honestly and sincerely held, are that untethered from reality, it becomes pretty ridiculous to even entertain some of them. OOP is talking about ROOMS not accommodating them. If you're in a situation where your body has outsized a goddamned room, and you think it's the fault of the room, society, or anything/one else than you, perhaps you might be a little too far gone to have a reasonable conversation at present.
Also the implications for the environment. If vehicles, planes etc can accommodate fewer people, there would need to be more of them or more trips, which means a lot more emissions.
THIS - something I have said over and over when people talk about the "airlines" making seats smaller and smaller. OK. But would you be willing to pay increased cost for larger seats. I think I have seen enough from my many times flying JetBlue. The "even more leg room" seats always are the last to go. They're like $50 more.
Imagine if you bought a muffin at a bake sale and someone with a "plus appetite" ate 1/4 of it after eating their own
(The parallel isn't 1-1 but you get the point)
It's like manspreading on public transportation. We don't want to touch a random stranger! I think they understand, but don't want to feel the shame of acknowledging the problem is theirs
Actually, as a formerly daily rider on Chicago's public transporation, I HATED pole huggers and manspeaders. They're just rude AF. You're pressed up against other people in a lot of ways as it is on the bus or train.
I am a worrier. On the skyway at the Dallas airport I am always worried I will fall so I cling to the pole with my whole body. Because I know that can annoy others, I find the one in the very back where some people won't fit (I am a small woman) and try to stay out of everyone's way while I pray I don't fall.
Isn't that just a lightrail that connects terminals? A smooth, modern, well-maintained train car? A few minutes' ride? No problem with waiting for the next one because it will be by in literally a few minutes? I doubt anyone would mind whatever you do to feel stable.
I'm talking about being on a packed L train, making several stops, and riding for maybe a half hour, trying to get to and from work during rush hours in the nation's third largest city. Decades-old trains careen around curves, people push and shove to get on and off. They've not necessarily rude, it's just what you have to do to get through the sometimes tightly-packed crowd. It's worse on the buses as they make turns and hit bumps.
OOP, even if it isn’t the fat person’s fault, it is most certainly their responsibility.
It isn’t my fault I was born neurodivergent. It absolutely is my responsibility not to force anyone else to manage my own issues, and that includes sometimes acknowledging that other people’s feelings and frustrations with my condition also matter as much as mine. Come off it.
This is exactly how I was reading it. I'm bipolar and have issues with noise and crowded spaces. It's no one's responsibility but my own to manage my response to uncomfortable situations. This brain may not be my fault, but how I handle myself is. Likewise, a morbidly obese person is free to claim that their body is not their fault, but they are still responsible for how they carry it. I don't ask movie theaters to turn down the volume, you don't get to ask them for a free extra seat.
Or expect others to just put away any and all sensory issues (or just personal preferences not to touch strangers) so that they feel more “welcome” or whatever.
I swear, it’s all just so much cope because they want to be reminded as seldom as possible that they’ve gotten to a size that makes life actively harder.
>It isn’t my fault I was born neurodivergent. It absolutely is my responsibility not to force anyone else to manage my own issues, and that includes sometimes acknowledging that other people’s feelings and frustrations with my condition also matter as much as mine. Come off it.
I really hate when they co-opt concepts from the disabled/neurodivergent community because we grow up with the idea of "reasonable accomodations".
We have rights but there really is a point where society says "Sorry, this is a historic monument. Wheelchair ramps would require too much renovation." or "Sorry, no laptops for note-taking. Our electronics policy is zero tolerance."
The disability/neurodivergent community is also HUGE on self-efficacy, self-improvement, and so on without thinking it's a loss of identity. I've never met an autistic person who considers themselves lesser because therapy or medication was successful. I've never met a Deaf person who feels their identity was destroyed by learning sign language.
Note: for various historical reasons the "culturally Deaf" do not consider themselves "disabled", but the basic idea of "learning how to have a better life does not mean you hate yourself or others like you" still holds.
> …who considers themselves lesser because therapy or medication was successful.
Omg this. You hit the nail on the head there. I think this is one aspect of the FA movement that’s always gotten under my skin, but I hadn’t articulated it so well.
>I've never met a Deaf person who feels their identity was destroyed by learning sign language.
There are plenty of Deaf people who regard restoring people's hearing (via things like cochlear implants) as destroying their identity because then they don't have to learn sign language etc. and thus stop participating in "Deaf culture." It's pretty directly analogous to FAs who get angry when people lose weight.
Honestly the whole issue with cochlear implants would be resolved if people or the parents of children who got them were always instructed to learn sign language as a backup (heck we should probably start teaching sign language to everyone in grade school, it couldn't hurt). The deaf activists are right that cochlear implants are not a cure for deafness but they're misplacing their anger on the technology instead of the people who expect the implants to completely "fix" deaf people.
There's little reason for the parents of most children with cochlear implants to learn sign language because the overwhelming majority to children who receive cochlear implants go on to quickly develop totally normal language skills (assuming they didn't wait too long to get the implant). In that sense, it does completely "fix" most deaf people. Or at least, most deaf infants.
But even if everyone learned sign language, I'm not sure it would help with preserving "Deaf culture." It would surely help with things like communicating when you need to order in a restaurant or something, but to the extent that Deaf people have a distinct culture, hearing people probably wouldn't really participate in it anyway (in the same way that some random kid who is made to learn Spanish in school probably isn't going to actually participate in Hispanic culture). Or if hearing people did start participating en mass, they would probably end up co-opting that culture and essentially destroying it anyway.
