Welcome back to the Learning Curve, a monthly column where we unpack the complicated experience of accepting your own body in a world that doesn't seem to want you to. This month, Nicola examines the small-fat and mid-size communities' inability to address their own thin privilege — and checks her own privilege in the process.
One time, I almost irreversibly ruined the vibe during a beach getaway with my closest friends after the topic of shopping came up. A girlfriend of mine lamented about how hard it can be to find jeans that fit because of her smaller waist and bigger butt. She’s thin. My other girlfriend who was in this conversation is thin. I was the only person on this trip above a size small. And that one offhand remark was all it took for me to see red.
“But have you ever walked into a store and been too big to even try on a pair of jeans?” I asked, so obviously bitter. She said, “No, but…” I didn’t let her finish. I repeated the question until she bowed out with a final, dejected, “No,” and we all silently agreed it was time to change the subject.
Six years later, I think about that conversation often and wince at myself, not for calling out that friend out for what I still think were rather tone-deaf complaints to make to a plus-size person but for the way I lashed out because I wasn’t able to calmly verbalize what truly upset me: her failure to recognize and be grateful for her thin privilege.
Anyone who is bigger than most of their friends knows these types of complaints well; sometimes, we are automatically designated “safe” people to whom one can voice shame about their own body. We hear complaints of “feeling fat” or not having anything to wear or having to stick to specific diet and fitness regimens to stay in shape. Fewer things set me off quicker than hearing these things from the mouth of someone who hasn’t lived any part of their life over a size 8.
But here’s the thing: I’m a hypocrite.
If you’ve read this column before, you already know I’ve fluctuated between sizes 12 and 16 my entire adult life. I’m much taller than the average woman, and I usually weigh anywhere between 200 and 215 pounds. I was a chubby kid, too, one whose weight was of constant discussion in my household. I’m no stranger to being publicly body-shamed or being excluded from clothing retailers or developing complicated relationships with food and fitness. I’ve made a career, in part, from making content in which I try to heal from that and help others do the same.
But in the past, I’ve also called clothing brands that only serve up to size 3X “inclusive” in conversation with people who wear a 4X and above. I’ve ranted endlessly to the same people about society’s lack of plus-size representation when I can name plenty of well-known models and actors my size. I’ve recalled being teased about my weight in childhood to the face of a friend who still gets harassed in the street with strangers tossing terms like “heifer” at her as an adult. No such thing has ever happened to me.
When you observe the internet’s mid-size (sizes 10-14) and small-fat (sizes 14-18) communities with this in mind, it becomes apparent that many of us share at least some lack of awareness of our own privileges. When you search the term “mid size” on TikTok, you’ll find a healthy smattering of people simply showing off their outfits and using the tag, it seems, just to reach other people with similar body types (totally fair). But amid that, you’ll also find videos of people using the label as an attempt to victimize themselves, whether they seem to be aware of that or not. You might stumble upon a video of a thinner-looking person pushing their stomach out or baring their roll-less bikini body in what they seem to believe is a grandeur moment of bravery and solidarity. You might even find someone posing or dancing in a flirtatious manner under the guise of showing what “real bodies” look like. You’ll find the comment sections of these videos almost always lean positive.
When people on the larger size of the fat spectrum (often referred to in the fat-positivity community as “superfat” or “infinifat”) post the same type of content, however, the response is generally much different. As we’ve previously reported in Learning Curve, fat content creators, whether they are making content that’s practical, comical, or sexual in nature, can be met with content bans/restrictions, harassment, content theft, and more. That said, the ability to even pose in a bikini online without it becoming A Thing is a privilege — one that mid-size and small-fat people (myself included) are prone to glossing over like the many other privileges we can often take for granted.
