Fat Phobia in Gyms? Whitney Way Thore Weighs In
Some of you may be asking, “Who the heck is Whitney Way Thore?” And you’re not alone. The only reason I know of her is that TLC has a show called My Big Fat Fabulous Life that my wife used to watch and if I was in the room at the time, I’d catch bits and pieces of the episode.
I want to start off by saying, this article is my thoughts and opinions on the situation and is not a personal attack or bullying towards Whitney Way Thore. In fact, I applaud her for what she’s trying to do through her show and her engagements where she promotes anti-bullying. Whitney Way Thorn suffers from polycystic ovary syndrome which has caused her to gain a substantial amount of weight over the years. She is doing her best to not only manage the disease, but also her weight.
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Whitney Way Thore: “They Don’t Want to See You Working Out”
This article has triggered me in many ways which I want to discuss. First and foremost, people who go to a gym are all there for a common reason – to get in better shape and live a healthier life. For Whitney Way Thore to conduct an interview on her version of “fat phobia” with People.com and come off with negativity towards gyms is fundamentally wrong.
I have been in gym settings for nearly two decades and I have never once experienced someone tell someone who was overweight or obese that they didn’t want to see them in the gym. Yet, Whitney Way Thorn is making it sound like this fat phobia is a daily occurrence that people essentially want her to leave the gym based on how she looks.
She goes on to tell People.com that she is, “Healthier, happier, and more physically fit” than she’s ever been at her larger size. I tip my hat to her for feeling that way as I’m sure it isn’t easy in a society where obesity is looked at in a negative light (even though my personal opinion is that we are accepting obesity to now be the new norm in our country).
The fact of the matter is, you can’t be 40+ percent body fat and be “healthy.” It doesn’t work that way. The accumulation of body fat around vital organs is not “healthy.” At 40+ percent body fat, you are not “fit.” I’m sorry, it might sound harsh but it’s the truth and I’m not going to stand here and act like most people in society today and accept the fact that plus-size individuals are the new norm – it’s not. And me saying this doesn’t mean I have a fat phobia.
Whitney Way Thore is doing everything she can, from what she says, to control her weight. I’ve seen pieces of her show where she talks about eating healthy, but then when I look back, she’s eating something that is definitely not healthy. Look, we’re all human and I don’t expect her to live off of salad and grilled chicken breast every meal.
Social Media Can Be a Mean Place to Live
When you put yourself out there and are on television, regardless if you are doing good things or bad things in life, people are going to judge you, poke fun of you, and be down-right mean. That’s the nature of social media today as people want to hide behind their keyboard and talk smack when they know in real life if they ever said those things to someone’s face, they’d get a ride to beatdown city.
Whitney Way Thore talks about the comments she gets on social media when she posts one of her workouts and chalks it up as fat phobia. I’m not even sure fat phobia is a real thing, rather just opinionated people who should keep their thoughts and opinions to themselves. Whitney Way Thore says in the interview with People.com that, “They don’t want to see you working out, and it’s so ridiculous because the people who maintain that I should lose weight should be applauding me, if that’s what they think I should do, and yet they still find a way to criticize me.” I want you to remember this part, as I’m going to touch on it in a couple of paragraphs.
She then goes on to mention that people don’t seem to understand the difference between someone who is exercising to lose weight and someone who is doing it to improve their health. Last time I checked, they go hand-in-hand. Losing weight is part of the process of improving your health – in the majority of the cases, not all. You’re not going to gain body fat while exercising and say you’re improving your health. That’s counterproductive if you ask me.
The whole reason why most people exercise is to lose weight which can cause them to have less joint pain, better manage some illnesses they may have, possibly reduce the number of medications they need to take each day, improve their immune system, boost energy levels, increase lean muscle mass and strength – the list goes on and on. But saying you’re healthier and fitter than you were before you started gaining the weight is wishful thinking and I’m not buying it.
Going back to her feelings on the gym (remember what I said a few paragraphs earlier), she said, “Sometimes I’ll be at the gym walking on the treadmill or something, and someone will come up to me and say, ‘You’re doing great honey, keep it up.’ And that’s the most condescending shit I’ve ever heard.” Wait wait wait. Above she just mentioned how no one says anything positive to her and that they should be giving her words of encouragement. Now that they are giving her words of encouragement to motivate her, she thinks they are being condescending? WHAT!? Maybe she’s playing this fat phobia nonsense out in her own head and blowing things out of proportion?
I truly feel like with Whitney Way Thore that there is no right way to handle yourself. You’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t. She then says, “If I was thin, you wouldn’t come up to me and assume that this was really hard for me and give me encouragement. I think there’s a lot of stereotypes and misconceptions about fat people working out, and at the end of the day you just need to do what’s right for your body and dismiss what other people think.”
How can you say people don’t want to see you working out in a gym and then say people were coming up to you saying you’re doing great? Personally, I encourage anyone who is working out regardless if they are skinny or obese and give them motivation and positive reinforcement on their progress and effort. That’s exactly what those people who are talking to you seem to be doing. So, would you rather them just not saying anything at all so you can tell People.com in your next interview that no one talks to you and it must be because of your size? Give me a break. Again, it seems like you’re playing the fat phobia card to simply push your own agenda and get attention.
What Just Happened? I’m So Confused
If you’re like me, you’ve probably read through all of this and are just as confused as I was reading the fat phobia article with Whitney Way Thore. It seems like she has some insecurities that need to be worked on and better managed as it appears, and she is lashing out for nothing. She is talking out of both sides of her mouth whether she realizes it or not.
The bottom line here is that Whitney Way Thore is trying to live a healthy lifestyle while having her entire life (including love life) caught on camera for TLC. There must be intense amounts of pressure having a camera in your face at all times – heck, it would probably give me anxiety. I truly hope Whitney Way Thore gets her weight and polycystic ovary syndrome under control. I can’t imagine being a healthy woman and then all of a sudden gaining a large amount of weight steadily due to a disease.
All-in-all, she’s doing a lot of good by pushing her campaign to stop bullying and I hope, for her sake, that the writer who conducted the story I just mentioned took things out of context. Because after reading the article, it left a bad taste in my mouth – almost as if Whitney Way Thore is bitter about her situation (which she has every right to be) and is taking it out on everyone else. She wants your help and encouragement, but when you give it you come off condescending to her. I’m not sure what else can be done or what she’s actually looking for. But I wish her all the best.
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