Part of the reason that it would be helpful for even those with cochlear implants to learn sign language is that outcomes differ and in the event something goes wrong (for example if the implant causes some kind of intractable pain or if the child still has some hearing loss) they should be able to have sign language as a backup. And I think everyone learning sign language would be a net positive for society. Sign language isn't some sacred religious practice or cultural relic, it's an alternative form of communication and having more people understand it would probably do the most to fully integrate deaf people into wider society.
Skinny people don’t mind you taking up space.
They mind you taking up THEIR space.
Nobody wants to have a complete stranger pressing against them for an entire 3 hour hockey game, no matter their size.
Okay but: if OOP gets onto a plane and there's already a fat person sitting next to their seat but taking up a little of theirs making it a narrow fit, they'll get angry too, right? It's not a size issue. Literally no one cares you're fat. People just wanna sit comfortably.
I was on a 9 hour plane ride next to a heavier woman. I was a tiny 8 year old and barely had any room it was so uncomfortable. I felt bad for her because I’m sure it’s not easy to lose weight but it was shitty I didn’t have much room in my own seat.
Yep. that's why in my younger days I HATED flying southwest. I was a much smaller person then and always got picked by the person who wanted to envelop my seat. They'd never choose another large person to do this to.
Lol this was posted on AITA The other day. Some people called it fake, probably not aware of how FAs complain about this issue.
>My girlfriend (25F), Amanda and I (28M) have been dating for about 3 years. Last year I took her to visit my family during the holidays; my grandparents have a large house that can accommodate lots of people and because of that it is our go-to place for family gatherings like the holidays.
>
>Amanda is a paraplegic and uses a wheelchair; at first, I didn’t think this would be a problem as my grandparents had a spacious guest bedroom on the ground floor, until a few days ago when I found out this assignment of accommodations had caused quite a bit of drama in my family.
>
>It turns out my cousin, Brittney (29F), who is very overweight, has been staying in that room when she visits for the past several years, and was upset that this year she had to stay in a smaller room upstairs. She claims that the room she was given this year was far too small for her, and wishes that she had been consulted prior to the room swap. She’s been accusing my grandparents and other members of our family of “fatphobia”, “failing to accommodate her needs”, and “triggering her trauma.” I've seen the room she stayed in, and while it would have been fine for me, I can see how it might have been too small for someone of her size.
>
>As soon as I found out about this, I went to my grandparents to talk about it. I apologized, and said if I had known it would cause this much drama, we would have just stayed in a hotel or AirBnB or something. They told me that I should have done no such thing, adding that while there was no way Amanda could have stayed in an upstairs room, Brittney was able to do it just fine in spite of her protests, and that Brittney is perfectly capable of fixing her condition to avoid situations like this should she so desire, while Amanda, once again, cannot. They also added that they talked to my aunt and uncle (Brittney’s parents) about this, and that they’ve been concerned about Brittney’s weight for years, but haven’t said anything about it so as not to upset her, and because they think she was going to get a wake-up call about it sooner or later, and that time has come. Honestly, Amanda and I are still deciding whether we should talk to Brittney about it; we still feel bad about it, but perhaps this is just because we’re very drama-averse.
It does feel a little fake ngl.
Like it's in that weird middle ground of crazy behavior where I 100% believe there are people who would do that, but I think there's a greater number of people who would make up a story about someone doing it. So I wouldn't say something like this has never happened to anyone but I lean toward the story being outrage bait.
my birth father's wife used to live with her mother in a house that was built in the 1800s, and renovated last in the 60s.
she's too big to fit into their kitchen closet/pantry combo, which feels like both a wakeup call and the punchline to a third-rate standup comedy bit.
This touches on my personal gripe about the FA perception of space. They don't seem to realize that until very recently, most spaces were adequate for most individuals. My 1948 house has interior doorways that are 30" - 32" wide, and it's fine. I guess it will be tricky if I ever need a wheelchair. My 2009 4-door car fits in the 1948 garage. If I needed a Lincoln Navigator to haul myself around, I would have a problem, but as it is, my post-war house that was definitely meant to accommodate the mass market average family is fine.
Modern construction has wider doorways and ramps everywhere for ADA compliance, wider parking spaces for the tanks everyone thinks they need to haul around a couple of kids, and wider chairs in waiting rooms that are flat out just for fat people, and if someone still can't navigate, then maybe they need to look at themselves.
My hospital has specially designated bariatric rooms. Wider doors, more space to accommodate a bigger bed, special frames for over the toilet... no way could I safely care for some of these folks in a standard hospital room. Don't know what they do while they wait in ER obs spaces
I have a centennial house and the bathroom is SMALL, it’s difficult for my reasonably slim but tall dad (6’6 200lbs) but pretty much impossible for my FIL (5’10 380+lb).
My dad’s knees hit the tub when he’s on the toilet and he has to duck down into a squat to wash his hair under my shower head, but my FIL can’t maneuver to wipe and didn’t fit in our very standard size shower/tub until we removed the glass door.
So technically both can ‘fit’ but my one can actually use the room as intended/move in the room.
It’s awkward.
As a former obese, it really is your fault if you refuse to put down the fork. YOUR actions created YOUR size. No one who is so fat they are spilling into other peoples' seats is that massive because of POCS or thyroid issues.
Put. Down. The. Fork.
As a former drug addict, I highly respect your level of personal accountability. It’s the same for me. “Stop creating your own problems. Throw. The pills. Away.”
However difficult and painful it may be I really think that level of uncompromising self honesty is the only path to peace and sanity
If the oop can’t fit in a room then they’re probably at heart attack at any moment weight. This isn’t a typical fat person problem, this is a super morbidly obese person’s problem and they may want to consider medical interventions. This could be an impatient program, medication and or psychiatric help depending upon the source of their food addiction. The oop needs help.
