Slim People in FatLand

As stated in my last post, there are indeed some slim people in FatLand. As FatLand develops its own complex growth and weight curve, they don't stand out quite as much as they used to.

However, in the earlier years of FatLand, there were very few slimmer people. And they did stand out markedly. They were sometimes ridiculed and sometimes harassed. They had extreme difficulty finding clothes. They also experienced problems on FatLand public transport, which was designed for heavier people.

After the killing of a beautiful fat Egyptian dancer and  the involvement of a slim child of Board members in an attempt to undermine FatLand (after which she reversed her views and became a shero on the Fat Underground Railroad), the FatLand Board realized that they had to make sure that education and consciousness raising about universal Size Acceptance would be provided for children and adults. This effort did help, and in subsequent years FatLanders actually had some children who werer naturally slimmer and also those who grew up not having to diet. By this time, Size Acceptance in FatLand was pretty much a given, and there were now no incidents of slim-shaming.

The Clothing Industry and not dieting in FatLand

Some FatLanders arrived in FatLand already possessing sewing skills. Others didn't. However, the sewing-talented were more than happy to furnish the non-sewing-talented with wonderful clothes for reasonable prices, and during the first couple of years, even less than that.

What happened is that a glorified cottage industry developed into a large, cooperatively owned, government-assisted FatLand industry which furnished many garments, both retail and wholesale, to both FatLanders and Other Siders. And not just to plus-size people in the USA, but to those in Europe and Asia, as well. The dilemma of obtaining quality plus-sized clothes transformed into the prideful boast of "I get my clothes from FatLand." And because FatLand did not import any clothes, clothing makers, suppliers and designers in FatLand were able to charge reasonable shipping rates to their clients in other countries.

What amazed FatLand clothing industries was that the non-fat (makes them sound like a salad oil :P ) people on the other side started to request clothes from them, as well. At first they were unprepared for this phenomenon, but after a few conferences with the FatLand Board and their suppliers of raw materials (also located in FatLand, since they had found a way to grow cotton artificially), some FatLand cooperatives were able to convert some of their sewing locations to smaller sizes. Ironically, when the next generation of FatLanders were born, FatLand found that they needed clothes for those of their children who were non-plus size, the first generation in a long time not to diet. Many of their children were still "plus," by the old Other Side standards, but often not as fat as their parents. Again, this probably happened because the children were not forced to diet - an eating behavior which, about 90-95% of the time, ends up making people heavier than when they began- and were not pressured to be thin. And of course it didn't hurt that in general, they were not made to feel bad about themselves and were able to participate in any kind of movement they wished, including sports. This constituted about 30-35 percent of FatLand children born to the first generation. 65-70 percent of the first "native" generation of FatLanders were still "fat," by the old standards, but they grew up much much happier and healthier than those of their cousins still on the Other Side, for the same reasons.

So the fat  "curve" in FatLand looked quite different from that of the Other Side, with people of many sizes of slim and heavy, and none of them stigmatized for their size. At least officially.

Next post:  Being slim in FatLand

Cat show?

There is debate, even now, on whether to allow a cat show in FatLand. Dog people have parks dedicated to dogs, the cat people say. What do we have?

The thing is, though, that FatLand, until now, has tended to downplay competitiveness in most of FatLand life. For instance, FatLand does not allow ads that bash other companies or concerns. (Since FatLand has not had political parties until now, campaign ads have not been a problem.) Even in sports, FatLand tends to emphasize team efforts by FatLanders that allow them to take on other teams.

So the cat people who wish to initiate a cat show in FatLand are in a way going against the grain. And the FatLand Board is afraid that this kind of competitiveness will lead to things like a Ms. FatLand and/or Mr. FatLand pageant, which is what some of its citizens are already discussing.

What will happen? Will FatLand get a cat show? Will there be FatLanders striding up and down the stage singing or playing an instrument in pursuit of the Ms. or Mr. FatLand title?

No zoo in FatLand

I keep wondering if there should be a zoo in FatLand. Something in me is constitutionally opposed to zoos. But I remember how I loved going to the Bronx Zoo when I was younger (when it was still the Bronx Zoo and not generally known as the New York Zoological Society). I don't know if there is enough space in FatLand in general to allow for the acreage that would permit most species to roam free without feeling crowded. But I truly don't like the idea of cages.

