obligation / fat culture, continued
Jul. 11th, 2006 05:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
keryxOver this weekend, the lovely fatnotfatwhatever ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
volondoinyaface told me we were obligated by our politics to perform more widely in the bellydance community. There were a lot of very slim, very young, really rather white, women at the workshop this weekend. They came from all over the place (many from further than we), but they were pretty not-diverse.
Other folks yell at me sometimes for noticing that I'm the fattest person in a room. But it's because of situations like that that I notice; people know when they're relatively alone, know what I mean? Ya stick out.
I pointed out that, in fact, no one else in the troupe should be obligated to do anything because of my politics (although yes, we are definitely a dance troupe about accepting different types of bodies and people, no one else has to sing songs in praise of fat or even use the word 'fat'). But she did have a point in general - that at least getting the gang out there more is striking a blow for dancers and people of a somewhat wider than typical range, and that people should see that. I see fat women in student troupes all the time, but rarely in performance troupes.
And it's not that performing takes so much energy that you automatically get thin. Less fat? Sure, maybe. Maybe more fat, too - that's happened to our leetle dancers; they get more muscle and look fatter.
Anyhow. It's about creating culture. If you don't like what you see, make more of what you want to see.
volondoinyaface told me we were obligated by our politics to perform more widely in the bellydance community. There were a lot of very slim, very young, really rather white, women at the workshop this weekend. They came from all over the place (many from further than we), but they were pretty not-diverse.Other folks yell at me sometimes for noticing that I'm the fattest person in a room. But it's because of situations like that that I notice; people know when they're relatively alone, know what I mean? Ya stick out.
I pointed out that, in fact, no one else in the troupe should be obligated to do anything because of my politics (although yes, we are definitely a dance troupe about accepting different types of bodies and people, no one else has to sing songs in praise of fat or even use the word 'fat'). But she did have a point in general - that at least getting the gang out there more is striking a blow for dancers and people of a somewhat wider than typical range, and that people should see that. I see fat women in student troupes all the time, but rarely in performance troupes.
And it's not that performing takes so much energy that you automatically get thin. Less fat? Sure, maybe. Maybe more fat, too - that's happened to our leetle dancers; they get more muscle and look fatter.
Anyhow. It's about creating culture. If you don't like what you see, make more of what you want to see.
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(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-11 09:47 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-11 09:48 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-11 09:52 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-11 09:54 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-11 10:16 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-11 10:36 pm (UTC)(see april, i do my part to promote the classes)
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-12 12:23 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-12 08:26 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-12 12:55 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-12 01:03 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-11 09:47 pm (UTC)heh. for some reason, this line was infinitely amusing to me when i read it.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-11 10:49 pm (UTC)I like that. A lot.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-12 12:08 pm (UTC)and so what if we don't all agree with your agenda, Maybe mine is to show that I am a dancer who has arthritis my whole life and I still get out there. *hugs*
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-12 01:58 pm (UTC)I'm only half kidding - I don't think most people would guess that about you, ya know? It's not like being fat, which is really obvious.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-12 02:30 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-12 03:21 pm (UTC)Again, half kidding. But that thing you wrote when you were doing the donation contest was really moving.
Again
Date: 2006-07-12 03:27 pm (UTC)I wonder if I still have what I wrote. Anyway I was going to get new ink in atl. But are you saying my back is big enough for my whole story?
Re: Again
Date: 2006-07-12 03:35 pm (UTC)Re: Again
Date: 2006-07-12 03:54 pm (UTC)hehe love ya
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-12 12:35 pm (UTC)In the acting community, I am often the fattest person in the room weighing usually 100 or more pounds more than the others. I used to try to tell my late husband Cliff of the fact that you just stated, only he kept telling me it was bullsh*t. You'd think that he - of all people - would've understood having been in a wheelchair for 20 years, but he never did.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-12 01:18 pm (UTC)Interesting side story regarding that workshop - we ran into these women we know from another workshop. They're beautiful dancers & good people. But. They asked why we weren't performing in the show, and before I could say "because my partner has massive stage fright" they said "but you're suuuuch beautiful people" in that "I have to reassure you of this cause you don't believe it" voice. That may have just been their voices, of course, or them acknowledging and embracing the fat, or it could have been them assuming we think we shouldn't perform cause we're fat - I mean, it didn't have an obvious meaning. But yeah. Hmm.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-12 01:42 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-13 12:48 am (UTC)And although I conceded that no one else in the troupe is obligated in any way to support your (or my, or anyone else's) personal agenda, I definately think they'd be behind you and could use the boost of performing at such an event for their own reasons.
I need a "Fat Ally" shirt or something. Stat.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-19 02:15 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-12 01:01 pm (UTC)I do get that, though. I don't often notice the size of people I'm around, but I often notice, especially at work, that I'm the queerest person in the room, or the youngest person in the room or the most liberal person in the room, or the only woman in the room, or some other superlative that probably only I notice, but which makes me somewhat uneasy anyway.
And I'm totally behind you on performing in D.C.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-12 01:59 pm (UTC)I'm sure it even happens to average-looking white dudes, too - I don't think of it as overwhelmingly political, just varying degrees of discomfort.