Women gain weight as they get older - a majority of them. According to certain studies this weight gain may even have a salutary effect and decrease their likelihood of dying from heart attacks, cancer and certain other illnesses (Analogy: pubic hair helps to filter out bacteria and keep skin in sensitive areas from being exposed to them. Kind of amazing, how ready fashion is to rob women of their natural defenses against illness).
What is truly amazing, though, is that at a certain point in their relationship with a guy, and whether or not they have actually gained any weight recently, women on the Other Side/USA are all too likely to hear their significant guy other say, "You might want to lose a little weight." (I would truly like to think that lesbian women do *not* hear as much of this, but I am not sure.)
This is one of the most devastating things a woman can hear. Ever. See, up until this point, you thought he liked you, liked your body, liked almost everything, and he rather acted as if he did. Then, seemingly out of the clear blue sky, he asks you to lose weight.
Of course most of the time it is about his being afraid of not being able to "perform" (another word I hate because it makes men sound like circus acts), and he somehow connects this with a certain weight, whether or not the claim has any basis in reality. In a way he might just as well ask you to dress up in different costumes (and that would be a whole lot more fun and not offensive). But what he hears a lot of around him is that women should be below x weight. So, with men often not being very analytical or discerning about the miasma of weight loss ads jumping onto the screen between WWW fights, he will connect the dots rather erroneously. And this lack of thorough comprehension on the part of men leaks out as, "You could stand to lose a few pounds." (And interestingly, this is voiced even when he himself weighs more than he did a few years ago, or has been fat since his youth.)
Now, for the women who hear this. They are flabbergasted. They've probably been on at least five diets in their lives, and they were feeling happy at not having to go on others. They haven't seen any telltale signs of dissatisfaction with their bodies or lovemaking or cooking or...
It is very very hard work to lose weight, probably even harder to keep it off. The hardest thing of all, however, is being able to trust your husband, to believe that you know how he feels. About you. About anything. And this volatility has its basis in confusion. Even if you did/do lose weight, then he might ask you to change your hair color. Or your bras. Once it starts, there's no telling where his efforts to rebuild you will end.
So the request itself isn't only to change your body. It is to enforce his control over your body and what you do with it.
And since in FatLand, such efforts to get someone to change her weight is forbidden, women in FatLand don't have to worry about getting sucked into the control vortex.
This in itself is probably the powerful factor in feeling good about one's body - not hearing or having to react to requests to change its appearance.
No wonder FatLand women are so happy about where they live...
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