Will You See Wall-E?
Sorry for the sporadic updating this week. There were some back end issues with the blog (they should be resolved for now), I had a couple of interviews to do (one for Japanese television, which I definitely will need to write a report on at some point, especially because I’m pretty sure one of the camera guys actually zoomed in on my fat so god only knows how that will turn out), and there was a family emergency. Oh, also work has been insane and I am teaching over the summer. So there you go: lots of things happening this week.
In the meantime, are you planning to see Wall-E this weekend? (Follow that link to read our previous discussion about the film.) Red No. 3 has some thoughts about the movie as well:
Indeed, it seems like Pixar is actually being quite subtle and I suspect their use of fat shorthand will appeal to a variety of different fat prejudices. Essentially, fat is cautionary in the film. A sign of humanity’s downfall in the future. But that’s all it is. A sign, a symbol to represent something else. That can be useful sometimes, but here the effect is far more crass. Rather than making a complex point about consumerism or over-consumpsion of resources, they just rely on people’s fear and disgust of fat. Forget all the valid complaints about those things. They’ll make you FAT! That fear can be so base for people, that it doesn’t matter if someone thinks of fat as a consequences of personal irresponsibility or corporate neglect. Both will feel the fear of fat and attach their own nuanced prejudices onto that.
Wow, that’s way more profound than I can be this Friday. So who’s going to see the movie? If you see it, please report back in this thread!
Posted by mo pie
Filed under: Feel Good Friday, Meta, Movies, Tidbit
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Hello. Great job. This is a great story. Thanks!
Being a busy college student, I kind of fell out of my body acceptance blog readership for a while. I went to see Wall-E having not heard about the controversy, and I think that honestly people are reading a lot more prejudice into the film (or rather, the previews, placing judgment on the film without actually seeing it) than it deserves.
I have always been overweight. I clarify this to make sure my perspective is understood.
I loved Wall-E. I thought it was one of the most thoughtful kid’s movies I’ve ever seen, with a really good set of themes and messages. Fatness in the film doesn’t represent the downfall of society – merely a bi-product of a lifestyle of complete inactivity.
I think those who find this offensive assume that it is perpetuating the stereotype that all fat people are lazy, and that people only become fat through laziness. I just don’t see this in the film, and I actually find it mildly offensive to read this into the story. The reason I find this interpretation offensive is because it seems counter-active to our stated goal of body acceptance.
As a general statement about the human body, if you stayed in a state of complete inactivity while continuing to intake food as you normally would, our general understanding would tell us that this would lead to gaining weight. I cannot envision that, after generations of living in complete inactive states, surrounded by personal media to the point of near isolation, our bodies would be able to maintain what we consider a “normal” range of weight.
Why do I think that seeing this as fat hate is counter to body acceptance? If we want the media to reflect reality in the body types they show, I don’t think its right to instantly see a representation of a body image that is not exactly how we would like to see it as offensive. While I understand that the knee jerk reaction to assume fat=bad in the media is due to a lack of representation of positive heavy forms, I still think that the message in this film is being lost by oversimplifying it (especially by those who judge without seeing it in context).
There are fat people who are lazy. There are thin people who are lazy. There are fat people who are fat due to inactivity and too many calories, just as there are fat people who are heavy due solely to genetics. Wall-E is not saying fatness is the problem. The problem is inactivity. The problem is living a life of such “convenience” that we lose the value in going for a walk, talking to someone face to face, etc. The weight of the people involved is just a result of that inactivity – its not condemning the people, merely the lifestyle that this society perpetuates.