political phases

[keryx]

Have y'all noticed that I haven't been doing as much fat and gender blogging lately?

I mean, sure, I've been self-obsessed with the apartment hunting and work and my personal life, but it's still rare for me to go even a few days without talking much about size or sexism.

I think this is why: I'm entering (or maybe have already entered) a different phase in my relationship to fat. This occurred to me in the context of our dance troupe's many inherent politicizations - we are almost de facto fat, queer & disability advocates just because we're performers. I find myself lately thinking "I'm fat, so what?" when it's called out to me & not really identifying with Fat in the ways I'm accustomed to. In my head, I might even be living (temporarily, I imagine) in a world where fat isn't a signifier of anything other than, ya know, size. My glances in the mirror have been more about how I move and balance and while I still register people as fat and not-fat, it feels more like counting off men and women or blue-eyed vs. brown-eyed.

Interesting, neh? It's as if I'm managing, off and on, to think in the ways I've hoped people in general could think.

My political leanings have often gone this kind of path - not marching straight to victory, but winding through various spots as I integrate them into a worldview. It seems pretty common. Like, my early ZOMG I Don't Need A Scale days are analogous to the process of coming out - I'm sure most of you have been or known someone who went through a period of identifying say, Disney characters as queer and not-queer, right? - where suddenly all fat people were komrades. And there was a period when it made me really sadangry that so many fat people and feminists really weren't komrades. So this is something different.

Comments

[chubbyninja.livejournal.com]

yay!
yep... thats all ive got.

[keryx.livejournal.com]

Just "yay"?

So's ya know, I was never saying you were a bad evil person for not being a komrade, just that say, if you want to lose weight, you're not really a fat activist. Which you don't even want to be & don't haveta be.

[queerbychoice.livejournal.com]

Having no scale is a wonderful thing. I don't think that concept is nearly as prominent as it ought to be within the "outward face" of fat activism (that is, what non-activists hear about first). It's such a simple concept, such an easy and concrete action that anyone can take, with such easily observed positive effects. Plus, you don't have to even bother with the argument over "are some amounts of fat unhealthy?" to get people to grasp that at least the amounts of fat that aren't even detectable without a scale are pretty obviously not worthy of constant observation.

[keryx.livejournal.com]

Indeed. I recommend getting rid of scales as the first step to a happy life, period.

[revolution724.livejournal.com]

This is an interesting post to read from you right now - I blogged myself something about size and gender yesterday, which I don't do all that often, because it came up in my life, which it doesn't per se all that often, and I thought, "Hmm, it would be interesting to talk to April about this."

But I hear you about going through stages in your feeling about fat + gender; certainly there are times when my own sensitive issues have been more at the surface and other times when they've just sort of been there in the background, just part of life. I think moving in either direction can be progress. So, go you. As ever. :)

[keryx.livejournal.com]

Ooh! Where is this blog, and does it have an RSS feed so I can catch it whilst reading LJ? Cause I'd like to - I don't keep up with my blogs like I mean to.

[revolution724.livejournal.com]

LOL. I have told you this like ten times. And it is linked on my so-called "LiveJournal."

The blog is at http://androgogy.blogspot.com. Since it is Blogspot, I think it automatically has an RSS feed - several people read me on Bloglines.

Hope you're able to do the reading-through-LJ thing. Also, what up with the apartment finding and other stuff?