From: avery@netcom.com (Avery Ray Colter)
Subject: Re: Hiding one's preferences (was Re: CHOOSING to be attracted to someone)
Date: Sat, 12 Sep 92 07:20:04 GMT
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services  (408 241-9760 guest) 
Distribution: usa

stef@Apple.COM (Stef Jones) writes:

>What were these people trying to gain by discouraging you from liking "fat
>girls"? I've gotten the impression from my experience that many men are 
>attracted to fat women, but feel the need to be secretive or dismissive 
>about it. That is, they enjoy sexual contact and friendship with a fat
>woman but don't want to be perceived as being in a relationship with one.

I don't know what they were trying to gain. I don't think they themselves
knew. They were just following and propogating this rule they thought had
to be followed to the letter by everyone. It was only a few schoolmates
actually who got on my case real intensively, but after a few futile months
of "ignore them and they'll go away", I turned to militance, which seemed
to work better at least for getting them out of my face.

>So where is the pressure coming from? If so many men are indeed attracted 
>to fat women, how did this attraction get driven underground; by whom or 
>what; to what end?

From my experience, "guilt by association" was at the core of it all.
I've often described the process as being "fascist" in nature, and I still
think that's a pretty accurate description. The reason I was able to mount
my own defenses pretty quickly was that even at that age, I recognized
"Nazi tactics" when I saw them.

The pressure I think ultimately came from the same media and the same
weight loss industry which directly attack fat people themselves. The
thing is, these institutions, at least at the time I was going through
adolescence, was pretty much shutting fat people out of any positive
imagery, including sexual imagery. The claim that "men don't like fat women"
is the really centrally hurtful one. Not only does it send fat girls into
despair, but it leads boys who find they have eyes for fat girls to question
their identity. "Does that mean I'm not a man?"

To what end? For those who profit from making fat people obsessed with
reduction, it is obviously to their benefit to drive a wedge between
fat people and their preferents by any means necessary; and my honest
perception is that they don't give a damn how much hurt that causes.

So it came to pass that men would feel it was some dark taboo to be
really interested in a large women, that to do so was categorically
radical and anti-establishment. That's why a lot of the men who don't
go for the "secrecy" thing tend instead to be all the way on the opposite
end, very vocal and expressive about it - because they're anti-establishment
types already in other ways.

>Disclaimer: I do not think this is true for all men. It is just a pattern I
>noticed in my life for a while (fortunately, not recently).

Oh well, I've heard women complaining that men seem attracted to them
but act secretive or dismissive. When I first heard that, I thought I
had it made - after all, all I had to do was tap into my already healthy
vocality and be open and affirmative. Alas, all that seems to have done
is scare a lot of wonderful women away from me, with the only consolation
being the few truly strong women who can take what they've asked for.
But then, it still might be for the better - it's a great way of finding
out something of the inside mind and personality of a woman, is it not?

I guess I place a lot of emphasis, rather than on just body or just mind,
on the mind-body interface of a person. To me, body image is a very critical
part of someone's personality - it's state has a lot to say about how well
the person's inside and outside cooperate. So a lot of what I do when I start
looking into personality is to tap into a woman's body image and see what I
find. It is pretty scary territory sometimes, but the scary parts are the
one's that really have to be seen.


-- 
Avery Ray Colter ("Elfcat") - 	avery@netcom.netcom.com (IP 192.100.81.100)
(510) 656-1902          	{elfcat|arcolter}@aol.com
"Heaviness is the root of lightness; calmness is the controller of haste"
Newsgroups: alt.support.big-folks