Let the Fatties Rise

As a thin woman it seems odd that I would feel strongly about fatphobia to most people. For some reason people think it odder than being straight and caring about LGBTQ oppression, being rich and caring about poverty, or being white and caring about racism. So here I will explain my personal encounters with fatphobia and fat resistance.

Like most women I’ve had to face criticism directed at my body. At 11 years old my father saw my protruding stomach and told me I must lose weight because he was worried about my health and the fact that I wouldn’t be able share clothes with my thin cousins. I wasn’t even fat. I’ve never been fat, but I feel as though I have. Despite never being larger than a size 10 I have felt a sense of achievement when I’ve lost weight and a sense of failure when I’ve gained weight. This is a common experience for most people, and I was lucky enough to never develop an eating disorder. I believe I didn’t because of the fat women around me.

My grandmother was fat. She was always fat. She was also the person whom I loved most and who loved me most. When you love someone, their body becomes yours and you love it the way you should love your own. In every fold you find a warm place to hide, a place that is only love. I knew she would eventually die, probably before me, but I never imagined it would happen quite the way it did. So when in the last years of her life a heart consultant told her to eat only one apple a day until she ‘looks like a supermodel’ I was rightly enraged. Later a heart surgeon refused to operate on her because she was obese. This led to irreparable damage that killed her a year later. Not only did the consultant essentially ask her to starve herself, he disregarded her diabetes, meaning if she didn’t eat often enough, her life would be at risk. If she had listened to this respected doctor, she would’ve accidentally killed herself very quickly. My overwhelming concern was for her health but it seemed that those most qualified to save her hated her body because it was fat. Of course the consultant’s advice was incredibly sexist too, advising a woman to ‘look like a supermodel’. It seemed obvious it was her appearance he wanted to fix and make acceptable, not her failing heart.

What I felt about her body was something I hadn’t heard anywhere else and found hard to understand myself. I was horrified by how they threatened her dignity, how they shamed her and how they made a body which I so loved, seem like something wrong that needed to drastically change. Was it perverse of me to love her softness, her round face, her strong thick wrists? It was confusing to me that those who didn’t know her could ever find anything wrong with the body that had fed me, protected me, held me. I loved that she was fat. Why was it so hard to understand loving a fat body not DESPITE its fatness but without conditions?

Recently I’ve discovered fat resistance, fatshion and body positivism. They are a whole new space where there is no fear of fat, no repulsion, no conditions for loving a body. Regardless of my thinness, it has made me look at my body as something entirely different. I smile at my tiger stripes (stretch marks), feel the comfort of my round belly, and see the life in my jiggling flesh. Suddenly clothes aren’t there to be ‘flattering’ but to decorate and celebrate your body. Clothes that are bright and cling to your round belly and let your fat be free and unbound by spanx. Here I see bejeweled bodies that move, that sag, that take up space, and demand attention.  

So this is my thank you to fat women who love their bodies and have taught me how to love mine in the face of violent hatred and fear or fatness, internal and external.

Umber Ghauri, head of Courtauld Equality

Reflecting on the Vagenda discussion

Nerves and adrenaline seem to have nullified most of my memories of the BA interview day. However, what did seem to resonate was when a BA3 tour guide describing the likelihood of future student romances. ''Basically, we're 80% girls here and most of the guys are gay. In that case, I'd recommend looking outside the campus for any relationships.''
At that point I was slightly taken aback to what seemed to be blatant stereotyping from the mouthpiece of an academic Institute. Surely such flippancy was single minded, if not improper? It was also apparent that there mustn't be any smoke without fire.
Could it be true that there is a ubiquitous quality in studying art that attracts more gay men and women? Certainly it is bigoted to subscribe to the idea that 'poofs just like pretty pictures’? I'm pretty sure that the Courtauld gay population doesn't similarly 'die for' a matinee performance of Wicked after a lovely day of sparkles and shopping.