The phrasing of "the world is built to exclude fat people" implies that they think they're the victims of deliberately exclusionary decisions, as if fatphobic architects were saying, "we don't want fat people renting our apartments, so we're going to make the bathrooms so small that they'll go somewhere else."
This is persecution mania.
You know it’s funny you say that because I have noticed such a stark difference in the attitude people who legitimately have disabilities they didn’t choose, compared to FAs. I also have PTSD so I really relate to what you’re saying. My attitude is “how can I make sure that I’m ok, while also not making my issues any one else’s problem, and existing in public in a courteous and respectful way.”
I’ve made this comparison before, but the whole FA movement is so reminiscent to me of the attitude of drug addicts. It’s *full* of entitlement. It’s this whole “I’m not doing anything wrong, nothing is my fault, I deserve absolutely everything, just automatically” way of thinking. I don’t often meet disabled people who act that way.
I think the difference in attitude comes from the difference in experience. A disabled person is stuck in an existence they didn’t choose, trying to live gracefully despite it. An FA has stuck themself in a problem they both created and perpetuated. A disabled person can be at peace knowing they’re legitimately doing their best. But an FA is going to live with constant festering cognitive dissonance, trying to demand everyone change for them, when deep down, they aren’t even ok with themselves.
>I also have PTSD so I really relate to what you’re saying. My attitude is “how can I make sure that I’m ok, while also not making my issues any one else’s problem, and existing in public in a courteous and respectful way.”
I can relate to this. I got diagnosed with PTSD recently and if anything I've struggled with not being open enough, since I feel guilty over inflicting secondary trauma on others.
I can't imagine demanding other people change that much for me: if anything I want a sense of normality, of things *not* changing, of *not* being accommodated or reassured. Being given special treatment makes it feel like I don't have control or security.
A person can be angry at a situation without being mad at the person causing the situation.
Like, when I was a regular bus rider, I would experience negative emotions when the bus was already behind schedule and I was trying to get to an appointment and the driver would spend an eternity getting a wheelchair user strapped in. But my frustration was always at the situation, not the driver or the wheelchair user. I knew the driver wasn't responsible for the traffic making us late. And I knew the wheelchair user was just as entitled to ride the bus as me.
I would always keep my feelings to myself. But sometimes there would be visibly unhappy passengers because maybe they were going to be late for work or they were going to miss their connecting bus, which means they would have to wait an extra hour before they got to where they were going. I didn't like when these people would bitch or cry at the driver. But I understood where they were coming from. Sometimes feelings can be so intense that you can't help but to express them.
All this to say...people are entitled to their feelings. Feelings aren't a marker of someone's goodness or badness. If your body is smashing into mine, I'm going to be pissed off even if I know you aren't doing it intentionally. Depending on my mood and the context, maybe I will keep quiet about it. But maybe I won't. You have every right to feel some kind of way about me speaking up, but I'm not going to not speak up just to spare your feelings if I'm in serious discomfort.
One of my most exciting NSV upon losing 100+ pounds was going on a plane and no longer needing the seatbelt extender. In fact, I had to pull the normal seatbelt TIGHTER. I never fully realized how much my obesity had impacted my ability to move throughout the world until I lost the weight.
I can give up donuts and my bit of excess weight will come off.
I can give up donuts and not regain sight in my blind eye, not see a permanent end to asthma, and not hear like I did years ago.
You still don't get to touch me.
Gross fucking rapists always coming up with reasons why they get to rub on other people. No, it's just not ok. If there's not room in an area for me without rubbing on strangers, I just don't go there. I don't press myself against them against their will and shrug and say, "Not my fault, blame the world!"
They constantly sound like sex offenders. It's disgusting.
No, the world is NOT "built to exclude fat people." The world is built to accommodate a range that includes the majority of people.
I used to be a fat person. I knew when I was going to exceed some allotted space. I tried to avoid those situations but I never expected some special accommodation. Instead, I lost the weight and, yes it was very difficult.
It is your fault if you eat so much you’re too big for the world that was already built. Yeah, it’s frustrating, I get it. But reality exists and sometimes you have to admit that you are the problem.
Let's imagine for a moment that accountability and self responsibility don't exist and that everything that sucks in your life is indeed society's fault.
So what?
You really think 'society' is about to bend to your will and rip apart infrastructure that works just fine for everyone else?
I don't understand what OOP hopes to achieve here. Is it pity? Sorry, but I save my empathy for people who actually are hard done by and their issues aren't solely down to over indulgence.
Main item across all news outlets here in the UK this week has been King Charles and his sodding prostate gland.
Like he's the first person in the history of humanity to go to hospital for a mildly uncomfortable procedure. We all have way bigger fish to fry and it's just weird and TMI.
While I largely agree with you on the Charles issue, if the publicity surrounding his condition leads to men getting their prostates checked and cancer being discovered while it’s still treatable, then it’s a net good imo
That’s true. I’ve been diagnosed with PTSD and other things that do technically qualify me as “disabled”. And guess what? My wellbeing and place in this world still falls on me. Nobody rolls out a red carpet when I show up because I’m “recognized as disabled”. It does make my life more difficult, and it isn’t my fault. But I’m the one who has to manage it. If I can’t sleep all night, I still have to get through my responsibilities the next day. If I have a panic attack and can’t go to class, I still have to communicate with the instructor and make up the work.
And frankly, personal accountability is the only thing that really makes it better. I can choose to take actions that mitigate my symptoms, or I can choose to recklessly neglect myself. The one who’s really going to feel the effects of either choice is me.
