Written by an organizer in Gainesville Women's Liberation for a GWL Consciousness-Raising Study Group in 1996
Topic: Speaking and writing about my own oppression/what is my stake in the movement for change
Weight has always been a source of worry and pain for me. In elementary school I was a liittle overweight. Baby fat, I guess you'd call it, but I don't believe I was ever really medically obese. That's hard for any kid, but especially if you are a girl. I remember the pain of being picked last for teams, being made fun of by other kids, and even being made fun of by the PE teachers. My weight was a constant source of humiliation for me.
Boys who were two or even three times more overweight didn't get picked on as much as I did. In fact, for the few overweight boys in my class, weight was a source of pride or even power, they were bigger than the other boys and that was a GOOD thing. They clowned around about being fat, bragged about how much food they could eat. But for me, a girl, even though I was more chubby than fat, well, it was too horrible to even joke about. A source of shame.
In high school I grew out of chubbiness. But still I felt fat. I wanted to be as thin as the popular and beautiful cheerleaders. I knew some boys who were lifeguards and I wanted them to like me, find me attractive. They would talk about the girls in my class, who was "fat," who had a good body. I'd see them on the beach and they would rank each woman as she walked by, a little bit on breast size, but mostly on how thin she was and how much cellulite she had. Some of them had T-shirts and stickers that said "No fat chicks." I was the platonic friend of more than a few guys, and they talked openly in front of me about how disgusting they thought this or that woman was, all of them normal weight or even on the skinny side. But they thought a woman who was a size 7 or size 9 was fat, and they were quite open about their disgust. Did they think that about me? I thought I was fat, they must, too. Did they think that about me? No wonder I never got any dates, I thought.
