Fake Ads to Track Conversions (or fun with a dash of fat hate!)

Posted on June 6, 2008
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The Philly Inquirer ran an ad that directed you to www.flyderrie-air.com - while it looked real, it was not.  It was created "by Philadelphia Media Holdings to test the results of advertising in our print and online products and to stimulate discussion on a timely environmental topic of interest to all citizens."

You know, I was laughing for a good solid ten minutes before I even thought to look farther into the fake ad to see it was a carbon-neutral aircraft.

Then I scrolled down farther so I could be shown how entrenched fat-hatred (and the assumption that fat-discrimination is somehow normal and okay to use in advertising) has become in society. Because of course to be carbon neutral, the fatties need to pay more. I bet not one person raised a hand in the meeting to ask, “Isn’t this potentially offensive to fat people, whom we regularly belittle and put down as an industry as it is?” Of course not. Fat people were not meant to fly, and this ad just assumes everyone already understands those people are a problem when flying, so they pay more!

A few of my favorite FAQs:

How much will your tickets be?

It depends on how much you and your luggage weigh. These masses will be combined and then turned into a price with our "Sliding Scale". If you and your luggage have a combined weight of less than 200 pounds, the cost savings is considerable-as high as sixty percent for domestic flights!

What is the "Sliding Scale"?

The "Sliding Scale" comes from the notion that each of us is responsible for the energy we use. There’s nothing wrong with toting around a little extra mass-as long as you pay for it.

At least the disclaimer at the bottom of the page is a decent size.

I think it’s smart to track advertising. I think it’s sad they haven’t figured out Google has a fun program called Analytics that could help them with that and they don’t need to treat readers like fools. The problem with viral advertising is that it can be very, “fool me once, shame on you — fool me twice, shame on me!” Which means the next ad campaign…the real one…isn’t going to get as much attention because people will think, “Oh, you got me last time with that joke.”

Bad job Philadelphia Media Holdings. Bad job all around.

How does this relate to networking? It’s a very bad networking move to hate fat people or blame fat people for global warming, which has been done more than in just this funny ad (see here, I’m not kidding!) Ever since they tweaked what number on the BMI was technically overweight and many clinically fat people (and plus-size models) wear size 10. It is bad networking to potentially trigger someone’s eating disorder by not warning them that you’re going to make them feel terrible about themselves when they read about a pound system for an airline. It’s just bad form.

I didn’t realize I was a feminist.

Posted on May 13, 2008
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I, like millions of women, cringe a little at the term feminist. Don’t get me wrong, I support zealots and feel they are a necessary cog in the machine of society. They get things done, they make us think. They’re important.

But I watched my great-grandmother (who was an avid, avid activist for women’s rights) become vice-president of a company in Chicago only to give so much of herself over the years to her family, to her job, that she is now a 93 year old depressed shell of a woman that just wants to die. I heard stories of her being a feminist "back in the day" but never saw it in action during my 32 years on earth. It was very, "Do as I say, not as I do."

I pictured hairy women that didn’t wear bras and yelled all the time. Or the flip side, the academic feminist that doesn’t know about how the world actually works and lives in some graduate-student nirvana instead of having to work within the very real framework of society.

But after that Twitter conversation I had yesterday, I kept thinking, "How many people are going to see that?" Some poor woman just having lunch while some bitch spews vitriol about her over the Internet. It’s disgusting. Then I found myself wondering if they would react the same way if it was a 250lb man sitting there? Or was it that she was alone that made her an easy target for hate? If she was with a friend there wouldn’t have been another seat available instead of the woman being in between two others.

Women should not be so hateful. I mean no one should be hateful, but women just have it a little harder in this society of ours. To accept one another would make life easier for all of us - so why can’t we accept others for who they are? Judging and making fun of the ugly, fat, short, tall, skinny, or different is just so unnecessary. There are other things to spend your time on.

Or so one would hope.

Fat Discrimination on Twitter

Posted on May 12, 2008
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This just in. Middle-aged, sloppy fattie detracts from Leslie Carbone’s Panera meal experience with her friend. I was following Leslie on Twitter (up till about three minutes before this post) and thus far have not experienced any kind of prejudice on the social networking site. It’s been pretty awesome, actually, but that trust in the global community of microbloggers was a mistake on my part because you know…someone being an ass can sneak right up on you when you’re on a social network that’s always been friendly to you in the past.

Here are the Twitter messages in order

at Panera, sitting separated from my friend, because the identical seat between us is VERY important to a middle-aged 250-pounder

I saw this and wondered…do middle-aged people not move if asked politely (what were the odds she actually asked if she could switch seats instead of being passive aggressive with the universe on twitter?) Or is it fat people that are loathe to move?

The reason for the importance of the chair is now clear. She requires BOTH side tables.

For what? Her food? Her fat ass? It is unclear.

Then I see this one

250 just pulled a tomato out of her sandwich w/ fingers, tilted her head back, and swallowed it like a pledge sliding a goldfish down.

