(TW for body shame and eating disorders)

“I get this idea that we, as geeks, are expected to rise above the common herd that are influenced by advertising and self-hate. We’re so much cleverer than that, so much more accepting! We were the fat kids in high school!

But we’re not. After all, geek boys lusts after the thin ones, every geek girl is bombarded with pictures of thin Leia, thin Xena, thin Sailor Scouts. Comics portray thin people as good, fat people as bad. There’s a reason Desire is slim and Despair is fat. Women get the same role-models in geek culture as they do in the rest of the world, but that culture is determined not to address this, nor to address the problems it might cause us.

I’ve grown up through both geek and jock culture and they’re both the same. Dominated by men, a thin varnish over pervasive misogyny. The only difference is where the jocks know the girls have eating disorders, but don’t care; the geeks genuinely think that this part of the world cannot touch them.”

This is a really great essay/article. And it’s so true. I remember looking through pictures online after Comic Con and being really disturbed by how they were labeled — overweight girls who dressed up as skinny characters were labeled “Fat [Character’s Name]” whereas overweight men in costume were usually just labeled by their character. It’s incredibly frustrating to find this sort of sexist thinking in a community that is so proud of its uniqueness and believes in defending the little guy and standing up to bullies…and the fact that a lot of people within that community seem to think it’s a non-problem just adds insult to injury.