10 Things I Have Learned About Kirstie Alley Via Twitter
While I was off hiatusing, Kirstie Alley was on the cover of People magazine talking about how she had gained 83 pounds after stopping her draconian Jenny Craig diet plan. To be more specific, she “fell off the horse” and became “disgusting” and “shlumpy.” Fatosphere (the blog, not the entire entity) had things to say about her article:
In the People interview she refers to herself as “disgusting” because at 5’8″ she let herself get up to 228 lbs. Yes, god forbid someone who’s 5’8″ should weigh that much. Can you imagine?! Jesus, how disgusting!! She also enlightens us all about how she got to such a disgusting size: she “went wild”, she banished her workout equipment to the garage, and for dinner she would eat two cups of pasta with six tablespoons of butter. Um, OK, actually that last part *is* disgusting. In fact it’s so disgusting that I’m going to go ahead and suggest that it’s an exaggeration (or dare I say a lie?). But even if she really did eat that much butter on her pasta, unfortunately the implication is that other people who weigh 228 lbs. eat six tablespoons of butter on their pasta too. And they just “go wild” with their eating, and of course they don’t work out. (Otherwise how could someone get to such a disgusting weight?!) This is just what we need, isn’t it?
I would also point out that she thinks she has to be “below 140 to really look good” but that her “real goal” is 128 pounds, because the producers on Cheers told her offhandedly one time that she should lose 20 pounds. Oh, Kirstie.
Anyway, the People article also pointed out that she has a Twitter account, so I went and checked it out. And here, for your edification, is what I discovered!
1. She Twitters a lot… I mean, a lot. I tried to count how many Tweets she posted yesterday, and I lost count after 100. A lot of those are replies. Very charmingly, she says she’s a “speed tweeter” and reads all her @ replies; in fact she does reply to people all the time. Definitely an accessible Twitter celebrity.
2. She’s pitching a weight loss show. “it is really funny and really fun. a different spin on the subject.”
3. She also has a weight loss “system” coming out in November. (That makes me wonder if the blind item celebrity might have been Alley after all.)
4. She believes weight is a personal choice, saying she wants to be “thinish.” She also says:
“YOUR own personal goal is the important thing..after all it isYOUR life and YOU are the only one who knows how u really feel”
And also:
“tell your daughter she is beautiful as she is..but she is the only one who can decide what weight is right for her.same with all of us”
5. She claims not to care what people say about her weight.
Here’s the real deal..I don’t really care what comments peeps make about my weight..Including Perez..I just like to throw down!!
6. She recently spent a week at a “fat farm“ which was expensive and involved four-hour workouts. She was the second-fattest woman there.
7. She believes in “The Secret.” (Okay, I’m kidding.) (But maybe.)
I know if I just keep saying I am a size 4 instead of saying I am fat all the time I will be a size 4..thats the way the universe works..i hope
8. She blames herself for being fat…
Trust me, I’m far from HARD on myself. How do U think I got so damn fat in the 1st place? Being REALLY easy on myself.mmmmmcake
YES, IT WILL BE FUN..WE WILL HAVE TWITERTAINMENT AND POPCORN AND CANDY AND.i think you see how i got fat…lol
…and says she has always been thin, due to being an athlete in her youth.
I have been thin my whole life. I was competetive swimmer from 8 to 16. always some athletic something.
9. She says she’s a member of the “Fat Pack,” not the Brat Pack or the Rat Pack. Okay, that’s kind of funny.
10. She loves herself, but not her fat. Oh, Kirstie.
No no..BEING FAT does not make YOU hideous…but trust me it does make ME hideous! I love MYSELF, don’t get me wrong..not my FAT”
If you refer back to point number one, you’ll realize this is only the tip of the iceberg in terms of what Kirstie has to say regarding herself and her weight. I didn’t even do a search, just skimmed her last two million or so posts. If you find anything else interesting, post it in the comments!
Also, as I was putting this together, I discovered that celebrity weight loss is a timely topic! I especially thought this was relevant:
“…the pursuit of thinness may mean as much as thinness itself,†says [Charlotte] Biltekoff. “Oprah and Kirstie are performing this for us.†Kate [Harding] agreed. “Once you acknowledge that your body is not O.K., then people love you, because that’s what expected of fat people all the time,†she said.
And Kirstie is doing exactly that… not only conforming to the “I hate my fat” paradigm, but also planning to capitalize on it with a show and a weight loss “system.” And she’s doing it all live and in real time, on Twitter.
Posted by mo pie
Filed under: Advocacy, Celebrities, Cold Hard Cash, Food, Gossip, Humor, Kirstie Alley, Magazines, Media, TV, Weight Loss
Email us
I was a competitive swimmer from 8 to 18. My senior season in high school I wore a size 14/16. So you can be an athlete and not be thin. I was a fathlete. :)
I want a reality show where cameras just follow me and show that I’m fat but there’s really no spectacle or magic to it. But that would get kind of boring I suppose. Also, I’m 2″ shorter and about 10-15 pound heavier than fat Kirstie.