On thinking it through, there will be no zoo in FatLand 3. See how useful this blog can be ? :)


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JyeQaS4aaxk

If fat people are not stigmatized..

Another area I didn't cover in FatLand 1 or 2 is sleep apnea. I have a strong feeling that a lot of the stress which led to fat people getting so-called metabolic syndrome will be completely removed, thus causing a lot of people in FatLand to be relieved or even cured of their sleep apnea.

I just keep wondering how far this can be pushed. I do talk about lower mortality rates in FatLand than even on the Other Side/USA because stress is lower, safety net is much better (health insurance is single payer and unemployment comp kicks in the minute one stops working for as long as one doesn't work) and people are just happier (camaraderie helps). But lipedema? Diabetes? Heart disease? Yes, the research shows that where fat people are not stigmatized, their rates of diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure and high cholesterol are no different than those of the non-fat population, however that is calculated. Stigma causes the same syndrome that supposed "fat" does.

And once the stigma is removed..

Maybe, maybe, we will all live as if it never existed?

FatLand Pets

Fat pets are also welcome in FatLand. They are not forced to diet, either. And they are not weighed. They are encouraged to eat a variety of foods, especially and including "people" foods, which furnish a lot of nutrition that supposed pet foods lack.

There are special parks for them, but a lot of FatLand establishments are pet-friendly, as well. There are hotels that supply pets for guests to play with and encourage the stays of personal pets, as well. There are a plethora of establishments for pet couture, as well as pet restaurants.

FatLand is Petland! (One of the ads for FatLand..)

A Dream of a Wonderful Reality

I do treat this issue, -the issue of becoming whole in FatLand after a life spent in dieting and being harassed and hated on the Other Side- somewhat in FatLand: The Early Days and in FatLand. But it is interesting to think about and exciting to write about just for the sheer joy of imagining it.

Imagine that you emigrate from The Other Side/USA while the Pro-Health and Diet Laws are still very much in effect. You have just escaped the probability of being sent to the Re-Education Center or were actually in it before someone bribed your way out. You have been told all your life on the Other Side that you are undesirable and that your eating must be monitored very closely, and that you cannot eat more than 1000-1500 calories a day, and nothing that contains certain substances. You have been told all your life that people have the right to make fun of you and harass you and sometimes torture you.

Then you reach FatLand, where you are allowed to eat anything you want, any time you want. You just don't know how to take this new freedom. At first you just eat a little more than you were allowed. You don't even go out much at first because you were so used to being harassed when you went outside, sometimes even assaulted.

The Block Counselor comes to see you and suggests activities you might enjoy. You agree to try one of them. You enjoy it very much, and also enjoy the new found camaraderie. On the way back from the activity, a couple of your new activity mates decide to go out for coffee or something stronger, and they very definitely include you in the invitation. You go with them, drink your first coffee with cream or beer in ages, and that feels incredibly good. The cheese pretzels accompanying the beer are out of this world.

When you get back to your place, you feel as if you are living in a dream. Then you realize that maybe, just maybe, the other side was a bad dream. This is reality. You have to pinch yourself to believe it.

Here's to the day when we can all live in FatLand...

I want

I want love songs written in FatLand. I want love songs to people in FatLand written in FatLand. I want people -young and old- to develop crushes on FatLanders. I want FatLand erotica. I want FatLand porn. I want comedies, dramas, romances, tragedies, existential monologues written in and about FatLand.

I want FatLand crossword puzzles and in jokes. I want FatLand specialties in fashion and food and politics.

I want FatLand protest songs and folk songs. I want a list of FatLand artists, singers, writers, sculptors, union leaders..ah. YES. I want FatLand unions and work coops. More on this later.

Two and a half hours left

Two and a half hours left to get your FREE copy of FatLand: The Early Days on Amazon Kindle.

The promo was unexpectedly interesting. It gave me a chance to reach out to friends instead of  staying holed up in my own corner.

It was also fun writing some of the ad-like posts. If it were to last longer and intersect with Halloween, I would write some zombie and vampire posts, even though there are no zombies or vampires in FatLand. Hmm..Stark might come close, though.

