This study found that "heavy set" women face more job discrimination. DUH! How about life discrimination? But reals,
Reuters reports..
"Body mass significantly decreases women's family income," the study by two researchers at New York University found. "However ... men experience no negative effects of body mass on economic outcomes."
I know this is not very suprising, but how do we begin to have a discourse about this EXTREMELY pervasive and dangerous phenomenon. Fat discrimination is still one of those things that people do consciously and it is considered okay (you've heard it, it is just not healthy blah blah blah, at least when you are a woman, if you are a man you are just a big guy!)
Some other findings...
--a 1 percent increase in a woman's body mass index -- a measure of weight relative to height -- pushes family income down by about 0.6 percent.
--a woman's "occupational prestige," a measure of the social status of differing jobs, also dropped as body mass rose, although to a somewhat lesser degree: 0.4 percent for each 1 percent increase in body mass
The study also found that women who are "heavy" for their height have a lesser chance of getting married and a higher chance of getting divorced. Yeah, maybe cause they are busy LIVING THEIR LIFE!!! But these statistics aren't suprising, the demon culture of diet and beauty does not stop short of the corporate world or the dream of heteronormative union.
Finally, the researcher found that body mass does not effect men in work or in marriage and divorce. Of course not, it is a woman that is judged not by her ability to do a job, but by her height to weight ratio.
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i know plenty of women who couldn't get jobs at regular places like restaurants and offices because they didn't fit into the "attractiveness index" for the place. even some of my freelance friends who do stuff like music composing have been turned down for jobs, after their work was evaluated as good, just because the jackass who was about to hire them found out they were "ugly." the image oppression women face here is astounding.
Yes, the oppression of heavy-set women is dreadful. I've been trying to find a feminist blog that uses a "heavy-set" women for its logo but I can't - they all use outlines of Barbie-like, hyper-thin renderings of the female form. And do they use "heavy set" womyn as models when selling t-shirts with this same logo? Nope.
Skippy, plenty of heavyset feminists put pictures of themselves in their sidebars.
Admiring beautiful women is not un-feminist. Holding women's looks against them in job situations is. It's really simple.
Womyn? That's like "wymmyn" and "wimmen", isn't it? Another change to the English language to remove patriarchal implications? I understand the sentiment, but misspelling the word doesn't change anything. It just looks like a silly typographical error.
Back on subject: if your job was as a fitness trainer, I could understand them judging you on your appearance. Rejected from music composing for being too big? That's bloody ridiculous.
If you want to judge your sex partners based on their looks, fine. Hell, you can pick your friends based on it too, for all I care. Rejecting a qualified induvidual from a job because of completely irrelevant attributes is not only an unnecessary form of discrimination, it's plain bad business sense.
Why trade in someone who could do great work (hence bringing you profit) for an attractive but lesser qualified person?
Johnny 5, I wouldn't take Skippy's use of "womyn" seriously; I think Skippy was probably a troll using the term saracstically.
Which isn't to say that Skippy didn't stumble across a good point, one that I think Amanda dismisses too easily. What does it say that Amanda conflates the way many feminist blogs (and zines, and magazines like "Bust," etc) feature hip, retro images of thin pin-up women with the idea of "admiring beautiful women?" Isn't there a problem with conflating thinness and beauty?
I don't want to criticize any individual blog or zine - there's nothing wrong with an individual blog or zine or whatnot presenting images of pretty women who happen to be thin. The problem is that nearly all blogs and zines, if they want an image of a vivacious or pretty woman, just happen to use images of thin women.
I've had the same thought as Skippy many times, although I haven't said so because I don't want to risk insulting feminist allies. How can we criticize the overall pattern while making it clear that we're not blaming or accusing the individual designers who contribute to the pattern?
I've managed to save up roughly $64745 in my bank account, but I'm not sure if I should buy a house or not. Do you think the market is stable or do you think that home prices will decrease by a lot?