Politics of Hunger

We are introduced to it young. We set our young eyes on female cartoon characters with impossibly tiny waists and grow up to see these same collarbones and legs on our magazine racks. It is so normalized we forget how truly unnatural and wholly unattainable it is. People may argue that our society as a whole has become more accepting of "thick" women, but despite this, dieting and hunger have not ceased.

It is important for me to note that I am all for health. I believe in eating well and eating until you're full. I believe in exercise and the enjoyment of the increase in endorphins. However, it is all too often that being healthy is mistaken for losing weight. It is all too often I hear a girl say "I'm trying to get more healthy" and what she really means is "I'm trying to lose weight and get a bigger butt." Health is feeling your best in whatever body that might be in. Health is sacred. It is a gift you give yourself out of love and respect for your body it is not defined by the dropping of numbers on a scale. Although getting healthy might mean losing weight for some, they are not interchangeable.

This idea of health is something I have really been reflecting on in this past year but it was still limited. During a trip I took to Costa Rica I read the chapter "Hunger" in the book The Beauty Myth and started opening my mind to the political weapon that women's hunger really is. The Beauty Myth analyzes the idea of "beauty" for women and makes an argument for how this concept of beauty undermines women's advancement and the chapter on hunger really stuck with me. Maybe because it was closer to home and more personal. It details how the ideal of women as skinny or as having an "ideal" body type is used as a political tool to keep women oppressed.

So let's break this concept down.

It is very easy to see that our society has ideal body types for both men and women. Just walk into a convenience store and look at the magazine rack. People may argue that in this regard, men and women are equal. This is wrong because women's ideal body, unlike men's, is unnatural to the majority of the gender. This is used as powerful political tools against women.

Fat is natural for women. Fat is healthy for women. Obviously, I am not talking about obesity, but as a whole fat is natural on most female bodies. In the Victorian age, this fat was widely celebrated and was regarded as a beautiful quality in women and signified wealth and health. Furthermore, a more toned body with a lower fat index was always associated with masculinity. It is significantly easier for men to lose fat because this is a natural state of being for them. A man who is eating well and exercising will have a much lower fat index than most women who are doing the exact same thing. So how did Western Society get from the celebration of fat to regarding female fat with the utmost repulsion? How did society get to a place where we celebrate a toned and thin version of women that is wholly unnatural for the majority of them. And why?

Well, let's look at the times when the idea of thin was introduced to mainstream media. It slowly got became more prevalent during the early 1900s around the time of the women's suffrage movement. Furthermore, this push for the "skinny" ideal really amplified during the early 1960s during the second wave of feminism and the fight for women's workplace rights. As women advance, the ideal female body continues to be further pushed down women's throats specifically in the western world.

No one can deny the stark rise of eating disorders among women with 13 percent of females engaging in some form of eating disorder behavior. Although men are affected by eating disorders, women are its primary victim. This percentage doesn't even include the numerous amounts of women who deal with self-esteem issues stemming from body image or tried 'dieting'.

Everyone can agree that these "ideals" for women are not healthy, but how are they used as a political tool?

Because hungry women are obedient women.

"A culture fixated on female thinness is not an obsession about female beauty, but an obsession about female obedience. Dieting is the most potent political sedative in women’s history; a quietly mad population is a tractable one” (Wolff).

Women who are hungry cannot organize. Women who are hungry cannot fight for their rights. Women who are hungry cannot enjoy their sex life. Women who are hungry cannot succeed.

Fat that once was celebrated as a natural and beautiful part of the female body is now used as a cruel slur to belittle women. If what is natural for women is disgusting and wrong, then in society's eyes women themselves and femininity must be that which is disgusting and wrong.

With some of these more radical ideas about women's bodies in society, I started reflecting more on my relationship with hunger. On times when I could spend hours picking apart my body. On times when my heart would race if I ate something I considered "unhealthy." On times when I told myself I could eat an apple for lunch and would ignore my stomach protesting otherwise. On times when I would be secretly happy to have the flu because I wouldn't be hungry. Not even stopping to consider that most of my male classmates weren't engaging in this same behavior. How can you possibly enjoy life when you are hungry? How could I have possibly fought for my own gender when I was taught it's natural state of being was to be despised? I was lucky. I never starved myself or vomited like so many other young girls. However, I would be lying if I said I never considered.

Hunger and the way it made me self-conscious of my body did its job in teaching me obedience. I've always been loud and a little obnoxious, but it taught me how to shrink myself. How to play my role. How to not speak up.

Maybe this idea of the ideal female body type being a political tool might not have been something I could have believed when I was younger, but it really is so simple. Why would the ideal body be one that is completely unnatural and unachievable to the majority of women if not for the purpose of destruction? How cruel a system that it pushes for young girls to destroy their bodies and minds with hatred.

Love is the only form of resistance.

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This was just a quick introduction to some of the things I learned about the politics of women's hunger. That being said, I do encourage you to your own research!

Have a great day!

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Wolf, Naomi. The Beauty Myth: How Images of Beauty Are Used against Women. Vintage Books, 2015.