On privilege, specifically the thin kind.
I haven’t always been fat.
And because I haven’t always been fat, it blows my mind when people try to deny the existence of thin privilege. Because I haven’t just seen thin privilege, it isn’t some imagined slight or discrimination for me because I’m fat, I’ve lived it.
Don’t get me wrong, I’ve still had it pretty easy. I’m white, young, fairly attractive when I paint my face up. But the obvious differences between how I was treated at 120lbs vs 220lbs are just that, obvious.
The other week, my mom was going to visit her boyfriend in Miami and wanted some new lingerie to surprise him, since they weren’t able to spend Valentine’s day together. So we went to Victoria’s Secret, where else ? My mom went into the changing room and I was entrusted in picking out a few more pieces that I thought she would love.
I took a few off of the racks, but they were mostly smalls, and my mom is more comfortable wearing a medium. I had seen several sales clerks when we entered, but most of them were busy with other customers. I saw several who weren’t busy approach other women in the store, asking if they could help.
One woman declined, so I made my move to go up to the girl and ask if she could help me. The moment she looked up and saw my approaching, she turned on her heel and practically sprinted away.
So I went up to one of the cashiers.
Before I’d even finished, I was being cut off. I tried again.
“Listen, I was wondering if you had this in a size-“
Again, cut off. Only this time the girl looked up from her keyboard and, while blatantly eyeing my body with disgust, shook her head.
“Look honey, we don’t have your size, okay ?”
That was it. Done. The end of the conversation. Now, that conversation was probably one of the more pleasant ones I’ve had with sales clerks, but it isn’t even about those girls who are so quick to refuse me their help.
When I was thin, life was easier for me. Even with an eating disorder, I felt less stressed ordering in restaurants than I do now.
At 120lbs, I could order cheese fries and a milkshake with extra fudge sauce, I could ask for every dessert on the menu and lick the plate clean.
Now I’m lucky to order a salad with dressing on the side without getting looks from the person taking my order. I don’t even remember the last time I was offered the dessert menu, but it was probably somewhere between 60-80lbs ago.
And while they might not be outwardly rude about it, I see the way they look at me.
I see how store clerks look at me when I try on clothes, I see the way the cute girl at Uno’s tries so hard to make it obvious she doesn’t believe my boyfriend is anything more than “just friends” with me and how she tries to separate our checks and make it seem like an accident.
I see the hundreds of lingerie choices other women get while I’m handed five bras to choose from, three of which look like something my grandmother would own.
And more than that ? I hear the hatred in other women’s voices when they talk about their bodies.
When I worked as a fitting room attendant at Old Navy, we had these super skinny jeans that were pretty popular among many women. Unfortunately, the label didn’t lie about them being “super skinny” and we were instructed to tell women that if they didn’t fit, they should go up a size because they were not made “true to size”, but instead were so shrunk down you’d be lucky to fit in a size above what you usually wear.
Do you know how many sales I lost because of those jeans ?
Do you know how many times I had a woman basically throw the crumpled pair at me and look at me as though I’d told her to shoot her own dog ?
“A size four ? FOUR ????!?!?! I can’t wear a size FOUR” They’d say, as if it was some awful, forbidden, dirty thing I’d asked of them.
I don’t think admitting all of this stuff translates into me hating thin people though, and if that’s what you take away from this, shame on you. I love my mother, I love my best friends (all of whom are half my size on their fattest days), I love my boyfriend.
And just like I do, they are able to recognize that society tends to work in their favor when it comes to their size. This doesn’t mean their life is easier, it doesn’t mean they don’t have terrible things happen to them, it doesn’t mean they’re any better or worse than me.
It just means that society decided to base worth on several things, and weight is one of them, like it or not. Denying that privileges exist is like denying that the sky is blue and the sun is yellow.
Having privileges does not make you a bad person, it’s what you do with those privileges and how you treat those who don’t have them that decides what kind of person you are.
germansingergirl
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