I hope that everyone who got a copy is enjoying FatLand: The Early Days.

It was also fun to see the FLTED's Amazon rank keep getting lower (that means more books sold). It has mostly gone back down now. But that's how it goes.

I would like to thank everyone who reposted links, offered encouragement and took the time to comment here.

And when you're finished reading, please question or comment here.

Another good reason for FatLand

Yet another wonderful thing about FatLand: If you make a friend, you're not afraid that you'll lose the friendship if someone starts referring negatively to fat people. I say this because today, someone suggested that I join his circle of musical friends. We are all interested in folk music, in listening to it and in some cases, in writing, whether music or lyrics. Great.

But I know very well that the minute one of them makes a nasty comment about fat or fat people or weight, I will be on the defensive. And if I can't convince him or her that such comments are unwarranted and bigoted, I will probably have to leave.

Once upon a time people just swallowed such comments, smiled and felt awful. Not any more.

I actually added Fat Acceptance to my profile on FB a few weeks ago.. I hoped people would understand from the entry that I will not tolerate bigoted remarks about fat people, about my own body, for that matter. It has not worked as well as I wished.

Yet another good reason to have FatLand..

Dystopia?

I guess most authors feel a bit sad when they read the first negative review of their work. It happened to me today.

It was from someone in Australia who likes male-written horror stories and men's menage a trois stories (three men). I can sort of see where FatLand (the review was for FatLand 1, not The Early Days) might leave him/her (I don't know the gender) a bit disappointed :) He/she commented that FatLand sounded fascistic because people there were told what to do.

Yes, the Constitution of FatLand forbade dieting and scales.

I thought he/she didn't quite have a handle on Fat Acceptance. Then again, most people outside the movement probably don't.

And that is why Amazon styled FatLand: The Early Days dystopian fiction. Can you imagine...being forbidden to diet and weigh yourself. Enough to make one...celebrate! Those are two "rights" most fat people are very very happy to have taken from them.

I then realized that to some non-fat people, those rights perhaps matter more. Maybe it is actually fascistic to take away the rights of thinner people to weight themselves and to diet. But guess what: it is doubly fascistic to stigmatize, harass, shame and insist on people changing their bodies to suit an image. Somehow that simply didn't occur to this person.

I did see that the person actually read a book on fat and stigmatizing. Maybe there is some hope.

If FatLand is a "dystopia," I'll take it any day over this supposed less-than-utopia that is our anti-fat country and culture.

Oh..and he/she gave Grapes of Wrath one star, lower even than FatLand in his/her review. At least I'm in good company.

Winston Stark, Sandor Foreman and FatLand

The financier behind a lot of FatLand's original infrastructure was, as some of you know by now, a man named Winston Stark.

Winston Stark did not have a very strong moral underpinning. He tended to invest where he could make money. He thought he could make money on selling fat people a lot of guilt in the forms of diet pills, diet foods, diet drinks, Health Clubs/Exercise Clubs/Gyms with the message of "Get those pounds down now." He thought that FatLanders would fall for these like a ton of bricks.

He was very very wrong.

In the early days of FatLand, because of his contributions to FatLand's roads, electricity grid, farming efforts, industry, transport and other areas, the Board of FatLand let his gyms more or less alone. However, a FatLander named Sandor Foreman founded a business of his own called GymNotTrim. He emphasized very very strongly that the objective of GymNotTrim was for FatLanders to enjoy themselves and not worry about losing or gaining weight. To underscore his message, he added bar-restaurants in every GymNotTrim that sold delicious snacks of many kinds, as well as tasty drinks, some alcoholic, some not. He also added spice to GymNotTrim activities by creating Midnight Swims and ChunkyDunk Evenings, as well as competitions between FatLanders in different games and sports. GymNotTrim even boasted a library, computers and legacy board games and card games.

So, in effect, Winston Stark's Complete Fitness franchises lost so much ground to Foreman's GymNotTrim that he was pushed out. He retaliated by trying to get Foreman to merge, undercut Foreman's message on the Other Side/USA by implying that GymNotTrim was going to change its policy and emphasis (untrue) and then tried to have Foreman indicted for trying to negate the agreement between them.

