In a post a few down from this one, a poor unhinged man is hiding behind an alias and hurling invective at me and some others because we criticized something he wrote for The Huffington Post.
His biggest card to play–this man in his fifties–is to call me “fat”.
The thing he may not realise is that (as I may have said here before) I do NOT consider being called fat an insult. I am fat. If you were trying to describe me to the cops or pick me out of a crowd it is simply the most easy descriptor. I have brown hair with some gray bits scattered in, but so do many other people. My clothes change from day to day. I’m five and a halfish feet tall, but if you don’t have a yardstick that may not do you much good.
I don’t know when Fatty Fatty Fat Fat ceased to be something that upset me and started becoming something as neutral as “she’s wearing a black sweatshirt with a dog on it”. But it happened many many years ago. I started to realise that I’m fat the way some people have darker skin. It’s just a sort of way in which we are who we are. Other folks are bothered by it. Other folks use it as an excuse to treat us poorly. Sadly, while it may cost us a job opportunity or a date or a good rate on a car loan in the long run it reveals more about the person who uses it as an insult than it does about us.
So while this man–in his fifties–continues to employee grade school tactics of rhetoric I decided I’d just take a moment here to make this clear in case someone else thinks they’ll reduce me to a state of dithering by pointing out one of the more basic facts about me.
What does make me sad? When people point out ways in which I’ve failed as a person. Ways in which I’ve been unkind. A few years ago a woman who knew me not at all said in a very public forum that I was not self-aware and that she didn’t like me. That still wounds me to think about. Mostly because I’m not sure how much more self-aware I, a professional navel-gazer, should become to please others and still not drown in narcissism. Other times folks have rightly pointed out the meanness and sharp tongue that can be my greatest stumbling block. I am ashamed of the way I have mistreated people. I am not ashamed of the way I look or the size of pants I wear.
You have the best trolls, I swear.
^seriously.
Now, where are the marshmallows…?
Hey, I’m kinda proud to have an unhinged published author with mother issues trolling here.
It’s a lot better than Freepers or Kos people.
Well, maybe not “better” but at least “more quirky”.
Hey, holly, have a square o’ chocolate and a couple of graham crackers. *passes food to fellow commenter* This should be interesting. ;o)
So I just really read the entire post. Wow, Kat. Amen. That’s the sort of thing we should dislike about ourselves — our sinfulness and how it hurts/harms others and offends God. And you’ve done a bit to help set me free from my “woe is me, I’m a plus-size gal” cryin’ into my own navel. The extra fat on me is not really pretty, but what is horrific is my flesh nature that can be very mean, selfish, lazy, stupid, hateful, prideful.
More good reason to rejoice in the season — ’cause the Savior I needed did come to pay the penalty He didn’t owe, a penalty I owed that I couldn’t pay.
Thanks for the reminder, sister. Press on!!
what is that saying… something to the effect of “the things we loathe in others are the things we loathe most within ourselves” — is that how it goes?
It wouldn’t bother me either – sticks and stones. But I will point out that a person whose best comback is “you’re fat” says much more about the person saying it, than the person at whom it is aimed.
(And Aunt B’s comment made me laugh out loud – I scared the cat)
Intended as an insult, it is a pretty weak one. I recall that scene from Steve Martin’s Roxanne: “I give you this and all you can come up with is big nose?”
Your troll should buy the Shakespeare Book of Insults for perusal. There are some real gems in those pages.