I’m not buying it.
In this edition of “I’m not buying it,” we must first go to Marie Claire magazine, where a female writer with significant body issues (yes, that describes many, many people, probably myself included, but anyway) wrote this lovely piece of backwash.
Since I’m not actually a regular (or even occasional) reader of Marie Claire, this was brought to my attention via Facebook, when an acquaintance linked to it. By the time I got to it, there had already been such a hue and cry (rightly so) that the writer had posted a fairly long apology in the form of an italicized addendum.
Now, some readers may consider that apology kind of bogus, since it’s qualified by all sorts of “healthy size” references and such. Sort of a “I’m so sorry you’re fat!” apology. But when I read it, I sensed true remorse buried in the confusion of her logic. I also was struck by something that ought to have occurred to me before I even got to the apology: This woman is ill. She’s a “former” anorexic — and I put that word in quotation marks because an eating disorder is the kind of thing that tends to dog a person throughout her life, something that needs to be managed and guarded against years after the initial crisis passes.
My feeling about this is that the writer was almost set up. Not to excuse her initial words — which were needlessly, uselessly, unsually cruel — but who put her up to that article? Her editors. And don’t try to tell me they didn’t know the shitstorm this would cause.
Another writer put it exactly the right way:
I’m not saying she gets a pass, but it does give everything she wrote some perspective. Honestly, I feel sorry for her. I bet she agonizes over every single calorie and beats herself up if she gains two pounds. I bet she can’t ever shut her brain off and just enjoy an indulgent meal or a lazy Sunday. I bet no matter what “naughtiness” she might allow herself, she always pays for it later. … That’s a miserable fucking way to live.
And it’s sad and I’m sorry and I get it. I still hold her responsible for her words, but I now see what prompted them.
That’s exactly it. And this chick, clearly a woman after my own heart, goes on to say:
Marie Claire – you knowingly paid a former anorexic to write a snarky article about fat people?
…Are you fucking kidding me?
I’m not buying it, Marie Claire.
And I’m not buying your magazine, either.
