1. Your Playstation Made You Fat, and other reductive narratives: Our problem with public health

...e image to embiggen. Reading my RSS feeds yesterday, I ran across a post on Kotaku -- of all places -- about the winner of a design contest by Let’s Move, Michelle Obama’s campaign against "chil...

2. The Pretty: Thoughts on appearance-based privilege

I expect being beautiful is not easy. No, really. I expect people’s assumptions about traditionally-pretty female-presenting humans get tiresome -- if you are good-looking you must be stupid,

3. Marketing with Substance: JetBlue's subtle nod to "passengers of size."

... differently on an actual plane with actual people on either side. Dudes generally don’t think as much about their space as womenfolk do. We’re brought up different. The internalized pressure I ma...

4. Huge, Episode 10: “Regrets, I’ve had a few.”

...ill cannot possibly hate Camp Victory as much as she says, and Will admits, “I don’t hate everything about it. I like the people.” Amber, coyly: “Like Ian?” Whoa. Will shrugs this off, but A...

5. Do Something: Keep body diversity on TV, and support a second season of Huge.

Tonight the season finale of Huge will be aired. Are you bummed about that? All of my protestations about returning to non-recap-centric blogging aside, I am going to miss this show enormously (

6. Friday Playlist: We were much too young.

...suppose some of them are more obvious than others. 1. "Beetlebum" // Blur. I was positively passionate about Britpop in my early twenties -- this was the height of Oasis' popularity, after all. And ...

7. Huge, Episode 9: Standing here on this frozen lake.

...ctive, and b) the fact that men, unlike women, tend not to create spaces in which they can talk honestly about their hypothetical feelings of inadequacy. The fact that women often bond over diets and ...

8. Friday Playlist: All Right, Already

...se, and as I said before I am reluctant to host tracks myself and risk the wrath of the RIAA. I'm bummed about it, but unless anyone else has a new suggestion, I'm at a loss here. 1. "Doing the Unst...

9. ReBlog: It was gnomes.

...en this past February, but is much beloved, both by me and evidently by many of you, if the emails I get about it -- three in the past week alone! -- are any indication. It began with a question on my...

10. Huge, Episode 8: Survive the only way that you know.

...orary) finale. Truth be told, as much as I love recapping, I do look forward to getting back to blogging about other things, like Janelle Monae, and this dress from ASOS. Angst-O-Meter (1-5): 5 Pr...

11. Coming Correct: Thoughts on the Huge Facebook drama

...inbox was collapsing quantum-singularity-style under the mass of so many aghast messages letting me know about it. I haven’t said it recently, and can never say it enough, but oh, my vigilant little...

12. Huge, Episode 7: “I could yank the life support on her illusion of allure.”

...f all this human drama: S’nalt. It’s morning, and in the laydeez’ cabin, the campers are talking about the impending weigh-in. Ah, well, the good times couldn’t last forever, I suppose. Chlo...

13. Love yourself, but not too much: Seventeen's mixed message

...e and trash their own bodies. * Never allow a dirty look from someone else to influence how I feel about my appearance. * Quit judging a person solely by how his or her body looks — even...

14. Friday Playlist: Hey you, with the pretty face.

...copyright paranoia FTW. If you have problems with making the playlist work, let me know. I have concerns about its accessibility for folks who use screen readers. My original playlist for today was ...

15. Huge, Episode 6: And the sky was made of amethyst.

...c, mostly “george and amber”, but as I do not read fanfiction myself I don’t know how one would go about looking for it. “Huge” being a common word, Google isn’t much of a help. This wee...

16. In which Lane Bryant is visited by the woodshed.

...rs before taking a leave of absence a couple months ago -- was a common outlet for folks looking to vent about lousy customer service or unfair company policies in the plus-size fashion world. What it...

17. Because this is what I do.

...en less of an adult than I did in my twenties. I do feel older, which has good points and bad points but about which I am primarily apathetic. I'm no more financially or professionally well-off than I...

18. Huge, Episode 5: "Walk her every day, into a shady place."

...r I composed after reading the above began: “Dear Savannah Dooley: That’s great. But let me tell you about Gossip.” Previously: Amber got a hoodie from George; Alistair got blown off by his si...

19. ReBlog: Race affects me. And you too.

...ur race influences, to one degree or another, how everyone anywhere interacts with you, what they assume about you, how you're treated in public and private spaces, the kind of attention you get, the ...

20. Huge, Episode 4: Playing at the Talent Show

...ting. She tells Amber to switch places with her so Chloe can showcase her good side. Amber asks, “What about MY good side?” and Chloe responds: “You have two good sides. I have none.” They exc...

21. Huge, Episode 3: "I was never cool, in school / I'm sure you don't remember me"

...n his smudgy glasses. That’s not a euphemism. Although I could probably make it into one, if I thought about it long enough. In the eating-cabin (“cafeteria” doesn’t seem appropriate, her...

22. "You have to walk out so far, and it never gets any deeper."

...rly in the summer. Though I’ve lived in the Boston area since 1995, approximately 87% of my statements about my life here still begin with “Where I grew up --” or “On my home planet of South F...

23. Friday Miscellany: Things that don't fit anywhere else.

...e and I hosted our first Chatty Fatty event, a loosely-planned and almost-entirely-improvised discussion about all kinds of fat-related subjects. I use the word "hosted" because we set it up, but once...

24. “...take the sandwich out of her mouth and go for a goddamn fucking walk”: On Olivia Munn, Feminism, and Cultural Criticism

... (of course, there are exceptions, I know, but I am generalizing for a reason). Since women only make up about 12% of the industry designing and producing these games (sometimes in horrifying circumst...

25. Huge, Episode 2: I Don't Want to Get Over You

...ped with abuse, or drowned in self-deprecating humor cannot possibly have a purpose. But I’m talking about fat-positive folks, here. My comrade in fatty arms Marianne has expressed concern that th...

26. Huge, Episode 1: Goonies never say die.

.... That's not this show. However, this is a show that seeks to interrogate cultural ideas and assumptions about the lives of fat teens, and frankly -- longtime readers will not be surprised -- I think ...

27. Miscellany: A tale of first-class flying, a new Fatcast, and a Huge game-changer.

...is: And first class people fly like this: Marianne and I have recently (and humorously) talked about the unpredictability of seating standards and the randomness with which they are applied....

28. [Meta] Say Hi.

Say hi, Rufus! There's something unavoidably surreal about being recognized in public as this... blogger. Recent conversations elsewhere have pointed out how the anonymity of the internet prom

29. Pet sounds.

...n the meantime, there is a new Fatcast for you to hear; it is part one of Marianne's and my conversation about Fat Travel, appropriately enough. Part two has been recorded, but sadly I haven't had tim...

30. Reading List: Links, commentary, and Cobb Salad.

... on this blog: You get poked and prodded by complete strangers and nobody will tell you a single thing about what’s going on. And that point was where I really believe that the dehumanization proc...