Miss-Anthropist
General Manager
Hear me out and please read in full before you comment.
I understand that being skinny is a white beauty standard but how is that applicable to me as a black woman? Who will never be white or seen as white (and has no intention in doing so) irrespective of my weight, how I do my hair, talk or carry myself? And more importantly why would or should a white beauty standard matter to me as a black woman who wishes to assimilate with her own people?
So how does it work?
I say this because of 2 things; my life experience as a skinny black woman and the way other skinny black women are treated in popular media.
I've been bullied over my shape and pretty much have to cover up unless I want someone to say something. I don't receive special privilege for being thin in fact I get a lot of backlash from it. My weight is a significant part of my life it's just that the insults are catered to my frame.
There are 3 main things I go experience as skinny woman that I notice other skinny women go through in general
Which are;
- Infantilization - being treated like and/or physically compared to a child or adolescent female by lack of display of secondary xes characteristics (big breasts, big hips, ect.)
- Desexualisation - Told you look stiff, frigid or awkward. Told xes with you wouldn't be pleasant because of your small breasts or buttocks. Told you don't look sexy or that your body isn't sensual. Body is compared to planks, twigs and various other objects
(Look at when Zendaya done Malcom and Marie, the amount of people saying they couldn't take her seriously or that the relationship between her and John was pedophilic esque or made them uncomfortable. But why when she's an adult female?)
- Masculinisation - being compared to male physique. Being told you don't look like a woman or that you aren't feminine despite presenting as female or expressing feminity in style or appearance.
(countless videos from black women on TikTok talking about how men like to say that Megan Thee Stallion is a man even though Zendaya is the same height and doesn't recieve the same vitriol, even though her body is "more masculine". And the funniest thing about that was on one of those videos (because there's multiple) the user actually mentioned that Amber Rose is also the same height as the both of them yet they only focused on Zendaya. Wouldn't it have made more sense to talk about Amber Rose seeing as they have the same body type and appeal to the same audience?)
And also
- being told you look sick/have a disease/ that you're dying
- being compared to a drug addict or people assuming you have a substance abuse issue
- people assuming you have an eating disorder or asking you if you have one
I don't understand how you can call a skinny woman masculine because she "doesn't have a shape" in one breath then peddle thin privilege in another?
Especially in a community that's renowned for uplifting curvy women? I guess the rest of us black women who don't fit are supposed to go fµck ourselves? Because no ones rooting for us like that.
I look at Nicole TV and whilst she's successful she has to practically turn herself into a joke and a caricature just to get recognition and it makes me so upset because I know if she was a normal weight she wouldn't have to do all that.
And yet despite the fact that she's confident people practically fight over themselves to call her ugly and body shame her. I don't think it's far fetched that a significant portion of her audience are laughing at her and I'm sure she knows it too given this heartfelt Instagram post.
Look up apetamin on YouTube and you'll see thousands of videos of black females (because some of them are teens) taking this unregulated substance just to be seen as feminine, desirable ect.
You can't say that femininity has nothing to do with being a woman then laugh at and shame other women who don't fit the mould of that same femininity. It doesn't make sense.
Other women have often made me feel very alienated from them because of the way that they talk about my body, from my friend that was struggling with her weight making digs at me ( I often have a strange relationship with women like this as they both idolise and diss me. Say they wish they were smaller but not like me), to people comparing me to a guy which I don't like because I'm very feminine and enjoy feminity. Just too many things happening to list here. It just makes me not want to be around people at all.
What people don't understand is that when it comes to beauty it's all about proportions whether it's body weight, height or facial features ect. I've always said that these things exist on a bell curve, and that when you go to the extreme ends of that spectrum you will see that level of attraction drops, whether it's that you're super skinny or super large.
When people talk about "thin privilege" they actually mean people that have an average or "normal" body weight, people in the middle of the spectrum. That's just life, that's how beauty as a whole works, which is why people who's eyes are too far apart are viewed as unattractive or weird looking. There's a bell curve to everything.