What are those privileges? Well, I’ve already alluded to some of them, such as seeing ourselves represented more in TV and movies, on runways, and even in advertising campaigns. Those of us size 14 and below are also much more widely catered to in fashion retail. Though both of these things might not have been true for us as recently as a decade ago, industries have shifted to appear more size-inclusive, and we are lucky ones who get to reap benefits from it. We’re the smallest people on the fat spectrum and are therefore first in line for the “revolution.”
But being able to shop for clothes only scratches the surface. Banning weight discrimination in the workplace has only become a priority for certain lawmakers within the past few years (it’s still legal in most states), and larger fat people are subsequently at higher risk of being fired without reason. In the medical field, they are more likely to be misdiagnosed or even refused care due to their weight. Discrimination can also prevent fat people from securing scholarships, receiving bank loans, and even buying a home. Hell, even the ability to sit comfortably — or at all — on public transportation or on a commercial airline flight is yet another right that smaller people are handed and fat people must actively fight for.
Mid-size and small-fat people have the luxury of not having to think about these things on a daily basis, if ever. But when you take the realities of large-fat and superfat people’s lives into account, posing in a size 10-14 bikini on the internet comes off as less brave and more… well, totally unremarkable. That can be a hard reality to accept when you are a size 10-14, and it’s obvious to me, at least, why that is.
Even though we mid-size and small-fat people are not subject to weight discrimination in the same way people on the bigger side of the fat spectrum are, we’re still steeped in a world that tells us our bodies determine our value, and that skinny bodies — ones that still don’t look anything like ours — are better. Some of us have had those harrowing dressing room experiences in which nothing fit. Some of us have been bullied about our bodies relentlessly. Some of us have had our weight policed by loved ones behind closed doors.
When those memories get dredged up, we’re put right back in fight or flight mode and we go into our version of self-defense: standing behind our victimhood like it’s a shield — just as I did during that conversation with my thin friend on the beach trip. It’s easier to play victim in those moments than to foster a thoughtful conversation about why we all have to be so sensitive about our bodies to begin with. When negative emotions are regurgitated and things start to feel personal, it’s even easier for smaller people to forget that the reason in question is good ol’-fashioned fatphobia, which many of us continually let slide when we aren’t its obvious target.
When you’ve been through Some Shit, you can wind up thinking in black and white, a means of validating your own experiences. You can develop a messed-up trauma barometer that labels people either as victims or not-victims. People’s lives are hard or easy. People are fat or they’re not. There’s no room for nuance. Maybe that’s just me, though — hence why my therapist tells me all the time that I should “allow space” for conflicting truths in my head. Still, I think that might be the key for those of us in the mid-size and small-fat categories who can’t seem to reckon with and verbalize the body-based privileges we do have.
We can be called fat and not actually be fat. We can be body-shamed to all hell and still not be impacted by everyday weight discrimination. Most importantly, we can feel sympathy toward ourselves for the struggles we’ve endured and at the same time save sympathy for other people who “have it worse.” But that requires a lot of inner reflection and, if you’re me, paying a mental health professional exorbitant amounts of money to emotionally heal and therefore view people with a little more complexity and empathy.
So no, mid-size, and small-fat people, we are probably not the enlightened body-positivity sages we all like to think we are — but that doesn’t mean we haven’t been impacted by fatphobia at all. Everyone is impacted by fatphobia and, unfortunately, solving that won’t be as simple as posting the occasional bikini photo. Challenge fatphobic rhetoric you hear in your friend groups, in your romantic life, in your workplace, and in your family. Stop buying from fashion companies that refuse to cater to fat people. Avoid describing yourself as fat if you aren’t. Read up on the racist origins of fatphobia.
TL;DR: One day, we might be able to live in a world where our bodies aren’t subject to such constant judgment, but that will never happen if we don’t liberate all fat people first. Mid-size and small-fat people, it’s time to accept that we might not be doing enough.
More from Learning Curve:
- Fine, I’ll Say It: I Hate It When Plus-Size Celebrities Lose Weight
- You Can't Gua Sha Away a Double Chin
- I Write About Body Acceptance for a Living, But I Hate My Body
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