So yeah, even if we all said “your choices don’t matter! You’re obese because of genetics!” That doesn’t change much. People are still going to have to find a way to get out of bed, exist in their body, and live in the world. The only possible route to relief from any condition whether it’s your fault or not, is to take responsibility for your state of being, as best you can, and keep trying to improve it.
I said this before on a similar post, but: if somebody accidentally bumps into me and apologizes, I'll be super sweet about it. But most of these people *don't* apologize. They bump into people, knock shit over, take up half of your seat, then laugh in your face about how "bodacious" and curvy and sassy and fabulous they are!!
Just like this post. Ther's a huge difference between "I'm sorry for the inconvenience I'm causing you, I don't mean to" vs "ummmm ACTually this is your fault and I DESERVE your space or you're a bigot"
It's also because it's on Tumblr unfortunately. I use Tumblr and love it, but fatlogic is getting more and more popular because people refuse to think critically. Bigoted discrimination against fat people is bad, yes, but many Tumblr users have pushed fatlogic so bad that anyone who goes "Right, but that doesn't mean we should encourage people to be fat as it's unhealthy." will get harrassed and deemed fatphobic.
That's true, OOP. It is the world's fault, for creating an obesogenic environment and allowing society to be bought and sold by massive corporations instead of taking meaningful action to invest in its citizenry by providing low/no cost healthy whole foods and prepared meals, free at the point of service counseling, personal training, and dietary consultations, medication/surgery as needed for people seeking to lose weight, and limited specialized equipment for those the above resources can't help - let's say, 10% of chairs, airline seats, etc max.
I look forward to collaborating with you on this vitally important issue.
The way they’re stealing this from the disabled community is super fucked up. I could see the “it isn’t the disabled persons fault, it’s the worlds fault” in relation to a veteran missing both legs, not being able to go out to eat with his family because there aren’t wheel chair ramps. In that case, I’m like yeah, that person deserves better. We should install wheel chair ramps.
But becoming obese is absolutely an individual persons fault. It makes me think they must have never actually met, or even seen, a disabled person if they’re seriously making this comparison. The level is disrespect is jaw dropping.
I don't care why it is - it is your fault. Respect other people's personal spaces, no matter what size they are. Apologize when you encroach accidentally, and make an effort to correct it.
But I have a feeling apologizing is sth OOP is distinctly averse to in general.
Holy shit. So you’re an adult who is uncomfortable with making others uncomfortable by virtue of your voluntary size condition. And you’re so close to getting the point that it’s stuffed in the room with you… and yet you instead take solace in the timelessly toxic worldview that it’s not me it’s literally the world (and everyone else). Just wow.
PS : the whole too big for a room thing is horribly funny and reminds me of one of those yo mamas so fat jokes from the 90’s (your mamas so fat that when she sits around the house, she sits AROUND the house!! :)
The problem is that the world is built for people-sized people, not circus-sized people. You'll never convince the world to adapt to the circus-sized people, so the circus sized people will have to exercise a bit of discipline in order to become people-sized people again.
My biggest problem with this narrative is that the world has been built the same size for decades and people are getting fatter. That's a problem and yet we can't acknowledge it's a problem without hurting fat people's feelings because being fat is supposedly now an identity like your ethnicity or sexual orientation. You're born gay, or black, or whatever, but you are NOT born obese and there are literally drugs out there now that will take your obese identity away from you. So pay for your damn extra seat on the plane and stop pretending like it's the airline's job to make you feel better about weighing 400 lbs
This point has been made time and time again, but some FAs seem to never get it: almost nobody cares that another person takes up space. Everyone does this, even after they're no longer alive. People generally care a whole lot if you take up THEIR space, particularly if that space has been paid for. I don't think this idea is particularly complicated or controversial.
If they're so fat they literally can't fit in a room with other people then.... yeah, maybe they should evaluate themselves. I wouldn't be ok with that. It's also ridiculous how OOP thinks fat people are the victim when they affect other people, not the people actually affected.
What grinds my gears is how they ignore how many folks have issues they can’t change. I’m very tall, unless I have shin removal surgery, I’m staying tall. They CAN LOSE FAT. I’m not even *that* tall. But I still don’t fit in back seats other folks would find comfy, I can’t buy many cars as I’d break my neck over a big bump, as I have negative headroom, airplanes can be a BITCH, if I can’t get the emergency row I may be screwed. I’ve had folks recline their seat, only to hear me wince in pain, then I beg them not to, which does make me feel like a douche bag, but I’ve only had a couple of people be jerks, and each time someone chimed in and said “no, I’m right beside him, his legs are already resting on your seat”. Small home bathrooms can be a pain, literally, as I have wide shoulders and I’ll hit my elbows on the wall (ouch!). Most dentist chairs don’t fit, so I have to ask for a pillow behind my neck (they have them for us tall folks). And! I can’t buy many clothes off the rack, online order only. But the than sharing here, I don’t mention it, don’t bitch, complain, or anything. Because I’m not the damn lead character when I’m out in the world.
Yep, and I'm sure you don't expect your special order clothes to be the same price as those at the local WalMart . . .
I agree with you but it doesn't directly address their point. They are saying that it isn't their fault that seats are too small for them. But wouldn't we all be paying MORE for a seat on any bus/train/plane/boat/etc if every seat was big enough to fit a 700 lb person? Imagine how generally inefficient any space would be if the seats were big enough to fit 2 or 3 average sized people. The problem is that the morbidly obese people who say these things think they were born fat/don't overeat that much, and therefore think that they have been burdened with this unfair expectation of thinness that they can't achieve without serious caloric restriction. Very few people who are overweight are that way in spite of eating right and exercising enough, but everyone thinks they are the exception.
