retrieval team for objects in the backseat

custodian of the parking garage tickets

"All clear my way"

en-route dining concierge

What do you like about being FAT? 

FaT GiRL Zine Issue No. 3 (1995)

My size!!! I feel powerful and immovable. As a woman, I’ve always been made to feel like I should shrink into the corner and take up less space; now that I’m comfortable with my body size, the very people who could once humiliate me are forced to be intimidated by me when I fight back. 

I like the political education I get from it. it caused me to get hip about feminism earlier than if I was skinny. An almost universal hatred forced me to be strong. I found allies and wrote, made art, worked on loving my body (an on-going challenge). I like the filter it is. Some people, men and women, blow me  off for fat—their loss. But, it’s a litmus test for bigots. Love that. 

I like big tits and big ass, curvy hips and meaty thighs, round face and soft skin. I love cleavage. I love to jiggle. 

I’m soft. When I give my body to someone, I’m giving a lot. My breasts are very large (DD) and beautiful. Round. Cantaloupes. 

I like my fat. I like being large, powerful, sensuous, heavy, sexy, intimidating, inviting, enfolding, warm, extremely soft, able to stare down big creeps, able to take up a lot of room and annoy people, able to be a tender pillow for a sad friend, or a soft playground for an exploring lover. I love being in bed with a lover, and being fat. As a fat woman, I am agile, graceful, and very flexible! I have almost 300 pounds on my side. I like annoying the health workers who think I should have high blood pressure, a dangerously fast heartbeat, and a high cholesterol level. (Ha!) 

I like exasperating the predictions of my mother’s skinny family members that I would be loveless, jobless and in poor health at 30, when I [sic] fact I have the best lover(s), the best sex, the best job and the best health of my life- and my health, at least, is better than any of theirs! 

I like posing for incredible photos, painting life-size full-body portraits, walking around my apartment topless with the shades up! I like being the fattest person on the beach, the only one who can go into the ocean without a wetsuit! 

I don’t get cold very easily—lots of insulation. My lap is very comfortable for kids and cats to sit on. I feel that my size makes me less vulnerable. And best of all, I and [sic] totally buoyant! When swimming, I don’t even have to tread water to stay afloat, while my skinny friends have to kick and paddle constantly. Ha, Ha!

I like being cuddly. I am comfortable in taking up my space. I like to wrap my big loving self around a friend or lover and give ‘em that big warm smother love of a fat girl all soft-like. 

This is HARD…I’m not supposed to like anything about it, right? I guess I like that I can’t ever *blend in.* 

The freedom of letting my body decide what size it’s going to be. Not worrying about constant diets and where and what I can eat. I’m also a big scary bitch! 

I’m warm, and men don’t fuck with me on the street any more. I take up space, and people stay farther away from me. 

I love my body. I am soft, warm, and curvy. I feel like the embodiment of pleasure and luxury! 

I like taking up space. I like my softness and that i can be a soft pillow for those i care for. I like how some clothes drape on me. I like intimidating some people (especially the obnoxious ones who make fun of me and other fat women). I like being substantial. 

Being and looking stronger…Although skinny women have a lot of ‘privilege.’ I like that I’m not treated as someone who is frail or weak. That I take up space in the world means I demand it. Also, having big curves feels like a big part of my femininity. 

My presence is certainly known when I enter a room (I’m told that I look rather foreboding). Also, I’m kinda tall too so that adds to the presence. 

I stay warm! I’m really curvy and I think that’s sexy. I’m not usually worried someone’s being friendly just cause they’d like to fuck me. 

I like a lot of things about being fat. I like taking up space. I like being/acting proud to be fat to our society’s dismay. I like saving on hot water bills (because I use less water in the tub than my skinny neighbors). I like feeling powerful and intimidating. I float really well. I like saying “Biggest butt gets the front seat,” and not getting any argument. 

Feeling strong & grounded. Being able to get flogged a lot. Feeling powerful and nurturing. Having a lover grab or bite into my flesh & swoon. 

Non-conformity. Never needing a two-ply jacket. Resonating strength. 

Well, it gives me something to work on. It’s important to have a cause so I have something to live for. It’s not enough being an aging, disabled, working-class, Jewish Lesbian. Being fat gives me a movement to work in. It gives me an opportunity to be stared at in public places, made fun of on television, pointed out on the street by small children, berated by my mother, seen as stupid, lazy, and out of control. On the other hand, I like that I am allowing myself to be all that I can be, that I’m not torturing myself to fit into society’s unreasonable mold. I like being big and powerful. I like the way I feel when I touch myself. I like to think of myself as an Orca, huge and beautiful and graceful. 

I think I like being large because, when I was young, I was always very small. Not only short, but very skinny, and very young-looking. People always thought I was much younger than I was, and didn’t take me seriously. Plus I got teased and ridiculed a lot for being so tiny. So I now have a feeling of satisfaction about being a person of substance, At last, I’m not smaller than everyone around me! 

Lots of “presence.” No one doubts I’m there. People listen. I don’t get hassled on the street like my thin friends do. i intimidate men (heh, heh, heh).