Round table discussion: Fatshaming

We're all familiar with the stereotype of the effortlessly skinny French woman, but that stereotype hides a horrifying reality of abuse, shaming, discrimination, and eating disorders. (All familiar problems in the US). Today I was reading an interesting article on just this subject. I never realized how bad it was over there, but it also made me thoughtful about the problems of bodyshaming - and especially concern-troll fatshaming- here at home (and in the Glow Community.) In case you aren't familiar with the term, fatshaming is defined as: "the action or practice of humiliating someone for their weight. (It affects fat people most of all, but it's not limited to those who are fat - if you were ever attacked by being called fat, that's fatshaming in action.) 

Here's a quote from the article:

Gabrielle has two degrees, a pleasant and open manner and weighs 150kg, or 23½ stone. She also has the misfortune of both being French and living in France, which means that her physical appearance counts for everything, including her employability.

In France, she says (and all the facts of her experience seem to bear this out), being fat is considered to be a grotesque self-inflicted disability. At any given time, 80% of Frenchwomen are thought to be on a diet. In the south of the country, there’s a lively gastric-band industry (50,000 operations a year).There’s currently a vegan craze sweeping the land – a way for some people to cover up eating disorders.

“Frenchwomen,” says Gabrielle, “pride themselves as being the most feminine in Europe. There is this feeling that women have to be perfect in every way.” Is it surprising then that the publication of Gabrielle’s book, You’re Not Born Fat, last month has attracted keen interest – a combination of both admiration and moral panic?

For Gabrielle the past 12 months have been like waking up from a nightmare, if nightmares were real and lasted two decades. At one point in our meeting she’s tearful – but they are tears of happy disbelief. Suddenly, at 38, Gabrielle, who’s been told her entire adult life that she wasn’t fit for work, is being called an intellectual break-out hero. She’s been profiled in Le Monde, Figaro, the political news magazine Le Point, and appeared on France’s most serious TV shows.

Have you ever been fatshamed? Have you found yourself fatshaming others (even in your head?)