As much as I want to be mad at her, I also want to hug her and tell her everything’s going to be OK.
I don’t like the entire thing itself, especially the public self-bashing itself (Doing it first so the magazines won’t?) but I’m just going to talk about how I don’t like when the youth card is played at times, like the whole “oh 15 years ago I was X weight and soooooo gorgeous” and such.
Take me for example, I can say I was thin about 10 years ago – before I *started puberty*. If I expected myself to stay that thin until I passed on, I might as well take up Self Misery 102 and Public Flagellation 101 from countless “role models” out there, but I rather live happy *and* healthy, thank you.
I just don’t understand the youth card at all. Why do we want our bodies to remain the same (read: thin) state that they could have been in 10-15 years ago? We’re not that same person. We’ve grown (no pun intended). We’re older, wiser and hopefully just as healthy as we were. But our bodies do change as does everything else in our life. As does life.
I just would want to talk to Kirstie and ask her all these questions. Maybe get her on a path of some sort of acceptance of herself.
I would just like to point out that when Kirstie Alley was her thinnest she was also a raging coke addict. Yeah, that’s healthy.
Man, Kirstie is just preparing herself for an even bigger fall when she inevitably regains the weight she plans to lose next!
Yeah, ’cause weighing the same at 58 (and have had 2 kids) as you did at 28 makes SO MUCH sense! And at 5/8″, with her frame, she should NEVER weigh 128!!!!!!!
She needs to get out of L.A., get out of film and TV, and focus on her life and her kids.
And maybe get some therapy.
That comment by Kirstie about how she’s “always been thin” because she was a competitive swimmer in her youth — um, hello, but isn’t she confusing cause and effect here? The fact that she was in training during those years and doing all that physical activity undoubtedly kept her weight below its natural level.
And if what Kelly says is true — that Kirstie was a coke addict during her “thin” celebrity years — well, I think we have our answer. Kirstie isn’t naturally thin. She’s only been thin when she’s been on drugs or constantly exercising. She’s no longer doing these things, plus she’s well into middle age. So *of course* she’s heavier than she used to be.
Kirstie is beautiful, talented, and charming woman. Unfortunately, her self-loathing and weight obsession are not so charming. I really wish she’d give herself, and the rest of us, a break.
Kirsite is full of anger and taking it out on herself.
Her anger should be directed at the entertainment industry which doesn’t have good roles for women who are not young and beautiful.
Maybe the fat offers some protection for not getting work. It is easier to hate your fat and think thin will solve all of your problems than to accept yourself as you are and challenge the societal belief that only thin is OK. (I should know, this pretty much sums up my ED career.)
To Kirstie’s “Oh no, I like myself, just not my FAT” *sigh*
I’ve been there. Still am sometimes and let me tell you, those kinds of thoughts are not the spawn of self love and self respect. Those kinds of thoughts are the result of years of a vicious cycle of self-loathing and internalized body hate.
And as for “the secret” I think the concept can be body positive. I think the idea is that to tell yourself you’re thin you’ll start to feel like you can be the person and do the things society tells everyone they can only be or do once they’re thin. It may work well for some to help them live their lives fat, thin, in betweenie, whatever, but the thing is, you still have to deal with the reality of what you’re body is and if you fully believe in the secret then now, not only are you doing the whole weight loss scam everyone’s bought wrong, but your thoughts are wrong too. Treating oneself the way someone thinks they’d treat themselves at a size four whatever the size is commendable, but lying to yourself that you’re a size four when you’re really a size fourteen or thirtyfour in my opinion is really just counterproductive to body acceptance.
Poor, poor Kirstie.
As someone who is learning to accept that my 48-year-old body is about 20 pounds heavier than my 38-year-old body was, I can sympathize with her thinking she should still be the size she was on Cheers. It takes some getting used to, but damn, girl, quit with the wishful thinking.
Hollywood is not really the place to get a realistic body image though.
Someone upthread said that her body would be different after having two kids, but I think both of her kids are adopted.
My 65-year-old body is 8 pounds lighter than my 11-year-old body was. Middle age, or senior citizenship, doesn’t guarantee weight gain.
I think the suggestion is though that bodies do change over time, they are not stagnant. Though your experience was that your weight gravitated toward losing rather than gaining over time whereas Kirstie’s body obviously gained it did change and I think the point is, it’s silly to expect to remain a certain way all your life. Some people for the most part remain within the same 5-10lb range most of their lives but I’m certain that if nothing else, their faces got smile lines, and their bodies aged.
To not expect that is just setting oneself up for unhappiness, not to mention the way our society so abhors that kind of change is just plain unreasonable. Being thin does not keep you from getting old, and quite frankly, from doing what all mortals do, fat, thin, pink, purple and, you know, being like mortal.
yeesh! I thought I had trouble with my body image – but I guess celebrities have more fabulous body image problems. She could do a lot more as a fat-positive role model for actresses and women in general instead of wallowing in self hate. Makes me cringe.