Stark thought of FatLanders as ungrateful. Margaret Clancy tried to explain to Stark, who lusted after her and may even have loved her, that FatLanders did not wish to hear the message that they were inferior, which leaked out of every CompleteFitness poster and ad.

"They don't know all that I've done for them," Stark said, "and what might happen if I decide to charge them for it."

"They would be a lot more grateful if you stopped trying to shove CompleteFitness down their throats."

"That bastard (referring to Foreman) stole my clients."

"He didn't steal them. He had ideas that they liked."

"The hell he did. I'll get him yet."

You won't, Margaret thought.


But in order to find out if Stark did "get" Foreman, you have to read FatLand 3 :))


FatLand, The Early Days will be available FREE until the end of October 20!!

Dystopian novels??? No - Fatopian! Glitch has been resolved.

Kind of fun. In the new classification, FatLand is listed as a "dystopian" science fiction trilogy. Funny. I thought that FatLand was a utopia, or a "fatopia," a wonderful word and description coined by Tracey L. Thompson, of Fatropolis fame.

The part that is dystopian is the Other Side/USA. They maintain a rigid hold over laws purporting to be related to health and diet, which of course cause many fat people to flee to FatLand. FatLand, it seems to me is a utopia of sorts, a "fatopia."

The more I think about being able to live in a place in which I am accepted and welcomed in spite of my shape or what I weigh, the happier I am when I think of living in FatLand.

The glitch from yesterday has been resolved. FatLand: The Early Days is inded available in Kindle on Amazon for FREE. However, you have to enter "FatLand: The Early Days" in Kindle Store.

For fun, go down to where the rank is listed and read what it says :P

Amazon glitch, Love Your Body Day

Today was supposed to begin the offer of a free Kindle FatLand: The Early Days on Amazon. It seems that this is not happening, for some reason. I am really sorry. It was so much fun to publicize, and I loved the idea of being able to offer it for free for five days, in honor of Love Your Body Day.

But let us think about Love Your Body Day.

So many negative words about our bodies, especially but not only women's bodies, and so much negative energy attached to words about our bodies has crashed into the ethos that it is no wonder that almost all of us hate our bodies unless we actually make the effort to talk to people who believe otherwise. It is a radical notion, not to compare our bodies to those on the covers of magazines, until we learn a) that there is NOTHING WRONG with any body shape, and that b) even the women on the covers of these magazines don't look like they look there. Airbrushed and photoshopped out of their natural appearance, they become something resembling mannequins - wait, they ARE mannequins, in a way. Just slightly more lifelike than the ones in the windows.

So whether or not Amazon fixes the glitch that caused FatLand: The Early Days not to switch over to "Free" for five days, we can certainly honor Love Your Body Day -today, October 16- by thinking about how wonderful it is that bodies DO come in all shapes and sizes, and honor FatLand itself by being glad that it exists for people who do *not* believe in body hatred!

Cass Auditorium - For the best singer of them all

Mama Cass was beautiful, fat and a superb singer, possibly one of the best rock-folk rock singers of all time.
She was the one who gave the Mamas and Papas pizzazz and piquancy. She was the one at whom keys were tossed, of whom autographs were begged, the one whose fan club was largest.

And yet John Phillips didn't want to let her into the Mamas and Papas because she was too fat. (Too fat for what? For people to love her? She proved him completely wrong.)

He just didn't understand the draw, the fun, and that the Mamas and Papas brand clicked because of the contrast between blond, thin, somewhat aloof Michelle and exuberant, large, endearing Cass. The male voices basically backed up the female voices, except on a few songs.

If a FatLand had existed for Mama Cass, she wouldn't have had to go on semi-starvation diets, and she wouldn't have died of a heart attack directly attributed to her yo-yo dieting, done because she didn't fit certain strict parameters of allowed weights or shaped. She would have been an idol for longer and would have sung into a ripe and happy old age.

As it is, there is an auditorium named for her in FatLand - Cass Auditorium, on Chastain Boulevard. At the foot of the steps, on the right column, there is a plaque.


