I have been consciously on a diet since I was about twelve....and so have lots of girls. That's not to say that every day I eat like I'm on a diet, not at all! It just means that every day, somewhere in my consciousness I have assessed what I'm eating and either felt guilty or good about it. And that can ruin a meal! And more than that, it's the self-deprecating comments about being fat, and the jealous criticisms of women that I think are pretty and thinking that my whole life will be better if I'm just a little slimmer...I'm on a diet right now, more consciously than normal, and me and my Uni housemates are keeping each other in check; calculating calories and weight watchers points, getting me up at 6.30am to go to the gym, comforting each other and justfying when someone eats something they "shouldn't". And here's the thing...none of us are overweight.
There's a saying that's come out of the Anglo-American Feminist movement (i guess feminists in some parts of the world don't have the luxury of worrying about weight loss); "Fat is a feminist issue" and it is. It's a Christian issue too, or at least it should be! Because I'm not overweight. I'm not endangering my health by being the weight I'm at. It's not about feeling healthier. It's not a short term detox to kick start my immune sytem, blah blah blah;
This is about aesthetics. This is about being a Size 8 (I don't think that's even possible...my bones alone are bigger than that!), this is about wanting to look like Kate Moss. This is about me buying in to this dominant idea that beauty is size 0, that thin is pretty, that people will find me more attractive if I'm thinner.
I'm a thinking girl, I'm a feminist, I know that this Western image of beauty is a myth. I know all about how lots of models stay thin and I know about air brushing and I know that a boy that doesn't find me attractive because I have meat on my bones isn't the kind of boy I want in my life. And more than this, I know that my Creator made me and that I am beautiful, not "to Him" and no one else, but beautiful. I know that I don't enjoy my life as much as I could because I feel insecure. I know that I'm not accepting the wholeness that God offers me by living like they way I look is imperfect, wrong, not pretty.
And this isn't God's kingdom coming in my life, this isn't wholeness and healthiness, this isn't being in the world but not of it, this is buying in to and being affected by the wrong things about the world. And I want to be different from a culture that makes girls (and boys) feel unattractive and imperfect when they're lovely.
I read an article in Bitch magazine once (an amazing US feminist magazine that engages with culture from a feminist perspective)about Beth Ditto, lead singer of the Gossip, who is definitley bigger than Kate Moss etc. And she spoke about resisting the dominant discourses about beauty, that hold women back and make them feel incomplete. And she talked about accepting the way she looked and better yet, acknowledging that she is beautiful and sexy and hot and attractive. And I thought "Yeah!". I want to, as a Christian, as a feminist, as a girl, resist these magazines and pictures and fashion designers and bitchy comments and criticisms of "fat" women in Heat Magazine and the things other girls say when I walk in to a party and hardest of all, the voice inside me that's internalised all these things. But it's so hard to do that, so hard to ignore these things that are so ingrained in me. But if Beth Ditto can do it, maybe I can too...
