Is fat shaming ever ok? This has been the topic of conversation yesterday and today when it came out that Megyn Kelly said ““Some of us want to be shamed! When I was in law school, I was gaining weight, I said to my stepfather, ‘If you see me going into that kitchen one more time, you say, ‘Where you going, fat ass?’ And it works!”
People are livid that she would say that or think that it would ever be ok to fat-shame someone. But, if I were to play devil’s advocate (which I am) is she right and we don’t want to admit it? Is it ok to fat-shame yourself or to do it to someone if they ask you to? How many of us have put up pictures of models and hung them on the fridge to motivate us? How many of us have hung up pictures of ourselves when we wanted to get back to that weight? How many of us have said to our friends our even to ourselves “Ugh! I’m so fat, I need to lose weight.” Aren’t all of those things just versions of fat-shaming ourselves?
As a woman whose weight has varied greatly over the years (I’ve lost over a hundred pounds and kept it off for 5+ years then gained half of it back over the next 6 years) I don’t believe that we should fat-shame anyone. Even if they ask us to. Instead I truly believe that we should speak to ourselves with love for our bodies. When I was losing weight, it was at a time that I started to feel beautiful even when I was heavier. That motivated me to work out more, eat more healthy and before I knew it within two years 100 lbs came off. When I started gaining weight and talking badly to myself, all it accomplished was feeling bad and not taking care of myself.
We already know that everyone and everybody is different. Different things motivate people differently. That’s the beauty of life and each of us. Knowing that, is it wrong for Megyn Kelly to say that she likes to be fat-shamed? Should she be called out and bashed for her opinion on what works for her?