Ellen Naomi Cohen/Mama Cass/Cass Eliot 
 September 19, 1941 – July 29, 1974

The best singer of them all.

Gay and transgender people in FatLand

I have not spoken much about gay people in FatLand.

There were certainly a fair number of gay people who came to FatLand in its earliest days. As a matter of fact, there were four gay people in the house in which the participants in the TV show "Living Fat and Happy" lived, the original FatLand House - two women, two men.

FatLanders of course in the early years had many other battles to fight than that of gender orientation and identity, so they may not have cared much about it when they were  trying to get FatLand built and negotiating so that it would maintain its status as a sovereign territory. But somehow it didn't really come up that much later, either. FatLanders seem(ed) to be a pretty tolerant bunch, which is just as well. I did not deal with, say, public displays of affection or gay gatherings or bars. I think that will belong to FatLand 3.

And transgender people weren't mentioned at all in the first two volumes of FatLand. They will play a larger role in FatLand 3, as well.

FatLand fantasy

I like many kinds of men, and for many different reasons. (No, I did not sample that new drug called "Lybrido.") And yes, I'm talking emotionally, romantically, sexually here. This does not mean that I feel compelled to do anything about my feelings most of the time. I imagine that some of these men like or would like me, and some wouldn't or don't. That's the way the cookie crumbles.

But I do have a special FatLand fantasy. It was covered partly in FatLand 2; Angela, one of the female protagonists, is in love with Paul, a brilliant Mondo sized man with a keen sense of humor and elegant sarcasm. She sort of tries to tell him. No more, or it would spoil the rest of the story.

Karen -Angela's close friend, and the person who co-produced the show "Living Fat and Happy"- also falls in love with Paul. Will not say more about this, either.

Jimmy, the great communicator of the house in which "Living Fat and Happy" takes place, at first considers Paul a rival, then starts to respect and appreciate him.

Mondo-sized - weighing more than 400 pounds. I have loved a couple of men who fit that description. (Um, not at the same time..although that could have been interesting..)

Pets in FatLand

Pets weren't given top priority over the first few years in FatLand. But then, when things settled down, it turned out that many FatLand pets had the same issues as FatLand people; they were pushed to lose weight when it just wasn't necessary.

FatLand started to offer veterinary services as a profession for which people could train at various levels when they were unemployed or when they wished to switch professions. It became one of the most popular career switch alternatives and training modules.

FatLand also built quite few dog parks. Their veterinarians felt that cat parks wouldn't be a big draw, but it turned out that there were several hills that cats liked to frequent when they went out. So FatLand set an informal watch on favorite cat haunts, just to make sure that the cats remained safe and to feed any that seemed hungry. There was a heated debate over whether stray cats should be trapped and sent to cat shelters, but it turned out that there were so many cat enthusiasts in FatLand that none of the strays stayed strays for long. They were brought to veterinarians, checked, spayed or neutered, given FatLand cat collars and lots of good food, hugs and room for playing.

Cosmetics et al, reminder

Cosmetics companies and cosmetologists, as well as trainers and pharmaceutical salespeople,  must show that they do not discriminate against or shame fat people. Their requests to sell products in FatLand are, however, much more likely to be approved if they can show that they feature fat people in their ads and that the products they sell benefit fat people especially. The last is a slippery slope because diet products are forbidden in FatLand, as are diet ads. So "benefit" here has to be defined as making fat people feel good or happy without reference to their size(s).

Reminder: FatLand 2 will be free from October 16-October 21 on Amazon Kindle to honor Love Your Body Day!

FatLand: The Early Days, Love Your Body Day, and a love note to her body from Frannie

FatLand: The Early Days, aka FatLand 2, will be featured FREE on Amazon Kindle from October 16-October 21 in honor of Love Your Body Day on October 16. I like that for a few reasons. Not only do people who have not yet read FatLand: The Early Days get to read it free, but FatLand 2 does indeed honor and offer up people who love their bodies and other people's fat bodies.

How does one love one's body? Does one give it chocolate and roses and perfumed lotions? Does one write little notes to it and tell it that you have a date with it and are going to do amazing things to it later on? Those are certainly two ways to love one's body.

One might also consider writing a letter to it.