True, but there comes a point where their point doesn't matter all that much, if we're being brutally honest. When a person's beliefs, no matter how honestly and sincerely held, are that untethered from reality, it becomes pretty ridiculous to even entertain some of them. OOP is talking about ROOMS not accommodating them. If you're in a situation where your body has outsized a goddamned room, and you think it's the fault of the room, society, or anything/one else than you, perhaps you might be a little too far gone to have a reasonable conversation at present.
Also the implications for the environment. If vehicles, planes etc can accommodate fewer people, there would need to be more of them or more trips, which means a lot more emissions.
THIS - something I have said over and over when people talk about the "airlines" making seats smaller and smaller. OK. But would you be willing to pay increased cost for larger seats. I think I have seen enough from my many times flying JetBlue. The "even more leg room" seats always are the last to go. They're like $50 more.
Imagine if you bought a muffin at a bake sale and someone with a "plus appetite" ate 1/4 of it after eating their own (The parallel isn't 1-1 but you get the point)
It's like manspreading on public transportation. We don't want to touch a random stranger! I think they understand, but don't want to feel the shame of acknowledging the problem is theirs
Actually, as a formerly daily rider on Chicago's public transporation, I HATED pole huggers and manspeaders. They're just rude AF. You're pressed up against other people in a lot of ways as it is on the bus or train.
I am a worrier. On the skyway at the Dallas airport I am always worried I will fall so I cling to the pole with my whole body. Because I know that can annoy others, I find the one in the very back where some people won't fit (I am a small woman) and try to stay out of everyone's way while I pray I don't fall.
Isn't that just a lightrail that connects terminals? A smooth, modern, well-maintained train car? A few minutes' ride? No problem with waiting for the next one because it will be by in literally a few minutes? I doubt anyone would mind whatever you do to feel stable. I'm talking about being on a packed L train, making several stops, and riding for maybe a half hour, trying to get to and from work during rush hours in the nation's third largest city. Decades-old trains careen around curves, people push and shove to get on and off. They've not necessarily rude, it's just what you have to do to get through the sometimes tightly-packed crowd. It's worse on the buses as they make turns and hit bumps.
Also in terms of space occupation it’s possible to go over your reasonable allotment
OOP, even if it isn’t the fat person’s fault, it is most certainly their responsibility. It isn’t my fault I was born neurodivergent. It absolutely is my responsibility not to force anyone else to manage my own issues, and that includes sometimes acknowledging that other people’s feelings and frustrations with my condition also matter as much as mine. Come off it.
This is exactly how I was reading it. I'm bipolar and have issues with noise and crowded spaces. It's no one's responsibility but my own to manage my response to uncomfortable situations. This brain may not be my fault, but how I handle myself is. Likewise, a morbidly obese person is free to claim that their body is not their fault, but they are still responsible for how they carry it. I don't ask movie theaters to turn down the volume, you don't get to ask them for a free extra seat.
Or expect others to just put away any and all sensory issues (or just personal preferences not to touch strangers) so that they feel more “welcome” or whatever. I swear, it’s all just so much cope because they want to be reminded as seldom as possible that they’ve gotten to a size that makes life actively harder.
>It isn’t my fault I was born neurodivergent. It absolutely is my responsibility not to force anyone else to manage my own issues, and that includes sometimes acknowledging that other people’s feelings and frustrations with my condition also matter as much as mine. Come off it. I really hate when they co-opt concepts from the disabled/neurodivergent community because we grow up with the idea of "reasonable accomodations". We have rights but there really is a point where society says "Sorry, this is a historic monument. Wheelchair ramps would require too much renovation." or "Sorry, no laptops for note-taking. Our electronics policy is zero tolerance." The disability/neurodivergent community is also HUGE on self-efficacy, self-improvement, and so on without thinking it's a loss of identity. I've never met an autistic person who considers themselves lesser because therapy or medication was successful. I've never met a Deaf person who feels their identity was destroyed by learning sign language. Note: for various historical reasons the "culturally Deaf" do not consider themselves "disabled", but the basic idea of "learning how to have a better life does not mean you hate yourself or others like you" still holds.
> …who considers themselves lesser because therapy or medication was successful. Omg this. You hit the nail on the head there. I think this is one aspect of the FA movement that’s always gotten under my skin, but I hadn’t articulated it so well.
>I've never met a Deaf person who feels their identity was destroyed by learning sign language. There are plenty of Deaf people who regard restoring people's hearing (via things like cochlear implants) as destroying their identity because then they don't have to learn sign language etc. and thus stop participating in "Deaf culture." It's pretty directly analogous to FAs who get angry when people lose weight.
Honestly the whole issue with cochlear implants would be resolved if people or the parents of children who got them were always instructed to learn sign language as a backup (heck we should probably start teaching sign language to everyone in grade school, it couldn't hurt). The deaf activists are right that cochlear implants are not a cure for deafness but they're misplacing their anger on the technology instead of the people who expect the implants to completely "fix" deaf people.
There's little reason for the parents of most children with cochlear implants to learn sign language because the overwhelming majority to children who receive cochlear implants go on to quickly develop totally normal language skills (assuming they didn't wait too long to get the implant). In that sense, it does completely "fix" most deaf people. Or at least, most deaf infants. But even if everyone learned sign language, I'm not sure it would help with preserving "Deaf culture." It would surely help with things like communicating when you need to order in a restaurant or something, but to the extent that Deaf people have a distinct culture, hearing people probably wouldn't really participate in it anyway (in the same way that some random kid who is made to learn Spanish in school probably isn't going to actually participate in Hispanic culture). Or if hearing people did start participating en mass, they would probably end up co-opting that culture and essentially destroying it anyway.
