The dark zeitgeist

There lies a dark zeitgeist in every epoch. With industrialism, the dark darks of the worker began to emerge. With colonialism, the light eclipsed on the colonized races. And yet for so long the question of Women remained unexplored, unchallenged, unnoticed.

For a long time, the question of the Woman was the dark zeitgeist of modernity.

But that too has come to pass. This is not to say that Race, Class, or Gender have ceased to become important or that the battles have been won. But they are no longer hidden. They are no longer dark history. They are history brought to light from the depths of Humanity's darkness. The problem is exposed, hence the light of the Modernity can shine upon them.

Yet, just as every new birth comes a new death, the dark zeitgeist have shifted. It has shifted into the shadows and now everyone bears within them the danger of becoming the ultimate ignored minority, and that is the Fatness.

But what hope can the Fat ever have in a Modern world? Unlike the modern categories of Race, Gender, and Sexuality, Fatness cannot be easily located. Yet, it is so painfully visible. No one can hide from it.

Fat is like Class, where you can hide and pretend that you are something you are not. You can put Eliza Doolittle in new clothes and she might no longer be an underclass, and so you also can have plastic surgery for your body. This continues to give the illusion that Fatness and Class are not real problems. 'Its all about mobility,' the capitalists chant from the 19th century till today, and their cronies echo those words. Marx reacted, unions were formed, and the world was re-humanized to take into consideration the importance of treating each other Humanely. But today, today the world chants and there is barely a whimper even from those who are mocked. It is all about self-control. Eat less. Exercise more. And we all bow our heads as if we are rightfully lectured against the great sin of eating.

We ignore the fact that weight gain is the result of the food industry and the products they put out on the market. We ignore the statistics that tell us that 'Fatness' is the norm rather than abnormal. We keep watching television and forget that every couple of years the models and actresses lose 20-30% of their weight and that becomes the new normal. We have been led to think that a size zero is normal.

In fact, it is so pervasive that all it will take in the eyes of many, is for one comment below this post to go "This must have been written by a fatty" and you are knocked off your socks laughing. Because fat is funny. It is funny because we need someone to feel superior too, and wouldn't it be nice to have a fat person reaffirm your horrible shitty lives, by pointing out how inadequate they are? You look at your own pathetic lives and wonder what happened to your relationships, your money, your future, and you have no idea how everything have gone so wrong. But hey! At least you have self control. At least you exercise. Look! You aren't fat. That makes you better. Maybe things aren't so bad.

In the same way Men used to go home to beat up and rape their wives, frustrated colonialists torture slaves, and Workers bully each other into submission, you too have your underclass. And no one will see it, because it is hidden.

When the day comes and all this is made light of, the world will once again wonder how the past generations could have been so blind and so insane to have treated others so badly. But for now, no one will give a shit. Nothing will change. At least, not in my lifetime.