Ngozi Nwokeukwu

Dr. Muniz-Villalon

English 15 Section 104

April 14, 2020

Every Body Should Feel Positive

Problem: Campuses are not creating safe spaces for a group of students whose well-being

affects many people beyond themselves. As the average weight of the American population

seems to grow, instead of American systems adapting and catering to bigger people, the anti-fat

bias becomes worse. The anti-fat mentality has predictably found its way into young,

impressionable, and developing college minds. Students joke about gaining “The Freshman

Fifteen” without knowing how rhetoric like that affects the different students of varying body

sizes. The horror stories of fat people on campus are diverse, yet simply summed up: Campus

does not make them feel included, so they avoid campus spaces. Places like bedrooms, dining

halls, recreational spaces, clothing stores do not cater to the needs of fat students on campus

(Stevens). Besides the lack of resources, fat students lack protection from abuse and do not have

places in which they can share their grievances. With the lack of such essential services, fat

people must use less accessible and more expensive options in order to live and stay silent in the

face of maltreatment.

Many people do not recognize these issues as prevalent because of how normalized

fatphobia is in the U.S. Being fat has large associations with laziness, greed, and lack of

motivation while thinness is seen as earned through hard work and being successful (Brewis).

Being fat is seen as a choice, and a negative one at that. Too often fat, more specifically obesity,

is linked to other ailments that cause death faster. These statistics are based off the BMI, made
by the Metropolitan Life’s insurance company trying to track deaths rather than practically

studying the link between health, height, and body weight (Crepezzi). The studies surrounding

different body weights, health, and activity is skewed, yet society clings to the current idea of

fatness and disregards the hostile nature of the mentality. Many fat people have extra financial

responsibilities in order to get the necessities that thin people receive for much less, a big

example being clothes. Places like Target and H&M, the latter being a major clothing store on

Penn State’s main campus, are complicit in the exclusion of fat people. Target is known for

charging different prices, the larger size being more expensive, for the same brand of clothing

(Malinsky) and H&M has been getting rid of plus size clothes in their stores altogether

(DeStefano). These stores do not consider fat people as important people to cater to, making it

harder for fat people to access clothes. And if the big chains do not have reasonable access to

these clothes, it also means the smaller stores will have much worse options. The issues with

clothing and furniture stretch further onto activities that promote health. Biking, a major outlet

for stress, exercise, and great way to get around on campuses can be up to 800 dollars more for a

fat rider (Malinsky). Fat people have the least amount of access to affordable supplies and

because almost 20% of fat people are passed up for jobs (Umoh) and are less likely to go to

college or be funded for college (Creprezzi), their financial situation are in dire situations. They

are in a cycle where they are making small amounts of money, or no money at all, from jobs that

do not give accurate support. However, they are stacked with extra expenses that people who are

skinnier do not have to face.

Besides, the financial effects of being fat on campus, the mental affects need to be

examined to. Fat people, especially women, are subjugated to varying abuses on and off campus.

For example, many fat women find themselves victims of sexual harassment like hogging in
which men date fat women as a joke which quickly escalates to public shaming and derogatory

acts of violence (Gailey). General views of fat people revolve around seeing them as weak and

lazy and less attractive, with evidence suggesting that fat people have a harder time building

relationships from friendship to romance (Crepezzi). However, most people look over these

instances and see them justified. Although just knowing that certain group of people are

suffering through such psychological abuse is enough to convince some, it is not enough to

convince others. That is when the fact that people who are thin are affected by these sorts of

mentalities also begins to get discussed. Studies show that many thin, specifically female but not

entirely female, college students have bigger issues of negative body image and in their attempts

to remain thin go through dangerous diets and have disordered eating patterns (Brewis).

Fatphobia is dangerous not only to the safety and well-being of fat students, but also the mental

and physical well-being of students in the “normal size” range. Professionals on campus tend to

use the solution of going to a healthcare provider or losing weight and keeping a healthy diet for

the issues stated. Still, this ignores some very important ideas: This is not a weight or health

issue. It is an issue of oppression based on a marginalized group, and even though it has not been

treated like that in the past, because of the types of consequences that occur because of fatphobia,

it must be treated like one. Also, healthcare providers are just as guilty in the conversation of

exclusion toward fat people with doctors spending less time with people who are obese, refusing

to give certain exams and educate obese patients, they fixate on a patients obesity while avoiding

possible crucial symptoms, and consistently bad-mouth obese patients (Sindhu and Reddy).

