Photo courtesy of studybreaks.com.

  Students at San Luis Obispo High School have all probably heard of the term ‘fatphobia.’ The term is starting to gain more traction throughout social media, especially surrounding diet culture.

  People can be fatphobic without even realizing it because not everyone knows what fatphobia really is. 

  Good Housekeeping defines fatphobia as the fear and hatred of fat bodies. Fatphobia is a form of bigotry and discrimination that shouldn’t exist.

  First, let me just start off by saying that the trauma that fat people go through doesn’t compare to what a skinny person has gone through. Yes, being told to “eat a burger” or to “get some meat on those bones” is terrible and it can definitely hurt someone. However, it doesn’t compare to the abuse that fat people have to deal with and recover from.

  There are a multitude of things that fat people have to put up with.

  As youtuber Nicholas Black has talked about in one of his videos, fat people are systemically harmed.

  Fat people have gone through years of abuse. A skinner person’s body type is more likely to be preferred for modeling agencies, it’s the standard that Hollywood values, and it isn’t used for comic relief every single time it gets representation. 

  Fat people not only put up with societal expectations, but they can end up dying due to medical neglect. Even when fat people are told to take care of their health and they listen, getting the right nutrition, exercising, etc., doctors don’t do anything for them, end up neglecting their needs, and it results in them dying. Skinnier or leaner people don’t have the same issue.

  Fat people will be denied service or a job because they are fat, even when the job or service they are seeking has nothing to do with that. There is also evidence that fat people in certain places get paid less than their skinny peers in the same job position. 

  The issue that I have with fatphobia is all that I have mentioned so far. The systemic problems that fat people have to face every single day do not need to exist. 

  People need to just mind their own business. Someone else’s body is none of your business. In his video, Black asks, “Why do you feel the need to comment on somebody’s body when it is not yours?” 

  This is a great question. Why do people feel the need to contribute to this cretinous systemic problem that shouldn’t even exist in the first place? 

  It doesn’t matter if you are ‘concerned for their health,’ it isn’t your business. Being ‘concerned for their health’ is making everything worse. 

  Not only is it insensitive, but it is extremely outrageous and ableist to make ‘health’ the marker for respect. By doing this, chronically ill people, disabled people, and mentally ill people are being put in danger. 

  As said in Black’s video, “People who aren’t healthy deserve respect too.” Everyone deserves basic human respect, whether they are healthy or not.

  It is also important to note that some people’s bodies are just fat. It depends on one’s definition of fat, but there are many people who are fat and also simultaneously healthy. 

  Some people are just like that, so focusing on someone’s ‘health’ when they are completely healthy just shows how ignorant people are. These people who care about someone’s ‘health’ don’t actually care about the person, they just hate fat people.

  Fatphobia is a problem that doesn’t need to exist, and every single person can help this problem by not contributing to it. By minding your own business and not commenting on other people’s bodies, you are already starting to help.

Sources: youtube.com/nicholasblack , goodhousekeeping.com , virgietovar.com , nationaleatingdisorders.org