3 Lies about Sex and Overweight Women You Probably Believe
Posted by Kayla
September 12, 2013
The stigmas surrounding overweight women and sex are endlessly hilarious and remarkable to me. Turn on your television, open a magazine, get on the computer and you will be bombarded by images of thin, slim, fit women reveling in their sexuality. Rightly so. I mean, sex is awesome and beautiful and all that happy crap. But I can only take so many blonde, tall, thin, white female characters being empowered in the media via the token “slut” who makes jokes about masturbation over a lunch of nicoise salad with “the girls”.
Through media, we’ve been shown that only certain women have sex and only certain types of women can enjoy it. So I can understand where some confusion might arise.
But really. It’s a bit difficult to keep a straight face when there are droves of people who really think that…
#3. Overweight Women Only Have Tragic Sex
It’s no secret that there are stereotypes out there about us heavier ladies. Like that we’re lazy food vacuums whose purpose is to stand behind the protagonist and crack a joke whenever there’s too much tension.
It’s just silly. I mean, the reason I’m lazy isn’t because I’m a size 18. It’s because I don’t like to do things, interact with people, or leave my apartment.
But where did this idea come from? This hideous idea that fat women are lumbering, asexual, ignoramuses on the topic of sex?
It rose out of decades of focusing on ideal bodies, policing sex, and shaming people. It’s absolutely crazy to me that society continuously ignores the connection between poverty and obesity, shames children of low income families for being overweight by force feeding them images of the “perfect woman”, and then tells them that because of the number on their scales that they are incapable of having a sex life in any context other than abuse. And when we do show some semblance of sexual attraction toward another human being we’re mocked and belittled.
This is a dangerous trend. It tells those of us who are overweight that good sex is something that we are incapable of having, and those who are thinner are told that overweight people don’t know anything about the realities of sex.
This opens the door for a whole mound of slut-shaming and violence toward overweight women.
But that’s just the icing on the cake. Somewhere out there, there’s a woman who thinks that…
#2. We Can Crush Our Partner
Of course.
But no, not really.
Okay…Maybe.
But there are plenty of ways to have sex that won’t end in a risqué rendition of that scene from The Crucible. And knowing which way is best for you and your partner is all about knowing your body. Which, incidentally, fat women like myself are continuously told we need to keep covered and out of sight.
Go figure.
But I digest.
The fostering of this fear is, if you really look at the big picture, a way for bigger women to resign ourselves to being constantly self-conscious which can sometimes keep us from even entering a sexual relationship. It’s meant to remind us, as if we are blissfully unaware, that this is a world for the thin and photoshopped.
Some of us have bought into it. We silently accept the lie that we are incapable of the physical act just because we have rolls and stretch marks.
But if my past experiences are any indicator, I’d say that’s not quite the case.
#1. We Want to Have Sex With You
We don’t. We just don’t, and we’re not particularly sorry about that.
We don’t have to sleep with you or anyone out of desperation. We’re not interested in people who think we’re “cute for a fat girl.” Just because I weigh 235lbs and someone found it in themselves to compliment my outfit doesn’t give them a VIP access card into my underwear.
And you know why?
Because we’re fucking awesome as hell. Nobody, including fat women, needs to settle for sex with anyone they don’t want. We can be as picky as we want because we’re human beings with preferences and turn-ons.
But apparently some people find it really difficult to come to terms with the fact that fat women would get more satisfaction from inserting a tampon than from having sex with someone thinks they’re entitled to our bodies.
Just like everyone else, fat women deserve unchallenged agency over our own bodies. We deserve to wear what we want, show as much or as little skin as we want, date who we want, sleep with who we want, and be whatever we want to be. And we deserve to be able to say no to someone’s advances without the very real fear of becoming the target for their fat-shaming and verbally abusive behavior.
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