Doctors are just as uninformed and offensive to fat people as the general public and refuse to

expand their knowledge, making them as an option in the fight against fatphobia senseless.
 Proposal:

The solution to fatphobia is not concrete nor is it a one step process. It is like trying to

solve homophobia or racism. What is feasible is developing spaces for fat people, financially

funding fat people, and creating an atmosphere toward learning about fat people. I like to use the

ongoing creation of diverse spaces on campus as an example of the battle of marginalized people

to feel safe where they dwell. Black students on campus know that campus was not always and is

still not consistently black friendly. Penn State, like many non- historically black colleges and

universities, went through the segregation process, and to this day students are still protesting to

make Penn State a safer school for black people. However, certain implementations have been

made to show safety and tolerance for black people, which could also be implemented for fat

students. There are scholarships for specifically black students to pay for university, including

room and board and any meals they need. There are many classes and majors dedicated in

African American history and contemporary, to talk about black people and their culture. Classes

dedicated to education of body positivity and its history, the erasure of the myth of fat being

equal to health, the topic of social effects of fatphobia, and adding in education on being healthy

while being body positive would help show the general public that fat people are three

dimensional. Fat bodies are not ideals that society has placed on them. About $800 dollars is the

cost per credit that we take at Penn State (“Tuition and Fees”) and while a slightly more

expensive tuition would have to be implemented to create new classes dedicated to fat studies,

they would inspire research and scholarships for fat people advocating and teaching info about

the diversity of the body.

Besides places meant for educating on topics of African American culture, places and

programs like the PRCC, Blueprint, ASU, and The Black Caucus are dedicated to creating places
that black people can talk and find solidarity with others. Shelters and Organizations dedicated to

fat rights and being a space for fat students to help guide and support each other while on campus

would be excellent in showing that campus can accommodate for fat students. In the case of the

PRCC, funds for its upkeep come somewhat from the general fund, which is a mix of state

funding and student tuition. However, much of the money for programming in the PRCC comes

from student fees. Student fees fall around $2.15 and are retrieved from all students. The PRCC

tends to rake in 120,000-180,000 (Hill, et al.). To get a building separate for just fat studies

would seem out of the budget, however, expanding the PRCC to include fat studies would be

plausible, especially because the PRCC budget has grown at least 60,000 from the 2016-2017

range to the 2017-2018 year range. These spaces would not just be for fat people, much like how

the PRCC is not exclusively for black people. These places would be for people of all sizes who

want to engage and learn about the ways toward body acceptance for all sizes. These are the

formulas for how oppressed students begin to see a change in their environment, and if not a

change, can begin to find comfort in people like them and feel as if there is some sort of

compensation for the discrimination they deal with. Classes like these, plus more exposure of fat

people in different areas of campus life for example sports and artistry and STEM positions,

much like black students in different magazines dedicated to black culture, shows that fat people

are people deserving of respect and who should gain as much as they give to society. Finally, fat

students need financial support and resources because, as discussed in the problem, fat people are

predisposed to be lower class and lacking in college money, proper clothing, transportation, etc.

This could be in the form of stores and groups opening on campus catered to their needs and a

reformation of student centers that accommodates all students. While a store on campus is a bit
out of student control, donating and creating clothes for fat people by fat people is a more

amendable and accessible option.

Feasibility:

I am not the first to have realized that fatphobia is beyond a health problem and has a

social justice standing as well as connections to other forms of oppression like racism and

classism. Many Universities like Maryland College Park and Oregon State Universities are

creating courses around the new emerging academic field of fat studies, with goals of talking

about the social, economic, and political effects of being fat, how it connects with other

marginalized identities, ways to educate on the history of weight bias and the hate for fat people,

and the liberation and acceptance of people of all body sizes. These Universities are dedicated to

proving the legitimacy of the body positive movements and highlighting the facts about weight

bias in America that many find ridiculous. Besides classes, growing organizations, like People

Opposing Weightism in New Hampshire, are dedicated to education and support in the fighting

of fat stigma (Hasson). If we applied these organizations dedicated to fat stigma to our own

school, the steps toward making campus an inclusive space for fat people could be fulfilled.

While these organizations will have some difficulty finding their way in the budget, starting

small with clubs dedicated to body positivity is a step in the right direction. With new

organizations comes the possibility for selling clothes between fat people, creating a market for

fat people to find outfits tailored for them. Strong organizations also create petitions and raise

donations toward necessities for students, like furniture and transport. Organizations such as

ASU (African Student Union) put effort toward selling African merchandise to not only bring up

revenue for their organization and their people but give African people a way to connect with the

culture. These types of organizations and courses are not impossible, they just need people
passionate enough to fight for it. With the introduction of organizations and studies for fat people

come the possibility of scholarships dedicated to advancing body positive research and different

donations and grants being created to support the cause. Getting large masses of people to

petition and send letters to university presidents and university governments to try to get new

stores on campus or new furniture is often difficult; however, community outreach is much more

meaningful, feasible, and makes a statement that people cannot dismiss.