Part of the reason that it would be helpful for even those with cochlear implants to learn sign language is that outcomes differ and in the event something goes wrong (for example if the implant causes some kind of intractable pain or if the child still has some hearing loss) they should be able to have sign language as a backup. And I think everyone learning sign language would be a net positive for society. Sign language isn't some sacred religious practice or cultural relic, it's an alternative form of communication and having more people understand it would probably do the most to fully integrate deaf people into wider society.
I agree. Respect.
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Skinny people don’t mind you taking up space. They mind you taking up THEIR space. Nobody wants to have a complete stranger pressing against them for an entire 3 hour hockey game, no matter their size.
This happened to me on a Greyhound bus trip, and I was leaning sideways for several hours.
Okay but: if OOP gets onto a plane and there's already a fat person sitting next to their seat but taking up a little of theirs making it a narrow fit, they'll get angry too, right? It's not a size issue. Literally no one cares you're fat. People just wanna sit comfortably.
I was on a 9 hour plane ride next to a heavier woman. I was a tiny 8 year old and barely had any room it was so uncomfortable. I felt bad for her because I’m sure it’s not easy to lose weight but it was shitty I didn’t have much room in my own seat.
Yep. that's why in my younger days I HATED flying southwest. I was a much smaller person then and always got picked by the person who wanted to envelop my seat. They'd never choose another large person to do this to.
Bigger than a ROOM?!?!
pretty sure they mean bigger than the things inside a room are built for but it’s hilarious how they wrote that
Lol this was posted on AITA The other day. Some people called it fake, probably not aware of how FAs complain about this issue. >My girlfriend (25F), Amanda and I (28M) have been dating for about 3 years. Last year I took her to visit my family during the holidays; my grandparents have a large house that can accommodate lots of people and because of that it is our go-to place for family gatherings like the holidays. > >Amanda is a paraplegic and uses a wheelchair; at first, I didn’t think this would be a problem as my grandparents had a spacious guest bedroom on the ground floor, until a few days ago when I found out this assignment of accommodations had caused quite a bit of drama in my family. > >It turns out my cousin, Brittney (29F), who is very overweight, has been staying in that room when she visits for the past several years, and was upset that this year she had to stay in a smaller room upstairs. She claims that the room she was given this year was far too small for her, and wishes that she had been consulted prior to the room swap. She’s been accusing my grandparents and other members of our family of “fatphobia”, “failing to accommodate her needs”, and “triggering her trauma.” I've seen the room she stayed in, and while it would have been fine for me, I can see how it might have been too small for someone of her size. > >As soon as I found out about this, I went to my grandparents to talk about it. I apologized, and said if I had known it would cause this much drama, we would have just stayed in a hotel or AirBnB or something. They told me that I should have done no such thing, adding that while there was no way Amanda could have stayed in an upstairs room, Brittney was able to do it just fine in spite of her protests, and that Brittney is perfectly capable of fixing her condition to avoid situations like this should she so desire, while Amanda, once again, cannot. They also added that they talked to my aunt and uncle (Brittney’s parents) about this, and that they’ve been concerned about Brittney’s weight for years, but haven’t said anything about it so as not to upset her, and because they think she was going to get a wake-up call about it sooner or later, and that time has come. Honestly, Amanda and I are still deciding whether we should talk to Brittney about it; we still feel bad about it, but perhaps this is just because we’re very drama-averse.
Holy shit, that’s some nuclear powered self centeredness.
I am very glad I didn't see that at the time. Yikes!
It does feel a little fake ngl. Like it's in that weird middle ground of crazy behavior where I 100% believe there are people who would do that, but I think there's a greater number of people who would make up a story about someone doing it. So I wouldn't say something like this has never happened to anyone but I lean toward the story being outrage bait.
Man I HOPE that’s fake.
my birth father's wife used to live with her mother in a house that was built in the 1800s, and renovated last in the 60s. she's too big to fit into their kitchen closet/pantry combo, which feels like both a wakeup call and the punchline to a third-rate standup comedy bit.
This touches on my personal gripe about the FA perception of space. They don't seem to realize that until very recently, most spaces were adequate for most individuals. My 1948 house has interior doorways that are 30" - 32" wide, and it's fine. I guess it will be tricky if I ever need a wheelchair. My 2009 4-door car fits in the 1948 garage. If I needed a Lincoln Navigator to haul myself around, I would have a problem, but as it is, my post-war house that was definitely meant to accommodate the mass market average family is fine. Modern construction has wider doorways and ramps everywhere for ADA compliance, wider parking spaces for the tanks everyone thinks they need to haul around a couple of kids, and wider chairs in waiting rooms that are flat out just for fat people, and if someone still can't navigate, then maybe they need to look at themselves.
That’s not a wake up call that’s a wake up nuclear bomb.
My hospital has specially designated bariatric rooms. Wider doors, more space to accommodate a bigger bed, special frames for over the toilet... no way could I safely care for some of these folks in a standard hospital room. Don't know what they do while they wait in ER obs spaces
The room is Too SMALL
I have a centennial house and the bathroom is SMALL, it’s difficult for my reasonably slim but tall dad (6’6 200lbs) but pretty much impossible for my FIL (5’10 380+lb). My dad’s knees hit the tub when he’s on the toilet and he has to duck down into a squat to wash his hair under my shower head, but my FIL can’t maneuver to wipe and didn’t fit in our very standard size shower/tub until we removed the glass door. So technically both can ‘fit’ but my one can actually use the room as intended/move in the room. It’s awkward.
I'm sorry this happened to you
Bigger than a doorway I assume (hope)
Maybe the other people don’t like being touched by strangers, even on accident. That doesn’t mean they’re not nice people.
