Sizeism Quotes

Sizeism = like racism, only against people who aren't a size two or four.

Anything under size five isn't a woman. It's a boy with breasts.

If I were in a different body, this would be the time I would lean down and kiss her. If I were in a different body, that kiss could transform the night from off to on. If I were in a different body, she would see me inside. She would see what she wanted to see. But now it's awkward.

Because of the size of this body, I must concentrate much harder than I usually do. Even the small things -- my foot on the gas pedal, the amount of space I have to leave around me in the halls -- require major adjustment. And there are the looks I get -- such undisguised disgust. Not just from other students. From teachers. From strangers. The judgment flows freely. It's possible that they're reacting to the thing that Finn has allowed himself to become. But there's also something more primal, something more defensive in their disgust. I am what they fear becoming. I've worn black today, because I've heard so often that it's supposed to be slimming. But instead I am this sphere of darkness submarining through the halls.

While for some of us it may take an event - a serious illness or a trauma - to remember that we are bodies, many people do not have to wait for a specific event to remember the centrality of their body. That's because their body is placed outside the cultural hierarchy of the "ideal body", and so they learn early on that their body makes them "other". Most forms of oppression are directed against the body as "isms": racism, sexism, ableism, heterosexism, ageism, sizeism, and so on. The message underneath isms is this: You are less valuable in this society because of your body. This exemplifies the body-as-object narrative mentioned above: people are reduced to body-as-objects, not empowered as body-subjects. Because of their inability to leave or transcend or conquer their unruly body, the social context suggests to some that they are nothing more than a body, less-than in a world that does not value the inherent goodness of bodies. This creates a trap: their body becomes central to their identity while also being something they are unable to conquer in a social context that privileges the conquered body.

My call to action goes well beyond asking you to pressure your recruiting team to hire a couple of token employees. That's easy and you've been doing that for years. My call to action is that you dig deeper and place focus on making the work environment sustainable for the minorities you introduce to your team. I'm challenging you to refrain from the habitual practice of listening only to the jaded opinions of people that you are more familiar with. Consider that, although you may be under the impression that your employees have strong ethics, morals and values, there is a possibility that they mat not be telling you the entire truth when speaking about the performance or demeanor of minorities. Furthermore, I challenge you to accept that racism, ageism, ableism, classism, sizeism, homophobia, etc., are real and shaping the semblance of your organization. Accepting that fact does not mean that people you work with and trust are bad people. It simply means that many of them are naïve, fearful, and more comfortable with pointing fingers at the innocent than they are with facing and addressing their own unconscious and damaging biases.

Ruby: Oh, that's interesting! Do you even call men "plus-size," is that a thing? Cat: Technically, you do, but it's not a phrase you hear a lot – society doesn't really feel the need to divide men according to their body size the way we do with women.

It’s one thing to battle oppression from the outside, but what do you do when the ideas that are attacking you are your own? As with all forms of oppression, sizeism doesn't exist in a vacuum. It interacts with and impacts other forms of oppression, including ableism. For those of us with disabilities where extra weight can make moving around that much harder, the threat of losing what mobility we have can loom over our heads. Ableism tells us that we must walk and become as “independent” as possible; sizeism blackmails us into making sure we stay that way. They both reinforce the man-made idea of an ideal body, one that everyone should aspire to have. Both feed into the capitalist idea that we must pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps, that we must fend for ourselves, that we must not be a burden on anyone else. The two work in tandem with sexism as well – a female body should be Barbie doll skinny, sleek and sophisticated, and anything else is just gross. Our culture's standard definition of beautiful depends on preconceived notions about how the perfect body should be, notions that rely on various forms of oppression to legitimize them. A model body should ideally be white or white-passing, slim and nondisabled. Is it any wonder we don’t see fat, visibly disabled people of color posing on the covers of fashion magazines?" -Cara Liebowitz, "Palsy Skinny: A Mixed Up, Muddled Journey into Size and Disability," Criptiques, 2014.