You’re right; it should be: “eat a sandwich and try not to deliberately induce vomiting afterward”.
<dons flameproof underwear>
<runs like fuck>
Er…hm…I wear an 8 (in dresses, dress pants, and blouses), and I’m 36-26-36, and I weigh 135 pounds now.
I think a large problem of the perception is the non-standardization of women’s clothing sizes.
I’ve personally gone for a jean-trying on session where I’ve fit into every size of jeans from 2 to 14, depending on the brand name. It’s bullshit, in my opinion. There’s no reason I should have to grab 20+ pair of jeans to take into a dressing room to find TWO that fit.
However, until women start voting with their dollars, we’re never going to find truth-in-sizing. Me? I started voting with my jean-buying dollars when I went thru the aforementioned jean-buying session.
I got so fucking frustrated with fitting into 12 different sizes while remaining the same goddamned size in that hour, I dumped the whole pile on the saleswoman, walked over to the men’s section, grabbed the pair closest to my actual measurements, tried em on, and bought em. I’ve never had to try on a pair of jeans since I started buying men’s jeans.
When and if women’s jean comapnies ever start gving me truth in sizing, I might consider buying them again. Till then? Fuck them.
As an additional note…I give the vast majority of my clothes-shopping dollars to Newport News (I buy online.) I still can’t buy jeans from them, because for some reason jeans are completely fucked, size-wise, but I have never had a single problem buying anything else from them without trying it on (obviously, since it’s online shopping).
I won’t reccommend them for jeans shopping, because I think all jeans makers are on really good drugs I’ve not been given access to, much to my chagrin, but the rest of it, frankly, ROCKS.
It’s not teeny-bopper clothing, it’s defintely not the slut-wear you find these days in the mall, and other than jeans, I have nevr had a problem ordering sizes via their measurement chart.
Women, if you want real truth-in-sizing, invest in companies that GIVE you truth in sizing. Companies like Newport News don’t change their sizes to fit what’s “fashionable”, they remain consistent.
I ordered a size 8 dress from them last year, I ordered a size 8 dress from them this past month, and assuming I don’t gain enough weight to bump me up a size over the next year, I can order a size 8 from them next year, and I’ll still be able to order with the confidence it will fit. Even if I do go up a size, I can follow their “sizing guide” and order with confidence.
Tell these clothing manufacturers who pull sizes out of, apparently, their assholes, to go fuck themselves. Their clothes ain’t that good, quite frankly.
Look, there is no “normal” provided you’re somewhere between 4’10’’ and 6’7’’ and your clothing doesn’t have to be specially made for you. I’d say that would cover the vast majority of people.
People come in different sizes. I have a pretty “perfect” 34-24-34 figure, a BMI of 20 and would fit into a US size 2 or XXS without problems. The difference between me and the ex Mrs Quicksilver is that I’m 5’, and my boobs are a 30E, cunningly balanced out by my hips so that I don’t fall over.
I get to see a lot of naked and semi naked average people everyday (med student, not some kind of weirdo, promise) and believe me, normal people look like “before” pictures, it is abnormal to look like most athletes, hollywood stars, or for that matter, porn stars.
If you are healthy and happy with your shape, then just accept it was how you individually were designed to look, and get on with living your life. Everyone wishes they could change something about themselves. The truth is that so do famous people- it’s just that they have the time and money to do it, either with extreme diet and exercise programmes that need full-time devotion, or through secret surgery. Plus, there’s always airbrushing, photoshopping, corsetry, flattering lighting and lenses- not everything you see is quite what it seems.
Imagine how I feel as a 5’10" size 14. Like a friggin’ freak. I have an ad on a personals site that lists my stats. You’d think I was Godzilla from the reactions.
Having come down to a 14 from a size 30/32, I find this alternately hilarious and horrifying.
VCNJ~
I’m curvy and I’m at the chubby side of a size 2 and I’m a grown woman. Anything more than a 2 and I’m looking dumpy. It’s perfectly normal for many women. I don’t see these anorexic size 0-2 people talk about. To me they look good. I think that because fat people are the majority, many THINK that it’s normal. But it’s not.
Ok, but how tall are you? I’m 5’8", and I promise you if I could regularly fit into the average size 2, I would either be anorexic, or in a hospital with nutrition being vehemently pumped into my veins because I wouldn’t be able to stand up from lack of energy.