Dear Body,

You and I have been together for more than 59 years. In that time we have been appreciated and vilified and yelled at and smiled at. We have been in many places that we liked and quite a few that we hated. We have tried on clothes that made us feel very good and clothes in which no one could feel good, not even the people who modeled them.

We have hugged those we treasured. We have cooked together and written together and thought together. We have felt breezes softly invading our every pore and heat pouring down into every crevice. We have braved torrential rains and laughed through snowfalls.

Look, you know I haven't always liked the way you looked. There were so many times along the way when I didn't know better and tried to starve you. You told me very plainly, each time, that this was not going to happen, and made sure that you gained back all the weight, and more, that I lost by not giving you what you needed.

But now that I have made my peace with you, body, I want you to know that I rather appreciate your sticking with me all this time and breathing and walking and eating and thinking and, yes, loving. There are people we treasure, although we don't know how long they can be with us. For them, body, let's try to stay more or less happy and get some sleep and not yell at ourselves when we don't do all that we think we should have in a given time period.

Let's hold them close and tell them they are precious to us. And body, I know you are saying, "She whats me?" And I say, as per Fiddler On The Roof, "for 59 years, I've cooked your meals, sat with you, starved with you, fought with you, had your brainchldren (aka books), shivered through cold, sweated through heat, walked through green grass and autumn sun. If that isn't love...what is?"

Hugs, body. And thanks for all the memories.

Love, Frannie

Punishment for Diet Haranguers in FatLand

A hypnotist who did parties and gatherings tried to hypnotize me into losing weight and following a "good" diet when I was 17 by trying to suggest to my semi-conscious mind that since I liked fruit, I should eat a lot of it.

This reminded me that FatLand has clearly indicated punishments for people who try to harass or shame anyone for his or her weight in FatLand. However, the line drawn between "diet" and "eating healthily" is not quite as clear. I am thinking now that it needs to be made a lot clearer in FatLand 3. The problem of course is that here in the USA, or in the world, for that matter, there is no such thing as the one perfect diet for everyone to follow, whether for losing or gaining or maintaining or just being healthy (however one defines healthy, and even that is not superclear, either).

How to punish people who try to make FatLanders "diet" in FatLand..simply tell the offenders that if another instance of this behavior occurs, they will not be welcome? But there should be some cathartic confrontation between the offenders and the offendees. How to do that and have it not sound like one of those ridiculous daytime shows...

And how do we keep FatLanders from looking too much at anti-fat healthist media sites? Perhaps that is a subject for another post.

FatLand and older people

My mom's stomach was upset today. At least I hope that is all it was. She is 85, and I get anxious every time she gets some kind of health problem, even if it is temporary. She already has enough of them.

In FatLand, insurance, which is single payer, covers all care needed by older people because it covers all care needed by everyone. Thus there is no schism between "them" and "us" because there is no "them" and there is no "us." Everyone receives care in her or his own home. There are also a few communities which cater to those over 70, and a few that cater to those over 90. There are three Mondo communities, as well, which cater to the Mondo sized.

People can work as long as they wish, as well.

The nicest part of all of this is that in FatLand, no one is ridiculed as she or he gets older. For anything.

Back stories: Escape from the Other Side

There are so many wonderful back stories to FatLand, including some escape attempts from the Other Side with the help of FatLanders and FatandProud, the organization on the Other Side responsible for sending members and others to safety when they had been assigned to Reeducation Centers.

Today's Fat Poets Speak blog entry is a poem by a FatLander who is remembering her escape on a flight arranged by FatAir -FatLand's airline- FatLand, and FatandProud. It was kind of a daring maneuver by FatAir and FatLand because if it had been discovered, FatAir could no longer have flown in US airspace and its license would have been revoked. Thirty refugees piled into a FatAir jet that also included other, non-Americans and non-refugees. As soon as she counted all of them and made sure they were safely aboard, the captain took off.

The escapees/refugees cheered loudly and long when the plane touched down. Some of them cried.

It was only known later that FIN, the FatLand Intelligence Network, orchestrated the entire proceeding.

