There is a very ugly stripe that runs through human beings, one especially prevalent these days. If something isn't MY reality, then it isn't reality at all. So why care?
It is born of privilege. And we all have some varietal of it. Some of us enjoy a meritage of all different kinds of privilege.
Privilege that you are not black so you don't worry about a simple traffic stop.
Privilege that you are not gay so discrimination is not a worry.
Privilege that you are not brown so you don't worry about being apprehended in an ICE raid.
Privilege that you are not trans so you don't think a thing of going to the bathroom in public.
Privilege that you did not bring your children to this country so why care at all about the ones in cages.
Privilege because you are not on food stamps, so why care about 3 million people on the verge of being thrown off.
I could go on and on. As the saying goes, Not my circus, not my monkeys.
It's wrong headed, it's hardhearted. And at some point, your circus is going to be targeted and your monkeys are going to be involved and you will be looking around for someone to care, to sympathize, to empathize.
The latest example of this mindset came across my desk this morning. A set of dishes being sold by Macy's.
At first glance what do you see? Nice, clean, simple plates with rings and words. I won't even fault you for thinking, "Oh, cute. HA HA HA."
That would have been me not so many years ago. But then, I had a small ass, a thin waist, believed all it took was Chew less, Move more! So, HA HA HA - cute plates!
Gradually, however, my eyes were opened, my brain was enlightened. I watched a dear friend starve herself yet still gain weight. A lot of weight. Her self control was not the problem, as so many who saw her would openly castigate. Her body was out of control all on its own and needed surgical intervention for the tumors on her pituitary. I listened to her, I learned from her. I watched as my daughter, pursuing her Bachelor's in Psychology began focusing on eating disorders. I listened to her, I absorbed the facts, the data, the research she shared. And my cavalier, privileged attitude began adjusting.
Just because it wasn't my reality, didn't make it NOT reality.
The plates are problematic. We live in a society where we literally put a higher premium on physicality than we do on humanity. It drives all of our advertising. It saturates the big screen. We raise children who believe their worth is translated by their jeans size. That being softer makes them less deserving of consideration, respect, opportunity. Approximately 30 million people, OF ALL AGES, in the USA suffer from an eating disorder. (Children, men, women, 13% of women over 50, 16% of transgender college students, 6% of minority men and women, 10% of military members, and on and on.) That means roughly 10% of our population at any given time is battling disordered eating on some level. And every 62 minutes, someone in this country dies because of it.
That is why the plates are ill conceived.
I asked my daughter, Kendall Sharp, now a grad student at Harvard, working towards her Master's in Public Health and ultimately her doctorate specializing in eating disorders, to weigh in (no pun intended).
"These plates perpetuate the diet culture that is rampant in our society. Some mom is going to buy these plates because they think that it's funny, but it could have a real negative impact on anyone who comes into their kitchen. This is not just a "funny" set of plates, it is an example of the constant messaging surrounding thinness and dieting that heavily contribute to disordered eating and exercise behaviors."
She's not wrong. I, myself, battled an eating disorder as a teenager. Refusing to eat, demanding my body get smaller. This went on right in front of my parents, yet they saw nothing, until the day I passed out. I battled again after my third child was born, eating little, exercising compulsively, getting as low as 93 pounds. I look at those plates and think of how bringing them into my home as a teen or seeing them as an adult would have done nothing but reinforce what was already tumbling through my brain. That I would have literally used the rings on the plate to gauge how much I was eating, rate my success.
The plates were called out on Twitter by Alie Ward, a correspondent for CBS’s Innovation Nation and who has written for LA Weekly and The LA Times. In her tweet she tagged Macy's and asked How can I get these plates from @Macys banned in all 50 states.
What poured forth was predictable. 40,000 likes, 5,000 comments. So many people who immediately saw how the dishware was insensitive, problematic, and contributing to our culture where thin is in. But for every person who got it, there were the equally predictable ones who chimed in with "Lighten up!" "How about this. Just don’t buy it?" "That's funny. Does nobody have a sense of humor anymore?" and "Imagine being offended by this".
Basically, this is not my problem, so it's not a problem.
It was when star of The Good Place, Jameela Jamil, a champion of body positivity and someone who had an eating disorder as a teen, chimed in, retweeting and amplifying Alie's original and tagging Macy's with "F**k these plates, f**k these plates to hell" did something happen.
Now, Alie never dreamed this would be the response from Macy's but is thrilled to see that someone at the company got it, someone at Macy's immediately understood they had been tone deaf, and decided to do something about it.
And that's important. Because it does take a village. A village in which we actually care about issues that may not affect us personally, but are real and affect others. A village in which we seek to help, not harm. A village in which being a dick is off the table and understanding fills the plate.
We all know someone who struggles. We may be the one who struggles. It may be our child, our spouse, our sibling, a co-worker. With 10% of the population suffering, it would be naive to think we don't interact with someone every single day who is mired in an eating disorder - genetics, environmental factors, and personality traits all are factors that contribute. And just because you have never had one does not mean you won't at some point.
Care. Care about the world around you, about the people in it. Care about those who don't look like you, don't come from where you come from. Care because that is what decent people do. Care because you don't have to hurt to know what it means to hurt.
Because if that point comes, if you find yourself targeted and afraid, if you begin to spiral and feel helpless, hopeless, when your circus and your monkeys are in peril, it sure would be nice to know that a buffet of empathy, understanding, support, and kindness are waiting from which to fill your plate.
Where do they come up with these products.Glad Macy's got the message. Hopefully when they try to offload them on outlets such as Big Lots those companies won't buy tgem. I suggest they do what the dinnerware company I once worked for did with seconds.Sell them to the companies that make asphalt for road repair. Somehow the materials dishes are made of add to the durability. This is where these belong.
Posted by: Nikki in nyv | Wednesday, July 24, 2019 at 02:06 AM