Fatpropriation

[Content Note: Fat hatred; lookism; bullying; eliminationism.]

So, many years ago, Abercrombie & Fitch CEO Mike Jeffries did an interview with Salon all about how the brand is for young, thin, attractive people. It's one of those interviews that's a classic in fat-hating among the fat activist community, but it recently started getting more widespread attention. At Forbes, Barbara Thau traces how Jeffries' old comments found new life and went viral recently after "Business Insider quoted Robin Lewis, co-author of The New Rules of Retail and CEO of newsletter The Robin Report, weigh[ing] in on Jeffries' 7-year old remarks, saying, 'He doesn't want larger people shopping in his store.'" Thau notes:

The story went viral, and all manner of protests unfurled. A video of a man handing out A&F clothing to homeless people blew up on YouTube. The Blog The Militant Baker whipped up "Attractive & Fat," a mock Abercrombie ad campaign showcasing a heavy model wearing the retailer's clothes.

Then celebrities like Ellen DeGeneres and Kirstie Alley offered up their contempt for the chain's anti full-figured ways.

This entire thing has been very interesting for me to watch, for several reasons. As I noted in a conversation mostly with Amadi and femmina on Twitter, I'm rather bitterly amused at the dedicated outrage at A&F, whose chief is merely more outspoken about not having a plus-size line. It would be easier for me to list the designers who do offer a plus-sized line, than the ones who don't. And then there are the retailers, like Old Navy, who offer plus-size lines, but only online, because they don't want fatties uglying up the shop. Do all the people getting angry at A&F think that most other retailers don't treat fat people the same way? Because whoooooooooops they do.

The thing that makes A&F different, at least for many of the people currently jumping on the A&F shaming wagon, is that Mike Jeffries has had a lot of plastic surgery in pursuit of the youthful beauty ideal the brand privileges. And never mind that he's fucked with his face because he has a history of being bullied and disordered eating: He is a perfect target for mockery, by people who want to feign concern about fat people as a cloak to bully him about his appearance.


In the past couple of days, I have seen all kinds of cheers and applause for Ellen Degeneres, whose "Fitch, please!" video includes the admirable line: "As long as you're healthy and you're happy, that's the most important thing." Which would indeed be awesome, if Ellen Degeneres weren't also a prominent celebrity endorser of Jamie Oliver's eliminiationist, fat-hating "OBESITY IS PREVENTABLE" campaign.

Whoops.

Listen, I want allies who call out anti-fat bigtory, but jumping on a really random bandwagon and pretending to be an ally in order to make fun of someone's appearance isn't being an ally. And pretending you're some kind of crusader for tolerance when you're also a supporter of a campaign that literally and explicitly wants to stop people who look like me from existing isn't being an ally. All of that? Is appropriative, opportunistic bullshit.

And where are the cheers and applause for Kirstie Alley, or for the fat people who have been saying this shit about A&F and every other retailer who discriminates against fat people for years? Oh right. We're fat. So who cares what we have to say for and about ourselves.