Lookin’ Good Girl: All Eyes On You

Haley Morris-Cafiero in a photo from her series Wait Watchers

Haley Morris-Cafiero is a photographer. She’s Assistant Professor and Head of Photography at the Memphis College of Art. And she’s someone who has hypothyroidism. A condition that meant when she went away to college and stopped engaging in sports as much as she once did, her weight ballooned in a drastic way. Morris-Cafiero is someone who doesn’t stress much about her appearance. She’s happy, eats well, and is not suffering from those diseases commonly associated with obesity. She’s also not dimwitted, or lacking in willpower.

Last week a FGFS reader linked us to a Salon.com article Morris-Cafiero wrote about her project Wait Watchers. This series of photographs are something I had seen before, and I was aware of the project, but without much context. When I replied to the reader to thank them for sharing I mentioned I’d seen it before and that I’d lived the experience captured in the images.

Morris-Cafiero started taking pictures of people who mock her body in public. It’s nothing overt, but it’s truly something most of these people wouldn’t do if they knew that the camera on a tripod 20 feet away was pointed at them by proxy and was snapping away. Most of these people stand a step behind Morris-Cafiero and revel in this false anonymity.

These are images of people, in a very public way, showing their disapproval for another person’s body. As if being a larger person outside gives you licence to judge them. As if you lose your autonomy.

Our Hamilton Squad Leader, Carly, and I once talked about this project months ago. Carly told me when she showed it to her dude he asked her if this happens to her. “All the time,” was her reply.

I live with social anxiety. A component of this disorder means that I’m hyper aware of the people around me, and I’m also compulsively, often irrationally, concerned with how they are perceiving me. I see what both Carly and Morris Cafiero said they have experienced all the time. This happens to me.  Depending on my level of stress it can hurt and affect me deeply. Beyond that even, it’s important to note that humans are evolutionarily primed to detect if something is looking at them. Our limited peripheral vision hones in on stimuli and information that suggests that something is looking at us, so we might run away from those sets of eyes should they want to eat us. We’ve all experienced that feeling of someone staring at us even though our back is turned.

We feel your eyes on us. Do you realize our eyes are on you?

So why is this a Lookin’ Good Girl column this week? Maybe I just wanted to share our experiences, or wanted to let people know we plan to stare back. Or, mainly I just wanted to tell you you’re lookin’ good.

We interact with a lot of our readers and it’s the highlight of our days. You’re all so bright and loving. So talented and humble. You’re also the best company a girl could ask for. With you we can change perceptions. Shine some light on all the BS and have some damn fun.

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Lookin’ Good Girl: Leigh van Maaren on “A Girl of Your Size…”

“A girl of your size should dress more conservatively.”

I received this call from a co-worker on my day off from a student job I had a few years ago. At the time, I wasn’t a very flashy dresser.  Every single skirt I own from that time is in my pile of almost knee-length, ‘family-appropriate’ skirts.  My shorts were no shorter than mid-thigh. I wore hosiery year-round and made sure that a cardigan or blazer always covered my arms. I wore shapewear every single day. I didn’t want to offend anybody with my fatness – and yet, it turns out my existence as a fat person was still offending one of my co-workers. I was both hurt and furious.

When I left that job, I decided I was going to wear anything and everything that I wanted. I’d wear my skirts and shorts as short as I wanted, sheer tops, stop wearing shapewear, and embrace every style that I’d ever been told a “bigger girl” shouldn’t wear. The years of my mother’s gentle reminders to make sure that my stomach was fully covered and suggestions that I try harder to lose weight fuelled the fire. I’d wear crop tops. I’d wear bikinis. I’d buy those bold patterns and weird garments that I’d always loved but thought, “when would I wear that? It’s too much.”

Any time. That’s when I’d wear it. Any time I thought it would make me feel awesome.

With that call, I realized that even in adulthood there’s just no pleasing some people. Trying to be an ‘inoffensive’ fat person hadn’t made me happy and despite my best efforts, narrow-minded people were still offended by my body. I had been trying to please people who have nothing better to do than to police other’s bodies, and I was done. I was just going to worry about making myself happy.

Coming in direct contact with the kind of person that was making me feel like I needed to obsessively cover myself made me realize just how pointless it is to care about the opinions of people that petty. It’s pointless to worry about what other people think of your body because it’s just a vessel for the other, more awesome parts of you. You’re the one that has to live in it, and what should matter most is that it’s doing what you need it to do.

That incident made me want to make a statement. As the owner of a highly politicized body, clothes are my way of showing people that I give zero fucks about their opinion of what ‘girls of my size’ should wear. I wear what makes me happy. I wear clothes that make me feel like the strong, creative, fierce person that I am. And I don’t fucking care what you think.

 

Leigh van Maaren is a new Toronto-based fashion blogger and Advertising student at OCADU. You can find her blog at curvyleigh.com & curvyleigh.tumblr.com.