A call to arms: "Go up not down. Get strong, not skinny."

By RAGE GRRL

F*ck Bethenny Frankel.

If you don’t know who I’m talking about, consider yourself a better person than me.

That woman’s whole existence is ridiculous– her meteoric rise from the ranks of that television show, the Real Housewives of New York to her current role as some sort of diet/lifestyle mogul.

In case you couldn’t figure it out for yourself, let me tell you; she’s a traitor to all of woman kind, the worst kind of person imaginable. She’s made a career out of cultifying skinniness.

When I see her hawking her line of Skinny Girl Margarita Mix or whatever it is, I want to vomit. I think, “Is this what you want for your daughters America? Cheap, booze and slim hips?” Screw that. I deserve a real-ass margarita. With sugar. I deserve to put  butter in it if I want to because I worked all day.

It’s a sick obsession, this over-concern women have with their body size. I’m not writing anything new here, I know that. But maybe you need somebody to tell you again.

Stop thinking about your body size. Just fucking stop. Think about something else instead. Think about a little kid in Africa who doesn’t have a

Think about some girl having to hide her pregnancy from her parents and she can’t afford an abortion and she’s got no place to go. Think about the fact that the planet is warming and soon there won’t be any  POLAR BEARS!

In less than 50 years THERE WILL BE NO POLAR BEARS! You just read that and I bet right after you thought, “I know, but if I could just lose this last 10 pounds…”  Wake up!

Look, I’m not giving you the permission to sit in front of the television watching socially progressive documentaries and spoon mayonnaise into your mouth, no, don’t do that. If you really are fat, the legit kind of fat where you can’t put on your shoes or fit in a seat on an airplane, that sucks. Lose weight.

Stop eating junk and get off your ass. That last sentence was 8 words long. The weight loss industry made 20 billion dollars last year selling Americans (and Australians) countless, useless permutations of that 8-word sentence. Stop eating junk and get off your ass.

If you have kids, raise your kids. Run after them until you’re not fat anymore. If you don’t have kids, volunteer at a place where you’ll be forced to do something with your body, then do whatever that thing is until you’re not fat anymore. Try not to buy terrible, poison processed food all the time.

There, voila. I’m a weight-loss guru.

But, even if you’re not fat, if you’re a woman, you’re probably still so caught up with your toxic weight sh*t that you can’t even see straight. During my working life I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been part of these ridiculous workplace group diets.

Almost all of the participants have been women. Sometimes they even try to bribe one another with money. They all put in ten dollars on the first week and whoever loses the most wins the pool at the end of 4 months, or whatever it is.

Look, I’m like you. I’ve done it too. And at a perfectly normal, healthy weight I’ve done it. All because of an ugly little voice in the back of my head that tells me I ought to be smaller.

And that’s the rub, right there. Exactly why do we want to be smaller? What exactly is the appeal of being smaller? How does it benefit us? Does it make us better mothers? Better students? Better lovers? Better artists? Scientists? Friends? Does it make us more badass badasses?

No, no, no, no, no. You must see that it doesn’t. It doesn’t do anything but make us smaller.

Babies and puppies are small.  So are dimes and Skittles.  You’re a fucking woman. A woman! You are entitled to occupy as much fucking space as you like with your awesomeness, and you better be suspicious as fuck of anybody who tells you differently.

Why, ladies? Why must we continue to whittle ourselves down? Who is it for? What is it for? You can walk through a certain aisle at the pharmacy or at the grocery store and see the language of diminishment all over the packaging for weight loss aids of all kinds. “Shrink your waist.” “Lose inches off your thighs.” “Slim down.” “Get skinny.”

How about “Grow your mind.” “Increase your confidence and productivity.” “Beef up your knowledge.” “Enlarge your scope of arsekicking.” ?

That’s a valid message for women and girls: grow, expand, branch out, open up, get bigger, wider, faster, stronger, better, smarter. Go up not down. Get strong, not skinny.

Language affects our thinking whether we like it or not. Every time we tell ourselves, “I’ve gotta get down to a size whatever,” or “I’ve got to get rid of this gut,” we discount who we are RIGHT NOW.

And f*ck that shit. Who we are right now is okay. Instead of encouraging ourselves and other women to get smaller, we ought to be focusing on what will make us better. Better. Not smaller.

You are not here to get smaller. You are not here to have a thin waist and thighs. You are not here to disappear. You’re here to change the world! Change the world, then! Forget about “losing a few kilos.”

Think about what you could be gaining instead.

Think about the possibilities, we could be so much greater, so much more powerful if we refocused our energies. So stop this nonsense with the Slim Fast shakes and the diet pills or whatever. CUT THAT F*CKING NONSENSE OUT. Get out there and learn and grow and be amazing.

Accomplish something real, right now. Don’t wait until you reach your super-wack “goal weight” which no longer has any bearing on real life probably. Your gratification, your happiness and your unconditional acceptance of yourself will do something for you that dieting never will: it will set you free and unlock your true potential.

You’re more than your weight, please remember that. And the irony of all this is, you probably look way hot right now. I bet I would totally do you.

This piece was originally published on Ladybud, and is republished here with full permission. You can find Ladybud on Facebook here. 

Rage Grrl is the vitriolic alter ego of a relatively mild-mannered New Jersey woman. She’s pretty sure that if you’re not mad, you’re not fucking paying attention.