No Place For The Big, Fat, And F*gly

Beauty is defined rigidly in our world – fair, thin, tall- with little place for the dark, fat, short ones. Here’s an account of the big, fat, and f*gly, who remain ignored, or worse, ridiculed.

All they could see was a large lump of flesh – obstinate, smelly and lazy. That was all everyone would see. They took her pictures, posted offensive comments, laughed at her face, and applauded at her jokes. She was the brunt of every third joke in stand-up comedy. That was her, a disgusting lump of flesh.

They vouched against racism, against discrimination on the basis of religion, caste, creed, but it was alright to laugh at her. She fit no controversial agenda. It was OK. She was but a lump of flesh.

She had a name. No one knew. They named her Gluttony and expected her to respond at their call. They disguised their callousness behind her gluttony. They disguised their crude words behind her self-loathing.  They blamed her for who she was; a huge lump of flesh.

She carried the burden of her cross. Day by day she dragged it as it grew heavier. They even got a fancy name for what they were doing, “Fattertainment”. Media could be creative, and no one blamed the media for flooding them with opinions. She had made poor choices and landed up where she was, they cried. They feared she would create an epidemic. Their fat humour was the best weapon against the lump of flesh.

She would never get into that little black dress hidden in her closet, the one she untiringly tried after every session of a sweaty workout.

The weight bias finally weighed her down. It killed her motivation and it crushed her chances. She would never get into that little black dress hidden in her closet, the one she untiringly tried after every session of a sweaty workout. Her genes had failed her as much as her jeans had. Away from prying eyes, all day, she would try a new regime, a new diet, a new set of exercises. No one would ever know. She would stand for hours in front of the mirror, wondering why everyone else failed to see her as she did.

She had beautiful eyes, she knew. Sadly, only she knew that.

Locked up in her room, she would emanate the fragrance of beautiful flowers. Sadly, only she knew that.

She longed for love. Locked in a room, crushed by their comments, beaten by the unrelenting media opinion, a lump of flesh longed for the love that they all took for granted.

She now rests, in a huge casket. As she disintegrates, like all of us will someday , it was noticed that she didn’t take up much space beneath the earth. They buried her deep, still fearing the epidemic. Filled with bony prototypes of humans created in labs and edited in softwares, this was certainly no world for the big, fat and the f*gly.

Pic credit: Concept image of obesity via Shutterstock

Jyoti Chettri

Hi everyone, I am a teacher by profession and a restless being at heart. I

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