Conclusion:

In the creation of this paper, I found few articles than I would have hoped to find on

fatphobia, especially on campus. Nevertheless, evidence of violence and institutional harm and

of faulty studies about weight and health are out there. It is just that no one wishes to counter

societal biases, people are skeptical of their importance. The diet business makes billions of

dollars from scamming people due to their insecurities. The body positivity movement wishes to

make life an inclusive and safe space for people of all sizes. Many people have felt what it’s like

to question your body and fight for an ideal that is not real, maybe yourself. Fat people receive

discrimination that they do not deserve, on the ideas that they can change their situation easily or

they deserve it for being gluttonous, even though it most cases fat is due to genetic and

environmental factors rather individual choice. Fat people are subjected to contempt because

people believe that their weight equals their health which equals their worth. But fat people go

through these injustices because no one takes them seriously, no one takes the danger both

physically, financially, and psychologically seriously. It is time for all of that to change. We

cannot let false information and unchecked biases continue to let us harm a group of people who

do not deserve it. The community must come together to fight this for the welfare of our growing

society.
 Work Cited

Brewis, Alexandra et al. “Weight stigma and eating behaviors on a college campus: Are students

immune to stigma's effects?” Preventive medicine reports vol. 4 578-584. 29 Oct. 2016,

doi:10.1016/j.pmedr.2016.10.005

Butkiewicz, Annemarie. “Media Influence on Body Image a Concern for College Students.” The

Daily Collegian, 5 Feb. 2014, www.collegian.psu.edu/news/campus/article_356b4b86-8e01-

11e3-8cc1-001a4bcf6878.html.

Crepezzi, Kristen. “Fat in College: A Social Overview.” The Vermont Connection, vol. 28, no. 1,

2007, https://scholarworks.uvm.edu/tvc/vol28/iss1/7

DeStefano, Nicolette, et al. “H&M Discontinues Plus Sizes in Select Stores.” Blush Magazine, 23.

Aug. 2017, blushmagfit.com/hm-discontinues-plus-sizes-select-stores/.

Gailey, Jeannine A. “Fatphobia and ‘Hogging’ on Campuses.” Inside Higher Ed, 6 Oct. 2017,

www.insidehighered.com/advice/2017/10/06/we-must-stop-discrimination-against-and-

stigmatizing-women-size-essay.

Hasson, Peter. “The Next Big Thing? 'Fat Studies' Courses, Fat Awareness Groups Spread

Across Universities.” The Daily Caller, The Daily Caller, 12 Jan. 2016,

dailycaller.com/2016/01/11/fat-studies-courses-fat-awareness-groups-spread-across-universities/.
 Hill, Elissa, et al. “Breaking Down The PRCC's Funding Sources.” Onward State, Penn State, 11

Oct. 2017, onwardstate.com/2017/10/11/breaking-down-the-prccs-funding-sources/.

Malinsky, Gili. “The 'Fat Tax' Is Real. Here Are 5 Examples That Prove It's More Expensive to Be

Plus-Sized.” Business Insider, Business Insider, 7 June 2019, www.businessinsider.com/fat-tax-

examples-clothing-fashion-flying-bikes-furniture-coffin-2019-6.

Sindhu, Kunal, and Pranav Reddy. “When Doctors Fat-Shame Their Patients, Everybody

Loses.” NBCNews.com, NBCUniversal News Group, 25 Aug. 2019,

www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/when-doctors-fat-shame-their-patients-everybody-loses-

ncna1045921.

Stevens, Corey. “Fat on Campus: Fat College Students and Hyper(in)visible Stigma.” Sociological

Focus, vol. 51, no. 2, Sep. 25. 2006. DOI, https://doi.org/10.1080/00380237.2017.1368839

“Tuition & Fees.” Tuition & Fees | School of International Affairs,

www.sia.psu.edu/admissions/tuition-fees.

Umoh, Ruth. “Study Finds You're Less Likely to Get Hired If You're Overweight. Here's How to

Avoid This Bias.” CNBC, CNBC, 3 Nov. 2017, www.cnbc.com/2017/11/03/study-finds-youre-

less-likely-to-get-hired-if-youre-overweight.html
.