What? The implication here is that someone swallowed a full sized tomato. While I’m sure it’s possible…it seems exaggerated, the size of the throat being what it is. I don’t think your esophagus gets fatter if your ass does, but I don’t have scientific proof of that.

Even better, by the third tweet this woman who is innocently having a meal at Panera is reduced to a number, guessed at by Leslie, and being broadcast over the Internet.

I replied (and then deleted because I’m thinking this is not a conversation I want to get into but it was too late and she’d replied)

Isn’t it disgusting when fat people eat fruit *shudder*

To which she replied (note the shred of righteous indignation along with a totally lame backpedal)

Not always, but it is disgusting when anybody pulls food, mayo globs and all, out of a sandwich and eats it w/ fingers.

So I was sucked in and had to respond

Yet you mention her weight repeatedly and not her sloppy manners. Shocking.

You’d think she could just admit she was having fun being an immature little girl and making fun of the fat girl in the Panera. You don’t like how she’s eating, address that…cause all of us nasty fatties aren’t sloppy. Oh, wait. I eat salad with my hands. I could be that chick at Panera with the crazy tomato eating, sucking everything in front of me down my gullet and my extraordinary throat.

She just wanted to talk shit about some person eating alone at Panera ruining Leslie’s view of…her friend. Cause there were NO. OTHER. OPTIONS.

I’m sure.

Fat hate in action, even on Twitter. Feel free to visit her and educate her. I suck at being an activist and get too flustered that someone could possibly think that way about another human being.

I Can Shop at Target

Posted on May 12, 2008
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Trust me, no one is more amazed than I am that most of the main Target clothing line now comes in a XXL.

Wandering in with my friend D, who happens to be a Weight Watchers obsessed (in a loving way) size 10/12 depending on the week we were both amazed because for the first time we actually took the same garment to the dressing rooms in different sizes!

The simple black summer dress I bought didn’t look good on her. The bright, low cut summer dress she bought didn’t look good on me.

But we both got to TRY them. That is a new experience for me. One that I’m not willing to give up anytime soon.

Thank you, Target. I’d like to see you expand the sizes further and maybe not make the armholes on some of the shirts so crazy-weird-small…but it’s a start, and I hope you continue in the direction you’re going…clothes for all women, not just for the few the small the genetically different.

2 inches of *Scandal*

Posted on March 31, 2008
Filed Under Bodies and Family, Bodies in Clothing, Body Love | Leave a Comment

Yesterday I needed to run over to my grandmother’s house.

Okay, I didn’t need to, but I wanted to. There was gram’s famous bean soup to be had…only a moron would pass that up. (Or someone that doesn’t like bean soup, but those don’t exist in my world). So I left my husband at home with the kids and the responsibilities and a bit of work that needed to be done I bolted before something came up that needed me!

Everything went really well for the first couple hours - until my grandmother noticed my shirt was about an inch and a half above the waistband of my pajama pants. (Hey, you wouldn’t wear your good clothes if you knew my grammas. They spill things.) She also knows I don’t wear my “going out clothes” to her house but still she couldn’t resist saying.

“How can you let yourself leave the house like that?”

My first response, “Because I wore a winter coat over it?
My second response, “Who cares?”

My final response, “You’re laying there on the daybed wearing a shirt that was part of your deli uniform over fifteen years ago…how is wearing a work uniform from over a decade ago better than wearing a t-shirt that wasn’t quite cut long enough for my 5′9″ frame?

She said, “Better an old work shirt than to show my belly. I’d just die.”

Seriously, I cannot imagine the worst thing in the world that could happen being for someone to see a streak of tummy skin.

Who. Cares.

An inch and a half of skin is NOT on that list. Never will be, because even if I believe that showing skin in public looks low-class, I’m not scared of that accidentally happening.

Would you rather have someone see an inch or two of tummy at your waistline, or would you rather trail toilet paper out of the restroom from a public bathroom in your nylons that you tucked half your dress into?

For me it’s a no brainer. I’ve seen that before with the toilet paper and the dress and the tucking and the awfulness and just knowing once she realized what happened…she’d never forget it.

I would have forgotten my skin by now if I didn’t have a blog :)

Hell, if my grandmother learned how to keep her mouth shut and stop being Queen of All Things Negative I wouldn’t have even known about it. LOL

Fat House

Posted on March 29, 2008
Filed Under Bodies Worldwide, Bodies in Public, Bodies on TV | Leave a Comment

Is that like cat house?

Honestly, I just found this video so…odd.

From the fat woman talking about the obesity epidemic, to the crazy segue into female genital mutilation - which I can’t even cope with the concept of. I get all shaky and freaked out.

More than anything, the mind blowing concept that it’s not enough to be fat to be beautiful. The fat expert makes sure the ladies are “fat in the right places.”

So, in case you were wondering…no, you can’t win. No matter what you look like or where you live. Thank you for playing.