In this case, I think it is necessary to consider what makes an art historian and whether these reflect the experiences that define many gay people.
An LGBT person spends a lot of their youth attracted to someone they are told their gender shouldn't. Unrequited crushes in the playground may make one ponder why they like Francis rather than Frances. What is it in the body’s chemistry and brain’s mathematics that makes an XY pair of chromosomes more appealing? An LGBT person may already have spent a lot of time pondering the taboo in beauty and gender. It is with these eyes, an LGBT person doesn't take the Odalisque or Apollo Belvedere for granted as just sexy people, but symbols; symbols of the relationship between Zeitgeist and attraction. It is in their position, an LGBT person can begin to cynicise, analyse and scrutinize the construct of desire. It is a position that has been shared by names from Leonardo to Wincklemann to Leibovitz.
A careers adviser isn't likely to tell us that Art History is the most employable degree. Coming out as an art historian frequently meets the timeless snort of derision, or being questioned whether it is a subject for 'arty people who can't paint?'
It takes a tolerant and brave individual to pursue such a condemnable degree in a tide of economic bedlam and a gale of public ignorance. Wading through a gale of public ignorance is commonplace for many LGBT people.
It may not be just an art History student that may be 'queer.' Art history is queer. It is natural that the two seem to collide and an asset to the Courtauld that they have. That includes you, Brian Sewell.

Giorgio Grande, Courtauld Student

Why did Umber start this rather vague society?

Equality is a deceptively simple word that has defied application throughout history, because inequality is so often the result of a series of silences and omissions, things that don’t occur. Deeper in contrast with the shallow victories of changes in law or changes in politically correct terminology, to name two examples. This society aims to fight silence. I want to know what you think of the Courtauld, philosophy, the leveson enquiry, porn, books, marriage, gay marriage, global warming, tax, ‘ethnic’ printed scarves, femfresh, Ingres, colonialism, etc, etc, basically anything.

The hesitation to express one’s oppressive experiences (big and small) often lies in a fear of inadequacy. Someone’s always worse off, and we’ve all been very lucky on the whole. However, failing to express and therefore failing to value the array of experience that comes with difference (whether that difference is due to gender, sexuality, disability, race, class, or a myriad of others) is to waste that experience, its to deny and devalue your life. In order to be taken seriously or viewed as intelligent we so regularly decide that our ideas are not as valuable as the ideas of those on our reading list, people who are older, richer, and more normal or more weird (the ‘I’m weird but not weird enough to be interesting’ insecurity is more common than you think). Something that is consistently reinforced by a plethora of authorities that systematically drown out our voices. Here is an opportunity to say what you want to say without risking a bad mark.

Why is your voice important at all?

Because allowing yourself to speak allows others to speak and therefore (quite selfishly, perhaps) you benefit from hearing other people’s voices (you also might quite like expressing yourself, which is great). Yes, Roland Barthes has a lot of great ideas which we should read about, but we all know that academic reading lists are dominated by white men. Now there’s nothing wrong with white men, clearly they have some fantastic and vital ideas and experiences, but don’t you want to know other things too? Don’t you want to know what an equally intelligent queer, adopted, disabled black woman (for example) thinks of Mark Rothko? Politically it is important to understand how certain aspects of society affect the most vulnerable but it is also just interesting. It frustrates me that I’m missing out on hearing what so many people think about things I think about too, how am I supposed to have better ideas if I cant steal yours? It also frustrates me that people think I’m playing the gender card or the race ‘card’ if I mention an instance of being treated differently. Being treated differently is a problem, but it can be a productive one if it is discussed. My experience is great, but I’m greedy, I want to hear how your world is different to mine (but equal, of course).

What do I want from you?

I want you to get in touch with me, tell me an idea you have for a video, an article, a poem, whatever, or send me something you’ve already done. If Giorgio and I think its up to scratch we’ll post it on the blog. Alternatively, I want to arrange talks, debates, lectures, performances, basically events. If you have an idea for one please let me know.

If you want to take on an active, regular role in this society get in touch, we will probably need more hands as we grow.