just one more thing for the morning. then i SWEAR i will do nothing but international relations reading for the rest of the day. well, except for coffee with the union rep, but i figure that's justifiable.

here is the capstone in a really fantastically ridiculously shortsightedly upsettingly fat-phobic series in the des moines register. my favorite bit is this:

"Anyone who has an overweight child who gets teased at school knows the emotional pain that accompanies extra pounds. Everyone is hurt by obesity, and everyone has a responsibility to help battle it."

let me just say: AAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGHHH! this is the sort of thinking i ran up against a lot as a fat child. we know the bullies are mean (said the authority figures), but ultimately it's your fault for being fat in the first place. that pain comes from you, not from them. i always left post-bully-incident conversations with teachers and principals and the like feeling as if they wanted to end their pseudosympathetic responses with a couple of well-placed pejoratives. "we're going to do everything we can to stop this...you big fat tub of lard."

see big fat blog, linked at right, for more on this one.