Go West Young Woman

Last weekend, Dan Savage, who writes for Slog, wrote a “satirical” post as a response to an Iowa senator using old, debunked statistics in an attempt to take down gay marriage in the buckeye state.

To do this, Dan suggests:

Iowa should ban fat marriage. There are, according to the state of Iowa, more than 1.4 million obese people living in Iowa. That’s nearly 30% of the state’s population, and those numbers just keep rising. The social costs of Iowa’s obesity epidemic are pretty staggering—and those costs include including premature death and lower average life expectancies for Iowans.

Lindy West, a fatastic, fabulous blogger, who also writes for Slog, responded with great thoughts as to why Dan is (and always has been) a fatty hater.

Then Dan responds, reprimanding Lindy for cherry picking offensive quotes from his past articles.  Yet, he is guilty of the same thing in his post about gay marriage.  He cites an article that is based on a 2007 study covered on the BBC about weight gain being “contagious.”  I’ve already stated my thoughts on that ludicrous assertion here, but Dan’s misuse of this article and reconstruction of his own blogging history is what is most disheartening.

Another egregious misstep Dan makes is not addressing or condemning fatty haters who comment to his blog posts all throughout.  If he truly wanted to show he isn’t prejudice against fat people, he would defend us.  Instead, he response to Lindy by doing his own cherry-picking from past articles “proving” he isn’t prejudice.  And, he disables comments!  What a wuss.

Here’s an example of a comment of hate:

I don’t care, fat people are A.) expensive and 2.) SO annoying when sitting next to one any airplane. Christ, MUST you all breath SO loud?! I know you just walked 200 yards in short bursts which is more exercise than probably your collective life, but JESUS H, STFU. It’s like sitting next to Vader.

AND

Back in 2004, Dan reacted to the angry responses with snide remarks.

One woman stated:

I stand a glorious five foot two and weigh a beautiful 450 pounds. My fellow sisters and I apologize to no one for our looks. We were born this way. THE HATE MUST STOP!

Dan’s response?

First off, you were born five foot two, 450 pounds? Did your mother burst like a seedpod?

Next to this particular column sits a disgusting cartoon portraying a 450 pound baby bursting out of her mother.  It is anti-fat, anti-woman and anti-fellow human being.

Basically, I’m calling bull*hit, Dan.

You put up old arguments that don’t hold water, and when you play the “I was a fat kid card,” you demean all those kids who couldn’t lose the weight because of genetics.  You are not one of us Dan.  Your stance on issues of weight is full of vitriol and resentment.

Dan, the obvious antipathy you have for fat people feels personally motivated. I wonder if you chide your inner child by lashing out against we who weren’t able to grow out of our baby fat.