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A very famous designer store in Mumbai, fat shamed a woman who went to buy a dress in their store.
Fat shaming is a common feature in our society. Neighbours, shopkeepers and sometimes even friends don’t hesitate to pass rude comments about the body. Recently, Mona Joshi, a woman in Mumbai went shopping for a ghagra for her friend’s wedding and ended up being told to go the gym. There was an outpouring of support for her on social media after her friend who accompanied her to the store wrote an angry email calling out the behaviour of the salesperson. The shop owner and manager reportedly have taken action against the salesperson for his behaviour and apologised for the incident. This incident also sparked a much needed debate on body shaming. But are we missing a few points?
About a week ago, a similar incident took place on the Tube in London. People received pamphlets about being “fat” and “ugly”. Similar reactions of outrage were seen on Twitter with women calling out this hideous shaming. I have also noticed how it has always been a slippery slope from fat to ugly. Because shaming of this kind not only attacks your body type but also what is considered as beautiful and attractive.
It is, therefore, important to not see each of these fat shaming incidents in isolation or acts by individual shamers. There is a larger societal problem of preferring a certain body type. These ideas are of course reinforced through movies, advertisements and finally through the fashion industry itself. We have to admit there is an obsession for everyone to be the same size, the same type. How often have we seen models and actresses who don’t fit this template of skinny and beautiful?
I am tempted to ask isn’t it suspicious that in a country as diverse as ours we want everyone to be size zero and skinny? Isn’t it worth questioning why women must “go looking” for clothes in their size? Isn’t it impossible for all women to look the same?
I find that it is essential to call out behaviour of strangers towards women or men who are deemed “fat”. Simultaneously we must challenge the larger agenda being forced into our consciousness.
The trend is changing with growing pressure on the industry to acknowledge that women of different body types exist. (Several campaigns run by the industry have been critiqued for being hypocritical and not changing their advertising patterns.) However, many women’s groups and magazines have started ‘love your body’ campaigns to combat self-esteem issues arising from body shaming. Beautiful photographs of women of all sizes helps break the myth that one size is ideal; with an added bonus of driving home the point that we need to love our bodies more.
Cover image via Facebook/MonaJoshi
Reader. Feminist. Poetry lover. Feisty. Emotional. Introverted. Passionate. Believes in human rights for all. Tries to write about all of these things. read more...
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I huffed, puffed and panted up the hill, taking many rest breaks along the way. My calf muscles pained, my heart protested, and my breathing became heavy at one stage.
“Let’s turn back,” my husband remarked. We stood at the foot of Shravanbelagola – one of the most revered Jain pilgrimage centres. “We will not climb the hill,” he continued.
My husband and I were vacationing in Karnataka. It was the month of May, and even at the early hour of 8 am in the morning, the sun scorched our backs. After visiting Bangalore and Mysore, we had made a planned stop at this holy site in the Southern part of the state en route to Hosur. Even while planning our vacation, my husband was very excited at the prospect of visiting this place and the 18 m high statue of Lord Gometeshwara, considered one of the world’s tallest free-standing monolithic statues.
What we hadn’t bargained for was there would be 1001 granite steps that needed to be climbed to have a close-up view of this colossal magic three thousand feet above sea level on a hilltop. It would be an understatement to term it as an arduous climb.
Why is the Social Media trend of young mothers of boys captioning their parenting video “Dear future Daughter-in-Law, you are welcome” deeply problematic and disturbing to me as a young mother of a girl?
I have recently come across a trend on social media started by young mothers of boys who share videos where they teach their sons to be sensitive and understanding and also make them actively participate in household chores.
However, the problematic part of this trend is that such reels or videos are almost always captioned, “To my future daughter-in-law, you are welcome.” I know your intentions are positive, but I would like to point out how you are failing the very purpose you wanted to accomplish by captioning the videos like this.
I know you are hurt—perhaps by a domestic household that lacks empathy, by a partner who either is emotionally unavailable, is a man-child adding to your burden of parenting instead of sharing it, or who is simply backed by overprotective and abusive in-laws who do not understand the tiring journey of a working woman left without any rest as doing the household chores timely is her responsibility only.
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