I’ve been the same 130-140 pounds (ok, I can fluctuate 10 pounds give or take, but it doesn’t make me look any different) since 5th grade when I first reached my full height, and I neither look anorexic nor fat. However if I lost 10 pounds from my lowest average weight and went down to 120 (which I did when I got pregnant, my body didn’t react well to the change in hormones) I WOULD (and DID, the doctor wanted to hospitalize me, put me on bedrest, and pump nutrition into my veins) look entirely anorexic. I might have, at that point, fit into a size 2, however. Or not, I’m not sure a loss of 10 pounds would have lost me 4 sizes, especially since I didn’t lose any height.
Point being, I think height has alot more to do with a general size than weight. A size 2 at my height would, I assure you, be damn near, if not absolutely anorexic. Those privileged few who are naturally a size 2 at my height may not be anorexic, but they sure as fuck look like they need to be force-fed a few sandwiches (Or sammiches, whichever are more fattening).
At the same time, a woman who is 6’ in bare feet would largely look just as unhealthy to my eyes if she wore my size, an average size 8.
I’m almost 5’ 2". So we’re at opposite ends of the spectrum. I think most women run in the 5’4" - 5’5" neighborhood. I still don’t think a size 2 would be an anorexic warning at that height. Thin ain’t anorexic necessarily. Sure, thin is fashionable, but it isn’t necessarily dangerous. I agree it would be for you, though.
Think I’ll skip my “sammich” today. 
What does it mean for a cultural paragon of beauty to be healthy? What’s unhealthy is for folks who can’t attain a particular body-shape to turn their lives into a miserable wreck in a fruitless attempt to achieve that body-shape.
What’s also unhealthy is to normalize the mocking of folks with that body-shape, to repeat over and over how abnormal the body-shape is. In my opinion, the obsession with this word “normal” is totally unhealthy. Who gives a shit about the norm? Who wants to be the norm?
Folks should consider whether they’d be willing on these boards to toss around comments lightly about big folks and their dangerous eating disorders that have led to their size. If you’re not ready for that, you’re not ready to be lightly diagnosing thin folks or their dangerous eating disorders.
Daniel
Yes they are. My mom always wore a size 6. She had a closet full of size 6 clothing. She went shopping, grabbed a size six in her usual brand and it hung on her. She had to buy a 4 to get it to fit. Yet all those sixes in her closet (of the same brand, mind you) still fit perfectly.
Just chiming in here to say that if I were a size 12, I’d be fit; at 10 I’d be slim; at 8 I’d look ridiculous.
I’ll never look like a supermodel because of my body shape. Even if my navel was 2" from my spine, I’d look nothing but misshapen.
This whole “this size is fat, this size is skinny, this size is perfect” thing is ridiculous. I find Quiksilver’s thoughts on the subject completely ignorant.
The dearly-departed Mode magazine had a blurb about this once. They said they had been guilty of making comments about thinner women, and resolved that if they didn’t think it was OK for larger women to have things said about them, it wasn’t OK to talk about other-size women either.
It was really cool and got me to be much more accepting and non-judgmental. I am really heavy (5’10", 300#), but I can still sympathize when a much smaller woman frets about her weight, without piping up about how lucky she should feel. I also fight the urge to let everyone know that I know just how fat I am, because if I want people not to judge me, I shouldn’t judge myself.
I also know the power of eating issues/disorders and while I know some people are thin through genetics or healthy behavior, I always leave open the possibility that there is disordered behavior as well.
<slight hijack>
I still mourn the passing of “Mode”.
VCNJ~
True, but his aren’t the only ignorant opinions in this thread. Those that chastise the thin for being “skeletal,” “emanciated,” and “anorexic” all border on the offensive, just as calling heavier people “tubby,” “whale,” and “piggy.”
Obviously somebody isn’t happy with their body size, and feels the need to take it out on those that they feel are their enemies. When in fact, on both sides of the spectrum, these people don’t want to be the way they are, they merely cannot help it.
Using a celebrity that gets paid to look a certain way as their platform, merely gives them a target that is a bit safer than calling somebody on this board a name.
I’m 5’10 and 185lbs, in great shape, very active and very mindful of every calorie I eat.
I tell **no one ** what to eat, how to eat, unless someone is seeking advice.
I am training now for a triathalon. I really want to get down to about 172, and I have warned everyone that I am not a big eater in advance. Why? Because, one of the greatest tensions that exist between my wife and me, and between my in-laws and me, is them getting indignant that I don’t eat more.