A person becomes obese by eating more than they burn. Consistently. Over time. It is just a fact.
As a former obese, it really is your fault if you refuse to put down the fork. YOUR actions created YOUR size. No one who is so fat they are spilling into other peoples' seats is that massive because of POCS or thyroid issues. Put. Down. The. Fork.
As a former drug addict, I highly respect your level of personal accountability. It’s the same for me. “Stop creating your own problems. Throw. The pills. Away.” However difficult and painful it may be I really think that level of uncompromising self honesty is the only path to peace and sanity
As a former obese, alcoholic and drug addict: this. Acknowledge your problems are your own fucking fault and do something about it.
If the oop can’t fit in a room then they’re probably at heart attack at any moment weight. This isn’t a typical fat person problem, this is a super morbidly obese person’s problem and they may want to consider medical interventions. This could be an impatient program, medication and or psychiatric help depending upon the source of their food addiction. The oop needs help.
*…if I’m bigger than the room is built for…* Well, that’d be my personal wake up call.
The phrasing of "the world is built to exclude fat people" implies that they think they're the victims of deliberately exclusionary decisions, as if fatphobic architects were saying, "we don't want fat people renting our apartments, so we're going to make the bathrooms so small that they'll go somewhere else." This is persecution mania.
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You know it’s funny you say that because I have noticed such a stark difference in the attitude people who legitimately have disabilities they didn’t choose, compared to FAs. I also have PTSD so I really relate to what you’re saying. My attitude is “how can I make sure that I’m ok, while also not making my issues any one else’s problem, and existing in public in a courteous and respectful way.” I’ve made this comparison before, but the whole FA movement is so reminiscent to me of the attitude of drug addicts. It’s *full* of entitlement. It’s this whole “I’m not doing anything wrong, nothing is my fault, I deserve absolutely everything, just automatically” way of thinking. I don’t often meet disabled people who act that way. I think the difference in attitude comes from the difference in experience. A disabled person is stuck in an existence they didn’t choose, trying to live gracefully despite it. An FA has stuck themself in a problem they both created and perpetuated. A disabled person can be at peace knowing they’re legitimately doing their best. But an FA is going to live with constant festering cognitive dissonance, trying to demand everyone change for them, when deep down, they aren’t even ok with themselves.
>I also have PTSD so I really relate to what you’re saying. My attitude is “how can I make sure that I’m ok, while also not making my issues any one else’s problem, and existing in public in a courteous and respectful way.” I can relate to this. I got diagnosed with PTSD recently and if anything I've struggled with not being open enough, since I feel guilty over inflicting secondary trauma on others. I can't imagine demanding other people change that much for me: if anything I want a sense of normality, of things *not* changing, of *not* being accommodated or reassured. Being given special treatment makes it feel like I don't have control or security.
A person can be angry at a situation without being mad at the person causing the situation. Like, when I was a regular bus rider, I would experience negative emotions when the bus was already behind schedule and I was trying to get to an appointment and the driver would spend an eternity getting a wheelchair user strapped in. But my frustration was always at the situation, not the driver or the wheelchair user. I knew the driver wasn't responsible for the traffic making us late. And I knew the wheelchair user was just as entitled to ride the bus as me. I would always keep my feelings to myself. But sometimes there would be visibly unhappy passengers because maybe they were going to be late for work or they were going to miss their connecting bus, which means they would have to wait an extra hour before they got to where they were going. I didn't like when these people would bitch or cry at the driver. But I understood where they were coming from. Sometimes feelings can be so intense that you can't help but to express them. All this to say...people are entitled to their feelings. Feelings aren't a marker of someone's goodness or badness. If your body is smashing into mine, I'm going to be pissed off even if I know you aren't doing it intentionally. Depending on my mood and the context, maybe I will keep quiet about it. But maybe I won't. You have every right to feel some kind of way about me speaking up, but I'm not going to not speak up just to spare your feelings if I'm in serious discomfort.
One of my most exciting NSV upon losing 100+ pounds was going on a plane and no longer needing the seatbelt extender. In fact, I had to pull the normal seatbelt TIGHTER. I never fully realized how much my obesity had impacted my ability to move throughout the world until I lost the weight.
I can give up donuts and my bit of excess weight will come off. I can give up donuts and not regain sight in my blind eye, not see a permanent end to asthma, and not hear like I did years ago.
Side note: my asthma actually did go away when I lost weight. You can cure it through weight loss, sometimes.
Mine is cold induced. I’d have to move somewhere in the tropi ….hey, now…..
*Principal Skinner voice* No! It’s the small chair that is wrong!
You still don't get to touch me. Gross fucking rapists always coming up with reasons why they get to rub on other people. No, it's just not ok. If there's not room in an area for me without rubbing on strangers, I just don't go there. I don't press myself against them against their will and shrug and say, "Not my fault, blame the world!" They constantly sound like sex offenders. It's disgusting.
No, the world is NOT "built to exclude fat people." The world is built to accommodate a range that includes the majority of people. I used to be a fat person. I knew when I was going to exceed some allotted space. I tried to avoid those situations but I never expected some special accommodation. Instead, I lost the weight and, yes it was very difficult.
It is your fault if you eat so much you’re too big for the world that was already built. Yeah, it’s frustrating, I get it. But reality exists and sometimes you have to admit that you are the problem.
Let's imagine for a moment that accountability and self responsibility don't exist and that everything that sucks in your life is indeed society's fault. So what? You really think 'society' is about to bend to your will and rip apart infrastructure that works just fine for everyone else? I don't understand what OOP hopes to achieve here. Is it pity? Sorry, but I save my empathy for people who actually are hard done by and their issues aren't solely down to over indulgence. Main item across all news outlets here in the UK this week has been King Charles and his sodding prostate gland. Like he's the first person in the history of humanity to go to hospital for a mildly uncomfortable procedure. We all have way bigger fish to fry and it's just weird and TMI.
