Ok, so it's come to my attention that there are people who think thin shaming exists in opposition to fat shaming. I do not agree, and I want to talk about it.

For one thing, I am hearing a lot of defensiveness when we, as fat people, try to discuss our experiences. And there are people who are claiming that just by talking about fat positivity, we are thin shaming people.

"I don't like what you are talking about and I want to you stop, otherwise you are the bad one, for making me feel bad."-- This is what I'm hearing here.

So. Let me walk you through it.

There are systems of oppression that lift some people up and shove other people down. Almost everyone has some ways in which they are raised up and other ways in which they are shoved down.

This is called intersectionality.

So here is another list of things that are not the subject of systemic oppression/discrimination--

White people, men, straight people, cis gendered people, Christians in America, rich people, etc.

You can't be discriminated against if you are in the group with the power.

We have watered down the definition of discrimination so much that people think if they perceive that a gay person or person or color or non-Christian (etc.) is mean to them, that means that they are now the legit victims of discrimination or oppression.

Or to put it another way, and paraphrase prominent atheist, Matt Dillahunty-- "If I see you beating someone with a stick, and I take your stick away, I'm not oppressing you."

Ok, but almost every woman in the world has stories about how they were made to feel shamed about their bodies, and many of these stories are women who have been mocked or shamed for being too thin or "skinny" or called anorexic, or for losing weight.

Am I trying to say that these things don't happen? No. Absolutely not. I know that this happens, and it is very painful for the women at the receiving end of it.

But it's still not thin shaming. I propose that it is mostly misogyny. Society sets women up to compete with each other for the attention of men. And if being thinner is considered more attractive (and we all know it is), then some women will respond in a competitive and angry way at the women who are winning the body wars.

Why would individual men need to oppress individual women when we are so very willing to do it ourselves by internalizing the culture's misogyny and enforcing it on other women?

Hence-- body policing.

This obsession with forcing everyone's body into a mold that almost no one can ever fit is very convenient for the ruling class. Almost no one cares about what they do, while everyone is expected to perform the required rituals of dieting. And if people destroy themselves through weight cycling and eating disorders, why should they care?

Which brings me back to the point at hand. Fat people are not able to shame thin people. We would have to have some sort of power in this equation, and as it stands-- in the war over people's bodies-- we have none.

For thin shaming to exist, fat people would have to be ascendant, and we clearly are not. So therefore, thin shaming is not real. You are thinking of misogyny and enforced gender roles.