Fat Shaming vs Skinny Shaming.. Pinacle of Irony

The question in short : Why is it acceptable to skinny shame someone but not acceptable to fat shame someone?

The backstory :

So was at the school gym this afternoon and saw this young lad trying to do dumbbell curls and he was surrounded by a mixed group dishing out so much unnecessary chat (to him). Most of it was like this: "you're so big mate", "wow! huge arms bro", "look at those legs, how much do you lift", "you make us look so small" ... He was skinny in truth but was not enjoying this sarcasm one bit and it didn't help that those dishing were chuckling and one of them even wrapped their arm around his to try and intimidate him further. When one of the girls (who was quite chubby) tried to do the same thing he quickly retracted his arm and she said "come on I just wanna see how big they are" whilst turning to the group and laughing, to which he replied "why don't you hop on the treadmill to try and lose some weight first. And let me do my thing".

*silence/gasp* She stared at him for a few seconds bewildered and then started to cry. A few of her girl friends were trying to comfort her whilst saying how rude and dickish he was for saying that whilst the other guys in the group did the same. They then walked off and spoke to each other about him, loudly so that he could hear .

I witnessed pretty much all of this from about 20 feet away and was totally disgusted; not so much by fact that the lad was getting bullied, but more so by the reaction of the girl and the group who couldn't experience a taste of their own horseshit. Didn't he have all the right to say that after all the abuse he was getting..?

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Reply 1

Arkasia

lmao he destroyed her faster than she would destroy a big mac

Reply 2

teenhorrorstory

Lol the head of sixth form is apparently worried about me because I'm 'too thin.' Yes I'm skinny(I'm a size 6/8) but I don't look at all unhealthy, so I honestly so baffled. Instead of speaking to me directly,they go talking about it behind my back to other teachers.
I was very annoyed because they wouldn't ever talk about a student being 'too fat', yet they think it's acceptable to talk about me being too skinny

Reply 3

TheFarmerLad

Original post by Arkasia

lmao he destroyed her faster than she would destroy a big mac

If I was him I would've said something along those lines :rofl:

Reply 4

Arkasia

Original post by MathsAstronomy12

If I was him I would've said something along those lines :rofl:

Why didn't you stick up for him?

Reply 5

TheFarmerLad

Original post by Arkasia

Why didn't you stick up for him?

If he didn't say that and the abuse continued I would have. In hindsight maybe I should've anyway :frown:

their year was about 2 years below mine as well

Reply 6

SophieSmall

short answer, skinny shaming is no more acceptable than fat shaming. But some people are perpetual victim snow flakes and think they award special illogical treatment

Reply 7

TheFarmerLad

Original post by teenhorrorstory

I think its coz there are more and more fat people around and it has become easier for them to be generally accepted by society as normal :biggrin:

Reply 8

TheFarmerLad

Original post by SophieSmall

short answer, skinny shaming is no more acceptable than fat shaming. But some people are perpetual victim snow flakes and think they award special illogical treatment

Ironic as well from a fitness point of view because it's so much easier to lose fat than it is to gain

savage

Original post by MathsAstronomy12

Ironic as well from a fitness point of view because it's so much easier to lose fat than it is to gain

I assume you mean to gain muscle?

If so, yeah very true.

Honestly I would have laughed so hard hearing him rail into her, she definitely got a taste of her own medicine. Justified/ acceptable or not :tongue:

This stuff annoys me too.

Reply 11

Arkasia

Original post by MathsAstronomy12

If he didn't say that and the abuse continued I would have. In hindsight maybe I should've anyway :frown:

their year was about 2 years below mine as well

Alright, but yeah you probably should've gone over before then.

Reply 12

SophieSmall

Original post by MathsAstronomy12

I think its coz there are more and more fat people around and it has become easier for them to be generally accepted by society as normal :biggrin:

Also true.

It's a depressing fact that most Britons are now overweight.

Reply 13

TheonlyMrsHolmes

Skinny shaming is more acceptable than fat shaming because skinny has been and still is a goal for so many individuals, mostly girls (which explains why the whole "fat acceptance" movement consists of mostly girls), and fat is quite the opposite. That is why.

Both are wrong.

Reply 14

Olie

Yeah, I totally agree, I've always been skinny and in the past have been called things like a stick or told 'you're all skin and bone', and while I wasn't too upset at these comments as I'm only slightly insecure about my appearance, it still really annoyed me that if I had said the equivalent to them like calling them a whale or 'you're all blubber' or something similarly harsh, I would have been heavily criticised and shouted at for it, and rightly so. Neither should be acceptable imo, skinny people can be insecure about their weight too, yet no-one considers that.