"You Look Disgusting"

I don't wear makeup. 

I mean, I own makeup and on special occasions I may throw on a little bit but for the most part I don't wear makeup. It's not a political statement, it's not a giant fuck you to people who wear makeup to feel good about themselves; I just don't like wearing it. 

I know that I've, not come under attack, but had comments shot my way that, while seemingly well-meaning, aren't. 

"You know concealer would cover that right up?" 
"You're never too young to start thinking about wrinkles.."
"You can cover up the fact you look really tired really easy."

I used to slap on makeup to cover up zits and cover up when I got way too little sleep but eventually (and mostly out of the want to get some more sleep in the morning) I just couldn't be bothered. I honestly abide by the thinking that I wasn't put in this world to impress people with my looks and in the grand scheme of things I have more important things to think about than what's going on (or not going on) my face. 

I think that people are really quick, especially with women, to jump down their throats for everything. There's a beauty blogger, Em Ford, who went without makeup for three months and it that three months was at the complete mercy of how crappy people can be when they see things they don't like. When she did start wearing makeup again she was privy to the shit storm that was the opposite end of the spectrum. 

Basically, it came down to she was disgusting to look at without makeup on and had 0 self-respect when she did wear makeup. 

Makeup is this giant polarized issue that seems to always dictate what political agenda you have and is basically up there with choosing not to shave. On one hand, if you're someone who likes wearing makeup you're obviously fake, an anti-feminist and hate women. On the other side, if you don't wear makeup you've given up, you've let yourself go or you're a radical feminist. What if I just am too lazy to get up 30 minutes earlier to put on my face? What if, and this is a big one people, I just don't want to wear makeup?

What the fuck is wrong with people? Seriously, in the grand scheme of things who gives a flying fuck whether or not someone wears makeup to feel good in their skin? In what way does the someone wearing/not wearing makeup affect you, your life or your existence? It doesn't! The simplest solution if someone else's appearance bothers you is to look away and continue to live your life, which a lot of people seem absolutely incapable of doing. The way that someone else looks literally has the smallest impact on your life because you are entirely in control of just not looking at them. You are responsible for your own happiness and if the way someone looks is impacting your happiness it's sure as hell not their fault! 

Basically, what I'm trying to get at is stop making physical imperfection the pinnacle of someone's existence. They weren't put in the world to be pleasing to your eyes. Don't point out their flaws first, if I have giant dark circles under my eyes please don't point out the fact that I look tired. I know I look tired, it's because I am tired. We know we our faces are breaking out, we know we look tired, we know we have wrinkles. Our acceptance, my acceptance of my physical flaws in no way impacts your life, happiness or perception of beauty. 

I am fat and happy

I've had this post in unpublished status for awhile, mostly because I wasn't quite sure how to end it off or where I was going with it. That was until the total babe Tess Munster AKA Holliday took the world by storm being the first size-22 model to make it big. 

When I first read about her success as a model I was super excited. There is someone who doesn't fit the typical thin, pretty, flat-stomached model mold. While I'm all about the plus sized models and diversity in body types, plus size models seem to have a very similar body shape - very hourglass, flat stomach. For lack of a better term or explanation the modeling industry has now gone ahead and created an "acceptable" amount of fat that is still considered attractive. 

Enter Holliday - not flat stomached, rocking the non-conventional hourglass who is blowing up the modelling world. 

And the world is pissed.

Why? Because this woman is happy with her body. She thinks that her size 22 body is glorious - and it is! She is the embodiment of what makes people uncomfortable and unhappy. She's a size 22, successful and happy woman breaking the conventional mold of happy women. 

I was reading through some of the comments and filtering out the blind hate one notion or theme kept coming up. People are ticked off and think that this woman is glorifying obesity and being unhealthy. I feel like many people (although this seems to be starting to shift slowly) still live by this Biggest Loser/before picture mentality. If you're not skinny or "appropriately" curvy you are a before picture. You should automatically feel the need to change the way that you look because you can't be happy with the way you are.