Now, I eat about 1800-2200 calories (and I make them healthful calories), and I eat about 1500-1800 when cutting back.
so, it’s FIGHTS, MORE FIGHTS, ARGUMENTS…arguing…disgust…from everyone…aimed at me. And I put diplomacy into overdrive to no avail.
I really can’t take it. I can’t eat a normal portion, turn down a brownie…nothing, without rolled eyes and talking under their breath. It takes my wife about three months to get it thru her hear that I don’t want to eat certain things.
In other words, I make good choices all day, and fight the will of everyone else (not even my own willpower against me…it is me against them!!!)…and I am exhausted.
People, if they can form any type of group, will seek out people different from the group and drive them bonkers. Around my in-laws, their ‘group’ is overweight people who know everythig about points/fats/carbs and all they do is preach to me, the one fit guy in their whole borderline diabetic life.
Some people need to eat alot, need to be overweight…and I don’t care. But drift from any group idea of the norm, and watch out.
I don’t diet, I fight with everyone!
Who said “big ol’ fat belly”? Um, that would be YOU, not me. A small, round tummy does NOT EQUAL a big fat ol’ belly, and screw you for saying so, actually. Many, many women, even those who are in good shape, have natural fat deposit there, because it’s normal for women to have some fat on their bodies. You can’t menstruate (and therefor are not “healthy” enough to reproduce) if you have no body fat.
Why on earth would I take YOUR word for it? She’s a personal trainer and she works will all different body types. You obviously live in an entirely different body from mine. This body has ALWAYS had a pot belly, even when I was a small child and was stick-like in every other way and always the smallest kid in the class. It’s just how I’m built and it’s NORMAL for me, but it would definitely disqualify me from being an underwear model.
When this personal trainer tells me that my fat pad on my belly is something that will probably not go away unless I put in a level of effort that would probably kill me, I’m going to take her word for it. I do not have to have a zero body fat index to be normal or in shape.
More power to ya. At least you’re not trying to say that you should be sporting D-cups.
WTF is up with you people, putting words in everyone’s mouth? Who ever said thin wasn’t “in”? Self-acceptance is what’s “in,” so if you’re trying to eat healthy and get moderate exercise, you should feel good about however you look. For a lot of people, Jessica Simpson or Laila Ali is just not possible, and those women should be SOME possibilities, not the ONLY possibilities for what’s OK for a woman.
Your focus on what’s “normal” does seem to betray a certain contempt for skinny folk. You may not be deliberately putting that contempt out there, but it certainly does sound that way in some of your posts.
Daniel
This isn’t the first time I’ve heard a very thin person express this, and while it seems logical, it doesn’t really ring true. I don’t think those that are too thin will ever be villified like the overweight are. I do think being underweight would be much more problematic for a man than a woman, but it still doesn’t compare with the stigma of obesity.
I’m pretty average but because I’m petite, five pounds in either direction can make a noticeable difference. A couple of years ago I lost about 15 pounds in a very short time due to some medication I started taking. All that people at work could talk about was how thin I was getting. CONSTANTLY. We’re talkin’ people I barely knew. Ya know what? I liked it. I liked it a lot. Again, I was not fat to begin with, but once I got sickly thin, I got compliments left and right from the men and “if you get any thinner you’ll disappear” comments from the woman.
So, to sum up my shameless hijack, I understood for a brief moment what it’s like to be “too thin” and the nervous breakdown that I was experiencing aside, it’s nothing like feeling fat (whether you actually are or not). It’s also kind of disheartening to think that people thought I looked my best when I was absolutely at the lowest point in my life 
On the one hand, you’re right: our society stigmatizes overweight more than it stigmatizes underweight, no question.
Several points, however:
- You learned what it was like to be thin briefly. You didn’t learn what it was like to be thin all your life. It sounds as if, previous to that, you’d struggled with your weight; therefore, comments that an always-thin person might find irritating, invasive, and passive-aggressive just sounded to you like compliments.
- Some thin folks are naturally thin, while others are thin because of eating disorders. Some fat folks are naturally fat, while others are fat because of eating disorders. If you’re not my doctor, you don’t need to be speculating on the reasons for my body size: it’s none of your business.
- When a group feels they’re being oppressed, it’s absolutely to their advantage to adopt a standard of scrupulous fairness, to show other folks how they want to be treated, to golden-rulify their actions. When a fat person makes snide comments about a thin person’s size, it’s difficult for anyone to take them seriously when they complain about someone making snide comments about their size. It’s simple strategy: you want to win in the court of public opinion or not?
Daniel
Amen, sister.