Sports and FatLand

Sports were never absent from FatLand. Even in the very early years when there were no organized leagues, FatLanders played on their own teams. FatLand men seemed determined to prove that they could be as athletic as their slimmer counterparts on the Other Side. FatLand women, free of the stigma which haunted them as they tried to exercise and participate in sports on the Other Side, exulted in feeling their bodies move.

Ironically FatLand served as a refuge for the football players whose BMI's were considered too high for health on the Other Side during the sway of the Health and Diet Laws. Some of them had trouble adjusting to life in FatLand and to observing the rules pertaining to not harassing FatLanders. Others adjusted beautifully. Although FatLand did not have formal relations with the Other Side/USA for a long time, their sports teams participated in Olympic and international games, with the FatLand team crushing the USA team in American football. High schools in FatLand gleefully boasted of their teams on websites and provoked angry putdowns from USA teams.

This ended up being one of the roots of anti-fat sites on the Other Side, one of which was to prove fatal to Amiyah, the beautiful Egyptian belly dancer who toured often in FatLand.

FatLand, Fatropolis and weddings

In Fatropolis, the story of a bright, attractive fat woman who finds her way into another, fat-welcoming dimension via a portal in a clothing store in Manhattan, Tracey L. Thompson does some really scrumptious things with weddings. I am slightly embarrassed to note that weddings have not played a very large role in my life, so I don't tend to think about them a lot. (When my partner and I married, we did so at City Hall. I think he went back to work and then I went back to work that day. No, actually we went back to work the next day. No honeymoon, either.)

But perhaps they deserve to be thought about. In FatLand 3, a couple of wedding halls will make their appearance. Previously people received licenses through the FatLand Board and held wedding parties in their own homes. But FatLand is growing up now.

Perhaps it deserves to have places in which brides can wear lacy, frothy, silken veils and gowns and trains and carry flowers and throw the bouquet and compile wedding albums and such.

FatLand, refugees and fleeing

In FatLand 1, it turns out that it may not always be a good idea to emphasize that people came as refugees to FatLand, with no other alternative. Why?  Because it makes the children of the refugees feel less pride in their parents. This is unfortunate in many many ways.

The kids of the emigres (and most people in FatLand are emigres in the first generation) feel as if they somehow have to counteract their parents' "helpless" status, even though being courageous enough to flee from the Other Side was probably a heroic act in itself. So they purposely cross lines and push the envelope. They visit the Other Side in secret. They meet anti-FatLand people. They participate in blogs with fat-haters.

Don't want to put in spoilers, so I won't tell what happens next :)

FatLand, doctors and diabetes

I am imagining, right now, what it would be like a) to go to a supermarket without anyone looking at what is in one's cart  b) to go to a supermarket devoid of  "diet" foods.

There was an extended discussion by the FatLand Board before the first supermarket opened in FatLand because they were talking about exactly this - what constitutes a "diet" food.

What is interesting is in FatLand, people with Type 2 diabetes don't alter their diets much. What is also interesting is that there are very few people in FatLand with diabetes.

FatLand doctors believe that stress and stigmatizing contributed/contribute to people's developing diabetes as much as their genetics. They also believe that being fat does not cause someone to get diabetes. They do not monitor blood sugar unless someone asks or someone is sick and they end up taking a lot of tests. They also make certain that they have three successive readings of what they consider high sugar levels before they decide someone has diabetes. And guess what? Often they go with the over 140 level. And if the person is tall and fat, they won't assign a "diabetes" label unless that person has a fasting blood sugar level of over 160.

They emphasize two things then: exercise and having fun. Sometimes that is enough to drop the sugar level. Sometimes it is not. But freedom from worry and stress seems to be a very big part of mortality, or indeed low levels of it, from diabetes or anything else in FatLand.

Sex work in FatLand

A very interesting question, among others, will come up in FatLand 3. People will be asking if sex work in FatLand should be legal and legalized.

For quite a few years after FatLand began, there was no paid sex work in FatLand because not enough people (mostly men at this point) considered themselves attractive enough for sex workers to want them. This started to change after men in FatLand began to feel attractive. Then of course the women in FatLand, after the same kind of counselling and after years of feeling welcomed and accepted, started to feel sexy and charming.

And guess what? They wanted to have the option of male companions.

This sent some of the males in FatLand to the media screaming.