Fat Guy In A Little Seat
All this week, I’ve been following the saga of director Kevin Smith and his ordeal with Southwest Airlines. If you haven’t heard about it, the short version of the story is that Kevin Smith, known for writing/directing such films as Clerks, Dogma and Zack & Miri Make A Porno, was removed from a Southwest flight for being “too fat” and needing a second seat.
You can hear his version of the story in his podcast here: SModcast #106
You can see Southwest Airlines’ responses HERE and HERE.
He’s posted a series of short video clips giving his final word on the whole situation, and you can watch them all HERE.
Now, for those that don’t know me… I’m fat. People try to tell me I’m not, but they’re my friends. That’s their job. I weigh 260 lbs. (give or take) and the last pair of pants I bought were size 42 waist. Of course I could be fatter, but I’m still what is considered fat. I’m too old to deny it or to be embarrassed by it. It’s reality and I have to deal with it. I believe Kevin Smith is considerably larger than I am, and I’m nowhere near “too fat to fly”, but I can still sympathize with what happened to him.
Statistically 2 out of 3 people in America are overweight or obese. Of course that’s not something to be proud of, but it’s a fact. In spite of that fact, we are still living in a thin person’s world.
Here’s what made me realize that a while ago. For the past several years, I have had a hell of a time finding shirts that fit me well. The trend for shirt makers and designers has been a tight fitting cut for t-shirts. “Slim Fit” I believe it is sometimes called. I usually wear either XL or XXL, but many times I’ve put on shirts labeled XXL that were just about skin tight. I could get the shirt on without any force or stretching it out, so technically it fit, but an XXL t-shirt or polo shouldn’t be skin tight on me. But the shirt is cut specifically to fit snug to the body… because that’s the trend… for thin people.
I got news for you: fat people don’t like tight clothes. Shocking, I know. But it baffles me that, even though most people in America are fat, things are just not made with fat people in mind.
I’m gonna go eat a pizza.
Unfortunately clothing really isn’t made for a lot of people in mind. I’m nowhere near fat, quite the opposite. I can’t go anywhere without getting accused of having some sort of eating disorder, and by American clothing standards I shouldn’t exist. There’s no possible way someone can be both tall and thin, right? Basically, to get clothes to fit right in this country you’ve got to be an extremely average height and an extremely average weight, otherwise you’re just SOL.
I’m going to go eat some pie.