It is important to identify your privileges before examining the ways in which you are ill-treated by society. As an able-bodied, educated, femme-presenting woman of a comfortable socio-economic background, I am aware of the privileges I receive as a result of these identities. I am also a dark-skinned, black, fat queer woman. Biases exist to exclude and justify abuse against me in society. At first, I contemplated proving my worth to people who see me as less, but quickly came to the realization that the onus is never on any marginalized group to make society at large see them as full human beings.
One aspect of my identity that has stood out to me through my whole life is my fatness. This part of me is not something people who are not considered ‘overweight’ can relate to, in fact, it is most often easier for people to deny that discrimination against bodies of a larger size exists. When they are not in denial about this, it is seen as acceptable to make fun of, publicize and shame fat bodies. In fact, it is so nonchalantly placed in society that a culture of dieting propped up by body shaming and pressuring people to fit into an arbitrary idea of health exists. Diet culture is upheld by several organizations centred around people experiencing true happiness after dramatic ‘weight-loss’, ‘post-baby-bodies’ and general unrealistic fitness standards.
Growing up in Nigeria as a young girl, I felt the grunt of my weight massively because policing female bodies under the umbrella of desirability and proximity to marriage is so often tapped into. When you are larger, people feel the need/have freedom to comment on your body; most, if not all of these comments unsolicited and filled with disgust. Being of size means you are perceived as older, so as early as the age of nine, adults, including older women would ‘advice’ me to lose weight so I would find a husband when I grew older. “No man likes fat women” they would say, “if you are this size now, how big will you be when you are pregnant?” These are statements that I would hear so often on an almost daily basis. When it was not this being said, fat-shaming would come under the guise of caring about my health, with people recommending health practices to my mum that ranged from completely starving me to placing me in schools where students are poorly-fed. At times, they would suggest I starve myself and call it fasting, as sort of a double win where I was losing weight but also worshipping God in the process.
Men who were vastly older than me often felt comfortable asking me to lose weight. I remember visiting a friend and having her uncle comment, very rudely, to both our faces that I would need to shed a few pounds. One of my mother’s colleagues on my first day meeting him outside her office; with another man beside him who was also a stranger to me, asked if I had started hitting the gym, in his own words because I was “just too large.”
Mainly because of the ‘respect’ factor surrounding older adults in Nigeria and being a suppressed child in general, I usually stayed silent while these comments were made, feeling very shamed but also hopeless because everybody assumed I ate my way to my size and this was simply not true. I hoped my mother would protect me but unfortunately, she experienced shame because of my weight as a larger woman actively pursuing weight loss herself and would constantly reiterate that people said these things because they cared about my ‘health’. I did not see the benefit of these comments, as all they did was make me feel lower and cling even more to my already high anxieties about my weight. As a result, I experienced a dilapidating fear of eating in public or people watching me plate food in general because I knew I was being judged. I remember finding out that my childhood crush had taken unflattering pictures of me while in church and having nightmares about those photos being leaked on social media, even worse if my shaming happened to go viral.
When they were not ‘advising’ me to lose weight, older men were hitting on me, pinching my fat body under the guise of showing how large I was or making sexual comments regarding my butt and early breast development. I noticed that ‘thicker’ children, or girls who develop early in age are very easily sexualized as it is often easier for people to deny your childhood immaturity when you are a larger person and they can pretend your age is much farther than it actually is. Men would ask my mummy if they could marry me since I was already so ‘ripe’ or suggest my body was prepared for babies. As always, I would cower and disassociate because I just could not handle these things at that age.
Another effect of constantly having to watch my back in regards to weight was completely dreading doctors’ visits. Straight size people do not often understand that for fat people, the doctor could present to be your worst fear when it is in fact supposed to be the opposite. The practice of medicine, along with being fundamentally racist is that it is also linked to the diet industry and unhealthy fitness practices in general. Doctors would recommend that fat people starve themselves just to lose weight even when there is no direct cause of concern linked to the patients’ blood pressure or cholesterol levels. Once a patient is fat, the consensus from medical professionals is general distaste ranging from how we let our bodies become like this or completely ignoring our primary complaints to give us feedback on losing weight. I have experienced instances of where my entire visit to a primary care physician was surrounded around practices to facilitate weight loss, whether or not I had a desire to ‘look’ better or if I was simply choosing to stay fat because I did not care about my body.
Typically, a visit to my hospital in Nigeria when I was younger and even now would start with the nurses critically assessing my weight gain and nitpicking my appearance in general. After this, they would ask me if I had tried any of the very toxic methods of weight loss suggested at my last visit, then attempt to pressure my mummy into forcing me to doing these things despite my unwillingness. I was considered incapable of making health decisions for myself simply because I exist in a larger body. Mostly, these people were interested in policing all my choices rather than giving me an opportunity to express my own desires for myself because I was fat. I never considered myself as intrinsically less than because of my body mass, but people’s constant harping on my weight had made me detest the way I looked and as a result, seek to hiding behind baggy clothes and a general lack of enjoying my appearance.
Dehumanizing people based on body size, ability or any other marginalized identity is never acceptable, whether or not society, in general, is willing to admit these forms of oppression exist. Fighting the very industries that are set up to paint fat people as worthless or miserable people who simply do not care about our health and bodies, in general, will always be in my line of work. I the current idea of health is something that should be carefully examined. ‘Health’ is not an anomaly, rather it looks different for every single one of us. Some people will never be ‘healthy’ as a result of different chronic illnesses, disabilities or complications and that is truly okay. Medical facilities must be less focused on appearance or appealing to society and more of ensuring patients are truly at the best place they can possibly be, whatever this may mean for them personally; such as recovering from an addiction or seeking out therapy in order to facilitate an improved mental state.