SkinnySongs Sucks

Posted on March 28, 2008
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Can you believe this? There is a site, a cd, an actual product called SkinnySongs.

Could this possibly be more offensive?

With songs like “Skinny Dreams” and “The Incredible Shrinking Woman”

I wish I could be eloquent about this, but I’m too angry.

Just in case you don’t hate yourself enough….you can have a CD to hate yourself wherever you are…the car…the gym…falling asleep at night…

Vanity Sizing

Posted on March 28, 2008
Filed Under Bodies in Clothing | Leave a Comment

right-fit-jeans.gifI know it’s ghetto to quote Wikipedia in most cases, but hey, it’s a simple entry in case you don’t know what vanity sizing is, either.

My favorite quote from the Wikipedia entry:

Finally, it has been suggested[9] that vanity sizing merely reflects the increasing prevalence of obesity.[10] [11]

My second favorite quote from the same entry:

Designer Nicole Miller’s spokeswoman has suggested that 00 or subzero sizes were introduced in part because of the rise of Asian markets, where women are generally smaller.[5]

So…the sizes are going up, but people that are smaller still need to have clothes (that part makes sense) so they make smaller sizes (also makes sense) - but couldn’t Nicole Miller just keep the same dress sizes? Will someone seriously not buy a piece of clothing because of the label and what size it says?

I mean, if you were in a clothing store, would you choose something uglier just because the label (you know, the one on the inside of the garment) says it’s a size 6 instead of a size 10? Does it really matter what the label says? Can’t you just cut it out?

I think the makers of jeans from Lane Bryant were terribly smart to redo the sizing. Not because now a fatty can wear a size 1, do you think a waif-like model might accidentally buy a pair of size 1 jeans from Lane Bryant thinking they were her size? Highly unlikely.

What having sizes 1-12 does (no numbers skipped, cause that was pretty pointless too, come to think of it) is take away the concept of sizing we had previously. More women are wearing clothing that fits them now, because the stigma of numbers has been removed.

To hell with vanity sizing. Just find the most petite person in America, make her the size 1 and move up from there. However far it takes, however high we have to go. Because someone’s self esteem being dictated by the number on the inside of a garment is disgusting and wrong and (ultimately) just kinda weird.

It’s a Thinspiracy!

Posted on March 27, 2008
Filed Under Bodies and Food, Bodies in Public, Bodies on TV, Body Love | Leave a Comment

I love words that are a creation of other words.

Thinspiracy is my new favorite word, I have to say.

No reason, I don’t think it’s a conspiracy or anything…I just think that fat people are discriminated against at worst, and at the very least, people think we eat fried food and bon bons all day.

Ultimately it shouldn’t matter if I did eat fried food all day, it’s the assumptions that are the problem.

We are seen as unhealthy even if we are not. If a fat person is unhealthy, it is blamed immediately on weight.

Like thin people don’t get sick or ill or die of cancer.

It’s all so bunk.

I think the starvation diets that everyone is on (1200 calories is a joke,  when a group of men at 1600 calories a day were part of a starvation study) are the cause for the mass hysteria. People aren’t eating enough, as such, they have distorted moods and feelings. These translate to feelings of hatred and fear of fat people.

Did I mention this is bunk? LOL

Sewing Perhaps?

Posted on March 25, 2008
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I have no clothes.

Let me rephrase that…I have very few clothes. No, still not right. I have lots of clothes, it just so happens that very few of them fit.

When I was pregnant it seemed that every friend of a friend was getting WLS - so guess who got all the cast-off clothing? That would be me!

Next time I get pregnant, I have to say, I’m going to be set through month 9 with all the clothing I have in my closet. But tomorrow? I’m going to wear pajamas. The day after? Pajamas. They’re cute pajamas, don’t get me wrong…nothing boring and drab…but I need something more.

I have two pairs of Lane Bryant jeans that I bought and now wear almost exclusively. The shirts I have are both brown and pretty…but are starting to be seen as my “uniform.” That isn’t good. I’m creative, I’m a writer, I’m interesting…I can’t have a brown uniform!

Sadly, this means I have to shop. I’m absolutely petrified of shopping. I hate trying on clothes, I hate standing half naked in socks in a dressing room. I’ve hated shopping since I was six, and now it’s a full on panic.

So…I’m thinking of starting to sew. I’ve looked at a lot of the full figure clothing sites online, and while some of the styles are really complex and beautiful, in many cases I find myself saying, “If only it were a little simpler.”

I think I can do simple.

Summer dresses for me and the girls would be fantastic. I could pick out fabrics and styles and colors that *I* liked. Not just what was offered. No more having to choose from what is available.

This would be a much better idea if I could match colors…but I have paint swatches for that. Thank you Behr, for helping me realize I can make my own clothes! LOL

I just have to get my husband to bring down the sewing machine from the attic and then print out some guides online to learn how to sew.

And then I just have to hope beyond hope that I don’t make stuff that looks straight out of “Little House on the Prairie” *laugh*

keep looking »