I understand that being skinny is a white beauty standard but how is that applicable to me as a black woman? Who will never be white or seen as white (and has no intention in doing so) irrespective of my weight, how I do my hair, talk or carry myself? And more importantly why would or should a white beauty standard matter to me as a black woman who wishes to assimilate with her own people?
So how does it work?
I say this because of 2 things; my life experience as a skinny black woman and the way other skinny black women are treated in popular media.
I've been bullied over my shape and pretty much have to cover up unless I want someone to say something. I don't receive special privilege for being thin in fact I get a lot of backlash from it. My weight is a significant part of my life it's just that the insults are catered to my frame.
There are 3 main things I go experience as skinny woman that I notice other skinny women go through in general
Which are;
- Infantilization - being treated like and/or physically compared to a child or adolescent female by lack of display of secondary xes characteristics (big breasts, big hips, ect.)
- Desexualisation - Told you look stiff, frigid or awkward. Told xes with you wouldn't be pleasant because of your small breasts or buttocks. Told you don't look sexy or that your body isn't sensual. Body is compared to planks, twigs and various other objects
(Look at when Zendaya done Malcom and Marie, the amount of people saying they couldn't take her seriously or that the relationship between her and John was pedophilic esque or made them uncomfortable. But why when she's an adult female?)
- Masculinisation - being compared to male physique. Being told you don't look like a woman or that you aren't feminine despite presenting as female or expressing feminity in style or appearance.
(countless videos from black women on TikTok talking about how men like to say that Megan Thee Stallion is a man even though Zendaya is the same height and doesn't recieve the same vitriol, even though her body is "more masculine". And the funniest thing about that was on one of those videos (because there's multiple) the user actually mentioned that Amber Rose is also the same height as the both of them yet they only focused on Zendaya. Wouldn't it have made more sense to talk about Amber Rose seeing as they have the same body type and appeal to the same audience?)
And also
- being told you look sick/have a disease/ that you're dying
- being compared to a drug addict or people assuming you have a substance abuse issue
- people assuming you have an eating disorder or asking you if you have one
I don't understand how you can call a skinny woman masculine because she "doesn't have a shape" in one breath then peddle thin privilege in another?
Especially in a community that's renowned for uplifting curvy women? I guess the rest of us black women who don't fit are supposed to go fµck ourselves? Because no ones rooting for us like that.
I look at Nicole TV and whilst she's successful she has to practically turn herself into a joke and a caricature just to get recognition and it makes me so upset because I know if she was a normal weight she wouldn't have to do all that.
And yet despite the fact that she's confident people practically fight over themselves to call her ugly and body shame her. I don't think it's far fetched that a significant portion of her audience are laughing at her and I'm sure she knows it too given this heartfelt Instagram post.
Look up apetamin on YouTube and you'll see thousands of videos of black females (because some of them are teens) taking this unregulated substance just to be seen as feminine, desirable ect.
You can't say that femininity has nothing to do with being a woman then laugh at and shame other women who don't fit the mould of that same femininity. It doesn't make sense.
Other women have often made me feel very alienated from them because of the way that they talk about my body, from my friend that was struggling with her weight making digs at me ( I often have a strange relationship with women like this as they both idolise and diss me. Say they wish they were smaller but not like me), to people comparing me to a guy which I don't like because I'm very feminine and enjoy feminity. Just too many things happening to list here. It just makes me not want to be around people at all.
What people don't understand is that when it comes to beauty it's all about proportions whether it's body weight, height or facial features ect. I've always said that these things exist on a bell curve, and that when you go to the extreme ends of that spectrum you will see that level of attraction drops, whether it's that you're super skinny or super large.
When people talk about "thin privilege" they actually mean people that have an average or "normal" body weight, people in the middle of the spectrum. That's just life, that's how beauty as a whole works, which is why people who's eyes are too far apart are viewed as unattractive or weird looking. There's a bell curve to everything.
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