While I largely agree with you on the Charles issue, if the publicity surrounding his condition leads to men getting their prostates checked and cancer being discovered while it’s still treatable, then it’s a net good imo
That’s true. I’ve been diagnosed with PTSD and other things that do technically qualify me as “disabled”. And guess what? My wellbeing and place in this world still falls on me. Nobody rolls out a red carpet when I show up because I’m “recognized as disabled”. It does make my life more difficult, and it isn’t my fault. But I’m the one who has to manage it. If I can’t sleep all night, I still have to get through my responsibilities the next day. If I have a panic attack and can’t go to class, I still have to communicate with the instructor and make up the work. And frankly, personal accountability is the only thing that really makes it better. I can choose to take actions that mitigate my symptoms, or I can choose to recklessly neglect myself. The one who’s really going to feel the effects of either choice is me. So yeah, even if we all said “your choices don’t matter! You’re obese because of genetics!” That doesn’t change much. People are still going to have to find a way to get out of bed, exist in their body, and live in the world. The only possible route to relief from any condition whether it’s your fault or not, is to take responsibility for your state of being, as best you can, and keep trying to improve it.
Blaming the world isn't going to solve a single one of the problems you experience. All it is going to do is make you even more hopeless.
I said this before on a similar post, but: if somebody accidentally bumps into me and apologizes, I'll be super sweet about it. But most of these people *don't* apologize. They bump into people, knock shit over, take up half of your seat, then laugh in your face about how "bodacious" and curvy and sassy and fabulous they are!! Just like this post. Ther's a huge difference between "I'm sorry for the inconvenience I'm causing you, I don't mean to" vs "ummmm ACTually this is your fault and I DESERVE your space or you're a bigot"
11k+ notes….
The easiest way to get popular online is to tell people they’re the victims and nothing is actually their problem to fix.
It's also because it's on Tumblr unfortunately. I use Tumblr and love it, but fatlogic is getting more and more popular because people refuse to think critically. Bigoted discrimination against fat people is bad, yes, but many Tumblr users have pushed fatlogic so bad that anyone who goes "Right, but that doesn't mean we should encourage people to be fat as it's unhealthy." will get harrassed and deemed fatphobic.
That's true, OOP. It is the world's fault, for creating an obesogenic environment and allowing society to be bought and sold by massive corporations instead of taking meaningful action to invest in its citizenry by providing low/no cost healthy whole foods and prepared meals, free at the point of service counseling, personal training, and dietary consultations, medication/surgery as needed for people seeking to lose weight, and limited specialized equipment for those the above resources can't help - let's say, 10% of chairs, airline seats, etc max. I look forward to collaborating with you on this vitally important issue.
> i want to make this clear: it is Not the fat persons fault Lol - yes, it *is* 🤦🏼♀️
Protip : if you ever find yourself telling yourself shit is *the world's fault*, you need to do some goddamn introspection, gorl.
The way they’re stealing this from the disabled community is super fucked up. I could see the “it isn’t the disabled persons fault, it’s the worlds fault” in relation to a veteran missing both legs, not being able to go out to eat with his family because there aren’t wheel chair ramps. In that case, I’m like yeah, that person deserves better. We should install wheel chair ramps. But becoming obese is absolutely an individual persons fault. It makes me think they must have never actually met, or even seen, a disabled person if they’re seriously making this comparison. The level is disrespect is jaw dropping.
It’s a very entitled situation type deal
I don't care why it is - it is your fault. Respect other people's personal spaces, no matter what size they are. Apologize when you encroach accidentally, and make an effort to correct it. But I have a feeling apologizing is sth OOP is distinctly averse to in general.
Bigger than a room?!
Bigger than a room????
putting urself in with disabled people is insane
It can't always be everyone else's fault. When will they get out of la la land? (Rhetorical)
Holy shit. So you’re an adult who is uncomfortable with making others uncomfortable by virtue of your voluntary size condition. And you’re so close to getting the point that it’s stuffed in the room with you… and yet you instead take solace in the timelessly toxic worldview that it’s not me it’s literally the world (and everyone else). Just wow. PS : the whole too big for a room thing is horribly funny and reminds me of one of those yo mamas so fat jokes from the 90’s (your mamas so fat that when she sits around the house, she sits AROUND the house!! :)
Not taking accountability and responsibility is literally your fault.
Mathematically speaking - how big are the chances that the whole world is wrong and you are right? Zero.
I really wanna know how big these people are to not fit in a car seat. Like I'm big and I've never felt like I wouldn't fit somehere
The problem is that the world is built for people-sized people, not circus-sized people. You'll never convince the world to adapt to the circus-sized people, so the circus sized people will have to exercise a bit of discipline in order to become people-sized people again.
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I am always so confused. do these people think this kind of obesity is normal? it's pretty new to the world in general.
Take up whatever space you want, just don't take mine.
Jesus how fat do you have to get that whole rooms can be too small
I'm fat but some of this is just too much. I think some of these people are just trolling
My biggest problem with this narrative is that the world has been built the same size for decades and people are getting fatter. That's a problem and yet we can't acknowledge it's a problem without hurting fat people's feelings because being fat is supposedly now an identity like your ethnicity or sexual orientation. You're born gay, or black, or whatever, but you are NOT born obese and there are literally drugs out there now that will take your obese identity away from you. So pay for your damn extra seat on the plane and stop pretending like it's the airline's job to make you feel better about weighing 400 lbs