“I Know I’m Fakin’ It . . .”

The other day, while checking out the Hotmail address where I receive stories for inclusion in Dimensions Online's "Weight Room," I received an email from a writer who respectfully asked me to remove their submission. Per this contributor:

"My friends from town found it, and are now spreading it about to everyone I know in an effort to humiliate me and ruin my life and any chances I had with any women. I guess liking fat girls really is a crime. I hate to admit it, but I'd rather fake liking skinny ones than be subjected to the kind of ridicule I'm receiving now."

I honored the young man's request (from the tone and focus of his email, I assume he's young) and removed the material. But at the same time I couldn't help feeling a little down about it. Even if (as is often the case with online correspondence), the writer was yanking my chain, the story still has a ring of believability.

As someone who's been married to a BBW for over fifteen years, it's easy for me to sometimes forget what a huge leap openly admitting one's love of fat womanhood can be in this thin-obsessed culture. In the pack-minded world of pre- and young adulthood, it ain't easy to go against the standards set by yer peers. Sometimes I think I was especially fortunate to've passed through my adolescence during an era when a fat woman singer could pose with the rest of her folk-rock hippie group in a bathtub – and it was considered kinda cool. There was plenty that was cheesy & phony about the late sixties, but for a young FA just beginning to step out of the closet, there was also room for a kind of group acceptance that I suspect today's emerging FAs don't so readily find.

But at the risk of sounding preachy, I've still gotta state: no matter psychically bruising the alternative may seem, "faking it" is not the way to go through the rest of your life. . .