I read this on a bbs I used to visit a lot in college tonight...was interesting, thought others might like to read it too...
What If?
What if fat was healthy because fat people had some cushioning and some reserve
food stores to live on, and skinny people were said to be putting themselves at
risk, and stigmatized for making this stupid health decision?
What if people went up to skinny girls in the street and said "Oh, youd be
beautiful if youd just gain weight!"
Or "Youre thin, but youre beautiful on the inside!" Or looked at me like I
was in some way sick and disgusting?
What if all clothes below size 10 came in girly pastels, with the reasoning
that small women are underdeveloped and childish?
What if they were called minus sizes?
What if thin people had to go to special stores to buy clothes, because none of
the regular stores wanted to stock clothes for them, saying that theyre
disgusting and their patrons wouldnt want to look at them?
What if all models were a size 16 or above, but every once in a while youd see
a "minus size" model in a size 8 cut to make her look larger?
What if "too fat" wasnt the greatest thing, because it was acknowledged to not
be terribly healthy, but the models who were "too fat" still got all the
modeling jobs, and they were told that they might want to lose a little weight
but nobody took it seriously? And meantime "too fat" was infinitely better than
"too skinny"?
What if thin people were depicted in the media as obsessed with exercise and
starving themselves, and thus not sexually interested? And fat people were
depicted as able to enjoy their food, and their lovers, with relish?
What if a TV character as popular as Friends Monica was depicted as once
having been thin, not even unhealthily so, and she was the butt of jokes for
that?
What if X percent of the American population was labeled "underweight"?
What if food commercials focused not on low-fat, but high in nutrients to gain
weight?
What if people said "I dont understand whats wrong with skinny people. All
they have to do is eat! Its not that difficult. They must be pretty stupid not
to figure that out."?
What if there were no labels saying "Low Fat" but instead they said "High Fat"?
What if magazines ran stories on "How to Maximize the Glory of your Curves"?
What if 7-year-old girls, copying their moms, asked their friends "Does this
make me look too skinny?"
What if magazines ran bogus ads for weight gain powder? And the ads said "Mary
gained 25 pounds in 8 weeks combining a high-nutrient diet, exercise to gain
muscle mass, and Product X"? And they showed a picture of Mary wearing baggy
clothes to make her look skinny and waifish, while in the "After" picture she
was trim and tan? And women looked at Mary, who didnt need to gain weight to
begin with, and say "If shes skinny, I must be a stick" and started gorging
themselves?
What if thin people had to pay more for clothes and underwear and almost no
pretty bras came in anything under a size 40?
What if there was an operation to enlarge the size of ones stomach or inject
fat under the skin?
What if middle-aged women were admired because they had put on some weight
after age 30 and young women were simply too thin?
What if kids made jokes like "Your mamas so thin, she blew away when I flapped
my arms"?
What if people talked to thin people slowly on the assumption that they were
like children?
What if thin people had to learn to be witty, because else they would be
utterly ignored by the opposite sex?
What if studies showed that thin could also be healthy, not just fat, but the
mass media only paid lip service to them?
This would be ridiculous.
Then why is the reverse still OK?
Author Unknown