I've had this idea reinforced in many places of my life. The most memorable was actually when I was going through the sign up process to go to a gym in Toronto. The trainer there kept busting out the "you'll look better, you'll find love because you'll look better, you'll love going to the beach and wearing bikinis" sales pitch.

I felt the need to shut him down right there - Excuse me, but I am confident. I am already deserving of love looking the way I do and I already love going to the beach - in a bikini - because I love my body. I got the polite almost "yes yes dear" brush off which frustrated me. I just couldn't understand why this person couldn't understand that I was at a gym to increase my fitness level - not decrease my waistline. My want to just get fitter physically had me whitewashed as a before picture because I didn't fit this person's mold of a confident person. 

I think it makes people who buy into this confident, perfect body type pissed when someone doesn't put in the work (dieting, working out, limiting to maintain the perfect body) and gets the result (loving their body, accepting their body). It makes people really fucking pissed when that happens and in turn they lash out with negative comments about glorifying being unhealthy.

The thing is - happiness, self-respect and self-love don't glorify anything. My shameless self-love doesn't glorify anything but body positivity. It doesn't glorify health issues, it doesn't glorify being unhealthy. You don't have to hate your body to want to improve it you can still absolutely love yourself while changing your body. Because my body doesn't fit the traditional perfect body image it's automatically assumed that I hate it, and that makes people feel better. They work hard for their socially-accepted looks, of course it makes them feel better when we hate the way we look.

It makes people angry, it makes people upset, it confuses people, but the thing is - my body is not responsible for anyone's happiness but my own. 

My body and I are not responsible for your personal happiness.

Fat shame.

I am fat. 
I am. I have fat in my stomach, thighs and definitely my ass. I am fat.
I'm not looking for people to tell me, "no, you're not". I am. 

Society, media have all instilled in us that fat is a bad word. To have fat is bad. To be fat is worse. Fat shame is becoming an ever present issue in the world and is completely alike to bullying. The word fat has a negative connotation right from the get go. Seeing some fat on you in the mirror people automatically go, oh man I have to diet and work out and get rid of all this fat so I can look good again.

People can look good with fat, I know it's a very foreign concept, but just as women can look gorgeous thin, they can look gorgeous curvy, and yes, fat. 

Lovin' the fat
Nude painting by Alex Polak

Around two weeks ago, some random man standing by me on the corner of Dundas and University, looked at me and said, "wow you're fucking fat, you must have a lot of health problems, thank god I'm not as fat as you." People turned and looked at me, to see what my reaction would be. Instead of full on freaking out like I wanted to, I just settled for a simple, "Nope, no health problems, thank you for your concern, and somehow as fat as I am, I still manage to be better looking than you." 

There's this connotation with having fat and being fat that automatically means that you're disgusting and a slob. Yes, fine, I'll admit it, I don't always do my dishes right away (sorry Mom). As for being disgusting and a slob? Not so much. The way that we look seems to dictate how people feel we live our lives. Take me for example:

Ignoring the outfit, I am fat. I wear a size 18/20 - which is not something that I am ashamed of. Based on the size of clothing I wear people have determined that I am lazy, I'm a slob, I'm disgusting, I'm a pig and I must eat a terrible diet of junk food and processed crap. 

Actually, you couldn't be more wrong. I walk for huge portions of the day and love it. I'm not a slob or disgusting and I'm not a pig. I don't eat a terrible diet of processed foods and crap all the time. Despite all of that, this is my body type and I am not ashamed. 

There are people, a lot of people, who will turn around and say that because you are fat you need to be ashamed. Why? Why does fat have to be such a negative word? I believe that we need to take back the word fat, take it back and turn it into just another descriptive word, like brown haired, green eyes, that birthmark there, thin. 

So, don't be offended when people call you fat. Don't take it like an insult that only reinforces this word as such a negative one. When we stop giving the word fat the power to have such a negative impact on our lives, we stop giving these asshats power over us. I think that everyone should strive for a healthy lifestyle but sometimes life gets hard. Sometimes life gets hard and not all of us are strong enough to be perfectly healthy and happy all the time, sometimes we slip. We are human.