This post is interesting. I came across it while out there on the net looking up health articles. I’ve had Kirstie on Twitter for a while, and frankly, I’m over the excitement of Twittering celebrities.
The term social network is a misnomer, because all they’re doing is plugging their latest music, books, interviews and that’s about it. It’s a selfish undertaking. Celebrities expect everyone else to add them to their Twitter.
Anyway…
I’ve had weight issues ever since I was a kid. Not due to my love for food, but after two decades of searching, I’ve figured that the deaths of my parents triggered a lot. I basically see overeating as inverted frustration and anger, a form of depression, but not as debilitating.
Celebrity weight loss ceased to have meaning for me when I saw Oprah endure the crash diet years ago, and relapse. Then she hired a personal chef, to relapse. Being overweight isn’t just about food, and if these celebrities admitted that, then they’d have to explore the other nastier issues or inner demons that act as triggers.
Ultimately, I believe that as long as Kirstie continues to capitalise, she’ll always be on the diet/exercise see-saw, and she’ll be more frustrated. I can’t say I’m a ‘fat activist’. I’m not a big fan of my own flab, I’ve been working on it at the gym for six months three times a week, am not on a crash diet, and yeah it takes longer. But I don’t do it to eliminate fat to resemble a celebrity. I do it so I can buy regular clothes.
These celebrities, I don’t even know why they do it. It’s not for health. It’s partially for money (in Kirstie’s case), so they can reignite their career, and that’s a sad reflection of what their careers are, dependent on their looks.
I read that article and found her honesty refreshing and inspiring. Where many celebrities blame everyone else for their problems, Kirstie is taking full responsibility for her weight gain – I really admire that. The comments she makes towards herself and her fat body may sound harsh, but you know? sometimes the truth hurts. Admitting to yourself you’ve fallen off the wagon and failed can be hard, but once you do you’re able to make positive changes and move forward. I wish Kirstie well and hope that even if she doesn’t attain her goals, that she will at least regain her health and happiness.
Lisa-marie: I’m sorry, but do you know what blog this is? If you want to talk about the “truth hurting”, what’s really hurting more is how her story reflects THOUSANDS of people across the globe who like her, FAIL at dieting.
And she’s releasing a “weight loss program”, which in the future will show to be a huge failure, like all the other diets and “programs” before it.
And you know what really gets to me? When young teenagers, or even children emulate this kind of self-hatred towards themselves. For an online example, go to yahoo answers. Every day will be a girl asking if she’s too heavy, how to lose her weight, how to tone this, how to be anorexic, or simply, hating her fat. Sounds familiar?
She’s bashing herself up for something that is biological, and from her years of yo-yo dieting. If she realised that she’s better off just being healthy, even if though she may stay fat, I think she’ll be much happier off. I know I am, as plenty of other people here.
Kari- your first comment to Lisa-Marie made me wonder what kind of blog this is? I used to read Mopie and have occasionally popped in here to read a post now and then, but I guess I myself am not sure anymore. I am honestly asking what the philosophy is- is this a fat acceptance blog or a love my body whether it is thin or fat blog or all perspectives are welcome as long as you are not putting others down on purpose?
When I used to read here more, there were a lot of discussions about a post like Kirsties- some agreed, some disagreed, but all comments were welcome- I get the feeling now that only fat acceptance comments are the norm- I have no problem with that- just curious for clarification… anyone?
That thing that Kate Harding said is so true. Bashing yourself for how fat you are is so popular it’s disgusting. I’m tired of telling my friends how beautiful they are. Sometimes I wish they could see themselves through my eyes.
Also since I’ve accepted my body and began loving it, I always feel like the odd one out when the body bashing begins since I don’t take part in it. So wierd.
Dancing Queen: Better late then never so here goes:
I always thought of Fat Acceptance, or size acceptance, as simply, “Love Yourself”. Skin colour, hair colour, hair type, height, weight, where you tend to gain weight, the nose you got from your grandfather, etc.
I highly disagreed with everything that Kirstie Alley said because to me, it was representative of what a lot of people go through – what my family and friends are going through *right now* even. I’ve heard almost the same things coming from their mouths and personally, when you’ve seen and heard the same thing being repeated for years – something has to give. Science has not found a way to safely make fat people thin, or vice versa – so let’s be happy with our biology. Let’s just focus on real happiness than the “happiness” that would come when weight is lost.
I see this kind of behaviour being emulated by younger and younger girls, and even boys, who were previously thought to be “immune” to this kind of body shame. And to me, there’s something wrong with that. Children are supposed to be, well, children. Hopscotch and lego and swings and bubble blowers and tree climbing and such. Not… body hatred.
I also have to ad that I found lisa-marie’s comment slightly perplexing – I don’t think I ever heard of any celebrity blaming others on their weight gain. As far as I know, it’s always “X celebrity falls off the wagon”, not “so-and-so makes X celebrity fall of wagon”. Maybe I am wrong.
I only begun reading more or less recently – I think starting late last year or early this year or so? Maybe I’m a latecomer.