Skinny Island: Part 2 (Patreon)

Kelly

Today was the fourteenth day of our protest here on Skinny Island. I expected to be amazed at the horrific treatment I received from the locals, but that isn’t what ended up happening at all. Actually, it turns out that all the people here know how to do when they see someone who doesn’t fit in is smile and wave from a distance. They don’t go out of their way to avoid us in any conspicuous way; no, they just make sure to give the other girls and me a wide berth when we walk around. Even in otherwise crowded areas, they make sure to keep at least an extra foot or two of space away from us like if they get too close, they’ll catch our obesity. It’d be funny if they did. What I would give to watch all these bony islanders trying desperately to keep to their company-promoted, mandated diets only to completely fail over and over until everyone just gives up. Get a McDonalds in here and it’s all over.

I guess the idea of “locals” existing here at all is the most insane thing to me. That’s what I’m REALLY amazed by. Up until only 17 years ago, there were no people living on the island. Then, I don’t know if it was like a social media meetup thing or something that companies planned in advance or what, but people started coming to live here.

I find that unbelievable. There were people from all over the world who decided to leave their jobs, their homes, their families, their countries, and everything they’d grown up knowing to come here and live on an island in the middle of the ocean JUST to make sure they never, ever had to see a fat person ever again. Seriously, how fucked is that? That a person could have bought into diet culture so heavily that they would rather leave behind everything they’ve ever known and loved to start a new sovereign nation where the core of their identity is based on starving themselves to death for fashion. These people aren’t sexy. They’re sick.

The food, the ads, and even the music is about being skinny. Everything here is marketed to thinness and weight loss as if anyone here needs to lose more weight. I mean, except for us anyways. It’s hard just to maintain the weight I already have. I woke up today and had to put on my stretchy blue bikini for the pool not because I needed the extra room, but because my other stuff is getting so loose that I needed the elastic to contract eno

ugh to keep myself covered.

(1)

Xiang

Dear Diary…

I gotta say this place is a lot less terrible than I expected. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still like super entrenched in it’s “skinny only” policy super hard, but I feel like that’s more of the companies and government than the people. Everyone else just kinda….seems to like being thin. They even have pop songs devoted to it and as much as I feel like it goes against everything I stand for, I’ve got one stuck in my head. It’s like…

I wake up every morning, feeling bright and light

My body’s thin and small, it feels like I just might take flight

I hit the ground with love to spare

I’m loving this, fat can’t compare

Pretty, pretty, I’m so skinny

I’m so hot for all to see

Skinny, pretty, and sexy me

Thinspo’s what I’m meant to be

I eat light and never binge

I know that skinny always wins!

I feel confident and beautiful, inside and out

I’m rocking this life, and I’m never gonna doubt

Pretty, pretty, I’m so skinny

I’m so hot for all to see

Skinny, pretty, and sexy me

Thinspo’s what I’m meant to be

Life is too short, to be held back

By a body that’s causing you pain

Take control, and make a change

You’ll be loving the way you feel, and the beauty you’ll gain

….Yeah… It’s awful, but it’s super catchy and upbeat. I hate myself for liking it as much as I do and I know it annoys the shit out of Val, but at least the message is about loving yourself.

That’s one of the things I’ve noticed here. I really do feel like people think I’m pretty, but they don’t really know how to interact with someone my size. Granted, I’ve lost weight since I arrived, but that’s to be expected in a place where a 500 calorie meal is considered “a big lunch”.  But I am starting to realize that many of these people haven’t seen a fat person in over a decade. I met an Asian girl (whoop whoop!) at the mall and she came right up to me to ask about my Bopo Club here on the island. She was so tiny and SO thin but super sweet and full of questions for me about what it was like being my size. It was only when she asked if it hurt to be fat that I thought to ask how hold she was.

(2)

Fifteen. This girl had been born and raised on the island, and while she knew they existed, she’d never seen a plus size person outside of history books. History books. I couldn’t believe it. Obesity on this island is taught as a bygone era, not an epidemic crisis. This girl had never even SEEN a non-pregnant woman over 115 pounds in her entire life. She still did the typical thing and nagged me to slim down after I told her I wasn’t on any of the popular diets, but she seemed immensely eager to join the club.

Fat Beauty on Skinny Island is starting to gain some traction!

(3)

Valentina

Day 14.

302 Pounds.

The amount of brainwashing on this island is unreal. They play weight loss reality shows even when all the contestants are skinny. They have pop songs DEDICATED to being thin. Even the other girls I came with are singing along to that shit now and it’s actually kind of pissing me off. We came here to shut this place down not dance around to “pretty pretty, I’m so skinny” every five fucking minutes. I swear it was bad enough hearing it over the speakers everywhere but having Xiang singing it too is making me want to commit felonies of a violent nature.

I must be the only one too since everyone else is all so ridiculously nice. I know that on it’s face this sounds like a good thing, but I can’t just ignore my instincts here. No one is this nice. No one is that well adjusted. You mean to tell me that on a multinational island absolutely drenched in weight loss propaganda that NO ONE is insecure about their weight? No one is rude or nasty? NO ONE ever gets into a fight or bitches out a cop at a traffic stop?

There isn’t even any law enforcement to MAKE traffic stops. But everyone just keeps on going, making sure to buy new clothes or attend a workout session or join/attend a diet club and just worship malnutrition all day. Everyone seems happy on the surface.

People still walk around me like I’m infectious and gawk at me while pretending not to, but the more time I spend here the more accustomed to seeing me the locals seem. I hate how perfect this place is when you’re not thinking about the obvious issues with the entire concept of an entire culture dedicated to being as thin as possible. Especially since it works.

…That’s another problem. I’m losing weight. Fast.

Like too fast to be normal. I have been ritualistically logging my weight every day as a means of tracking how I am doing without as many calories and as a way to demonstrate the crash diet effect on new island inhabitants.

…But this can’t be real.

I stepped on my bedside scale and weighed myself this morning and saw that I was only 302 pounds. I know that sounds crazy, but as I look back I can see my weight drop incrementally. 380, 374, 368, 362, 356, 350, 344, 338, 332, 326, 320, 314, 308, 302.

How the fuck am I losing SIX POUNDS per day? It can’t be possible. Tomorrow will be a crazy one for me if this keeps up too. I haven’t been below 300 pounds since I was a kid and it looks like I’m going to be there again in just 24 hours. I honestly don’t hate that, but I know it isn’t natural.

The other girls are thinner too, especially Xiang. It’s weird because I don’t even really notice too much when we’re just hanging out. They seem normal to me until I go back and read my older entries and realize how fast we’re shrinking. There must be some kind of facility somewhere emitting some kind of subliminal message or…Something. I don’t know.

But I do know that I’m going to have to keep a close eye on things and make sure not to lose track of myself or why I’m here.

(4)