Skinny

I don't know why I'm still explaining my blog- "I don't think it's a fashion blog", "I don't want it to be my public journal", "I don't want it to be too serious"- as if anyone reading this needs me to explain that I'm pretty much going to write whatever I want sans filter.  So I'm NOT going to preface this post with "I really don't want to rant about this" dot. dot. dot.

When CLEARLY I DO.

Because I am so sick of the drive to be thin.

As if there is no nobler goal for women alive today but than to be a single digit size.  Below the number six.  I know I know, how many times and by how many people have we heard this argument?  We're just one more pseudo-lesbian group away from being a generation of surly old maids, right? Except we're not.  We're still shopping at Victoria's Secret and wanting Gisele's ass.

I'm not a feminist.  Or shit, maybe I am- because I don't even know what it means to be a feminist.  Does it mean that I think every woman is more than a firm set of tits and a waist small enough to fit a dog collar around?  Well pardon me while I burn my bra and braid my armpit hair. What I do know is that I never again want to envy a supermodels body.  I never want to see another set of protruding hips, or another face photo shopped to the point of being WITHOUT PORES. What has brought me to this state of outrage is the labeling of inanimate objects as "skinny". It's a dangerous game- calling things "skinny". Skinny lattes, skinny jeans. Placing the word "skinny" in front of something does not in fact lead to thinness. All it leads to is a continued assurance that our society is obsessed with weight. Please recognize that wearing skinny jeans changes nothing about your legs and ordering "skinny milk" makes me cringe because it is nothing of the sort. It's non-fat milk and you know what else is non-fat?  Candy. Tons and tons of candy. Which also, WILL NOT MAKE YOU SKINNY. A food that is void of fat does not mean that it won't turn to fat in your body. So it's dangerous to wave this word out in front of us as if it offers some sort of protection to ward off fat. As if fat is the worst thing we could be. 

It is dangerous to be so vulnerable as to think that we are only bodies.

I'm not suggesting that we disregard out health- quite the contrary. And I'm not proposing an agenda in which Rosie the Riveter is our mascot into the world of female-dominant leadership. All I mean to say is that thinness, being skinny and the pursuit of it, is wasting my time. Of all the things I love, enjoy, am passionate about- I couldn't ever say that the pursuit of thinness is one of them. In fact it makes me miserable. Is making me miserable. And let's be real, I'm not alone.

I'm not giving up my femininity or my health. I'm not giving up my self-respect or my desire to be attractive.  But I am giving up on skinny. Because I believe that my value is not measured by the circumference of my waist of the length of my legs in inches.  And if my value could have a numerical form, it would always be higher than my number on the scale.