Dear fat admirers and chubby chasers: We don’t care whether you find us attractive. At all.
Every time I talk about the innate desirability, attractiveness or sexuality of fat women, men roll up to let the world know that unlike the rabble, they like fat women. A lot. In fact, they even have a thing for them, these swains admit bashfully, waiting for the just desserts of admiration and dates that must surely spring from such good-heartedness.
My dudes.
Listen.
We do not care that voluptuousness makes you, internet stranger, have pantsfeels. We don’t care! Ever! At all! Not a single one of us is thinking,
“Oh, thank goodness that Random Bob from the internet wants to f*ck me. The culture-wide discrimination, bigotry and oppression that keep me from living the same kind of life thin people do is clearly over. Long live Bob!”
No. We’re edging away because your inevitable appearance, whenever fat liberation and sexuality are brought up, to display your pantsfeels is *gross.* It’s creepy. We don’t want it.
And if we do want it, we’ll seek out dating- and sex-specific contexts where your expressions of feelings for the fat ladies are more appropriate.
(And yes, it’s almost always cisgender men who identify as fat admirers.)
“But wait!” the fat admirer cries. “I can love fat women and respect them, too!”
My dude, you can think this till the latest block from a body-positive blogger you’re harassing on Instagram comes home, but respect is shown, not claimed.
Context is vital. If you’re a chubby chaser or fat admirer, cool, you do you, as long as you’re sticking to the appropriate contexts. Dating app? Fine. BBW bash? Excellent. Random fat women’s social media accounts? Nah. Random fat women’s social media accounts, even if they’re posting sexy pics? Nope. They’re not doing it for you, bro.
If you respect fat women, you’ll seek out the appropriate contexts to tell us how you feel about our bodies.
If you respect fat women, you’ll stop harassing fat women in their professional and activist spaces. Yes, personal compliments are harassment in that context.
If you respect fat women, you’ll stop contacting women about their bodies or hitting on them unless they have made it explicitly clear that they welcome that attention in that context.
And once again, posting a sexy photo is not permission to come aboard. Fat women do many things, including posting photos of themselves on the internet, that have zero to do with you and your boner. If a woman is not clearly signaling with hashtags and text — beyond just an image — that she’s interested in male attention, leave her alone.
If you respect fat women, you’ll engage with us for other reasons than our appearances, and be genuinely interested in our lives, careers, opinions and activities.
Otherwise, just leave us alone. If you’re not working with us towards liberation, at least stop getting in our way.
No, really. Leave us alone.
If your desire to “help” fat folks comes in any way, shape or form from your desire to f*ck us, stop.
We can tell when your efforts stem mostly from your pantsfeels. We can tell when we’re being objectified. We can tell when you follow us on social media as wank fodder rather than as human beings. We can tell when you’re “helping” because you think it’ll help you get in our pants. Your “help” is worse than just leaving us alone, because it’s dependent on our willingness to perform sexiness and be objectified. And that’s not okay.
Occasionally male photographers will approach me and ask how they can work with plus-size models. On the surface, that’s great! More representation would be fantastic!
But every single time, turns out what they really want is to date plus-size women.
Wrong context, bro.
Here’s how you can tell if you’re doing it wrong:
> You’re secretly hoping to get dates out of it
> You’re talking for or over the people you want to help
> Every aspect of your involvement is somehow sexualized or about physical appearance
> You’re doing it for us instead of stepping back and supporting our existing efforts
> The people you surround yourself with all just happen to be people you find attractive
> The people you surround yourself with all just happen to be people whose presentations are highly sexualized
Don’t do that. Do this.
I’ve spent a lot of words here explaining what’s probably pretty obvious, but I’ve seen some heavy-duty denial around this, too, so let me say it one more time: If you’re “helping” fat folks because you think we’re sexaaaaaay, please stop. You’re doing more harm than good. Find some BBW (big beautiful women) dating events instead. That’s the right context for your pantsfeels.
If you think fat folx are hot and want to actually help us, here’s how to do it:
1. Fund our existing efforts
2. Support our Patreons
3. Buy our music and artwork and books and writing and crafts and other works
4. Fight fatphobia because it’s wrong, not because you think fat chicks are f*ckable too
5. Stop starting organizations and media outlets and businesses where you claim to speak for fat people, and let us speak for ourselves
6. Stop sexualizing us in non-sexual contexts
7. Stop stealing our photos for your fetish accounts
8. Don’t hit on us outside dating contexts
9. Don’t hit on us outside dating contexts
10. Don’t hit on us outside dating contexts
Will these steps help you get a date faster than what you’ve been doing? You’ll never know until you try. It’s certainly less likely to get you blocked on social media and a reputation as a creep.
Let’s dig deep.
Every Monday, I send out my Body Liberation Guide, a thoughtful email jam-packed with resources for changing the way you see your own body and the bodies you see around you. And it’s free. Let’s change the world together.
Hi there! I'm Lindley. I create artwork that celebrates the unique beauty of bodies that fall outside conventional "beauty" standards at Body Liberation Photography. I'm also the creator of Body Liberation Stock and the Body Love Shop, a curated central resource for body-friendly artwork and products. Find all my work here at bodyliberationphotos.com.