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Insiders know things. I have never identified as Protestant or Evangelical, but I have intimate ties with both of those communities. For most of my life, they were my primary exposure to the Christian world. As such, I know things that outsiders to Christian culture might not see, and what I am about to share is something we can all relate to as fat activists and as activists in general.

Proestants and Evangelicals have a curious tendency to make everything about them. This mentality is less prominent in the Catholic, Orthodox, and old Proestant (Lutherans, Anglicans, etc.) communities, but it is unfortunately on the rise in those areas as well. People with this mentality are almost exclusively on the extreme right-wing of the thought spectrum. To them, anyone to the left of Torquemada is not a genuine Christian but an atheistic imposter whose sole mission in life is to spread paganism, secularism, and moral relativism (often with no understanding of what those words mean). Everything in the world is judged according to whether it is for or against Christianity, their Christian denomination, or their idea of what their Christian denomination should be. If anything is not explicitly for Christians, it is automatically assumed to be opposed to Christians.

When someone asks you to watch how you speak, it is not the same as asking you to abandon your beliefs. No one is asking you to abandon your belief that Halloween is evil (although I personally wish you would at some point). You are entitled to say, “In my religion/background, Halloween is considered evil and I am concerned about this or that behavior that often happens on Halloween.”

However, if I tell you about my plans for Halloween during small talk about plans for the weekend, that is not the time to go into a towering rant about how much you hate that Satanic holiday Halloween and the degeneracy of the people that like it. (Yes, this actually happened to me last night). It would also be nice for you to LISTEN-not AGREE WITH, but LISTEN-to someone say, no, it is not the Devil’s holiday and we have never used it to hurt anyone. It does not mean the same thing to us that it does for you.

People that promote the separation of church and state* aren’t trying to tell Christians not to practice their faith openly or to influence the culture, nor are they trying to expunge Christianity from the culture in general. People believe in separation of church and state for ALL religions.** They do it because of the many abuses that have occured throughout history when they mix.*** People disagree about how it should be applied-funding for religious institutions, displays of religious symbols in public places, etc. and this is where it gets tricky. I agree that people can be overly politically correct in this area. The principle of separation of church and state in itself was not invented to “oppress” Christianity.

Basically, Christians need to stop entering every exchange and every conflict with the mindset that, “These people are evil and they are out to destroy me because I am Christian and Christians are oppressed.” It’s really not about you all the time.

Increasingly, I am seeing accusations of body policing of thin people by fat activists. Certainly, thin people can experience body policing and it’s not any more fun for them than it is for us. I don’t want people butting into my business, attributing stereotypes to me (a self-centered fashion obsessed teenager trying to look like a model, for example) or calling me names because I am thin. I don’t want people doing anything to me because I am thin because it’s my body.

At the same time, it is not always body policing to criticize someone’s behavior. If someone is shilling for a weight loss company after making a career out of being a role model for young girls, that is worthy of criticism. It is not the fact that she is on a diet that is problematic, but her promotion of that to a vulnerable audience. When a fat activist or plus size model chooses to lose weight or adopt the current obesity paradigm, we are not telling her not to diet. We ARE criticizing her involvement in a culture we feel is destructive and, since they have turned FA into a public platform, we might question what spurred their shift in priorities.

Discussions of healthism, I find, often get derailed into discussions of autonomy. Yes, you have the right to express opinions about health, healthy lifestyles, and their intersection with politics. I have never asked anyone to stop being vegetarian, to stop giving exercise advice, or to stop offering shopping tips to families on WIC or food stamps. I HAVE asked that people re-examine their language for prejudices and stereotypes about poor people when conducting these discussions. I have criticized our culture’s obsession with health and common health icons, like fruits and vegetables, not the desire to enjoy movement or fruits and vegetables. I have criticized the approach that some activists have taken that programs like “Let’s Move” would be good if they did not focus on weight. I do not believe the government should be in the business or promoting or providing incentives for leading the “right” lifestyles.

Naturally, you do not have to share any of the opinions I expressed above, but I will express them and it is not in any way a threat to your autonomy or a criticism of you.

Every now and then, someone will make the rounds of FA blogs and basically criticize fat acceptance for being fat acceptance. They want to talk about how much they hate being fat. They want to discuss a cure for obesity that doesn’t involve dieting or surgery. They don’t BLAME fat people, of course. They just want them to stop being fat because it obviously is an unhealthy, unhappy existence. They want to talk about the “other side” of obesity.

Our culture is full of opportunities of discuss the “other side” of obesity. That “other side” of obesity is all that really gets discussed. It is fat acceptance that is the “other side” of obesity. Because of the near total opposition to our ideas, we have created safe spaces to discuss the positive side of being fat, how to live a satisfying life while fat, and advocating for fat rights as we are. We discuss what it is like to be fat as well as [insert intersectional identity here]. Yet even this is too much for people opposed to FA. We do not do enough to talk about the “other side” of obesity.

Well, guess what. That’s not what we do. That’s not what we’re about. If you want to do that, go someplace else. FA is not for you, apparently, and there is nothing I can do about that. But I am not oppressing you by not allowing you to hijack my blog for a purpose to which I am opposed.

For the record, you do not HAVE to like being fat, disabled, or anything else you happen to be. You don’t have to agree with me or any other FA blogger. You don’t have to do anything, and it’s not my job to live your life for you. I provide options and alternative views. It’s not about “oppressing” you.

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*Yes, Einsteins, I know that the phrase “separation of church and state” does not literally appear at any point in the Constitution. I actually did study American history, American government, and constitutional law, and I still support it. That old trope is American government 101 and it just isn’t as impressive or revolutionary as you think it is.

**Yes, there are, in fact, religions outside of Christianity. They are all equally “oppressed” by church-state separation. No, atheism is not the religion being promoted when religion is removed from the public square. Not everyone who does not adhere to religious practice is an atheist or a humanist.

***Enough of the argument that “Government can’t tell us what to believe or practice, but we can tell the government what our values are!” Just because someone does not ride in on horseback and issue a written decree that a national religion has been established does not mean that government is not interfering with private religious practice. If you influence a government to enshrine your teachings in law, fund your projects, accomodate your holidays, etc. at the expense of other religions and do not give people of other faiths appropriate avenues to challenge those privileges, that is effectively establishing a government religion. If I am Jewish and I want to protest my treatment at work, how am I supposed to do that if everyone in power is Christian and denies all my appeals? If I am a Muslim living in a Christian enclave that is very biased against Muslims, and it becomes common practice to recite Christian prayers, will I be able to sit out without risking my safety? Again, it’s NOT all about you. Enshrining your laws in secular government might make you feel good, but your actions have destructive consequences for other people.

For that matter, no government has ever rode in on horseback and established a religion without the consent and support of a faction of the citizenry. Regardless of who interfered first, government or people pressuring government to “reflect our values,” the result is the same. There is no meaningful difference between the two and it is disingenuous in the extreme to imply otherwise.

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