The problem with BBW.

I guess I'm a BBW? I'm never sure if I really count. I'm pretty fat, but if I Google "BBW" they're all way bigger than me. (Except for the depressing few who are tagged "BBW" and are, like, 135.) More importantly, they're not really shaped like me. It seems like a lot of the appeal is "they may be fat, but hey, big ol' titties," and I don't work that way. My titties are extremely moderate in scope. And my ass, although not precisely small, fails to provide the desirable "bubble" effect as it isn't really round and it's not much wider than my waist. My fat is mostly belly. I'm like 38-38-38.

So even though it's relegated to the ghetto of shameful fetish interest to begin with, I don't find much solace in the BBW label. It's not acceptance of fat chicks, it's just another, larger beauty standard. I can't measure up to 40DDDs and big shakin' booties any more than I can measure up to 32Ds and lithe little waists. I'm a third creature entirely.

(It sucks buying clothes too. Tops that are cut to gracefully cover a belly are always also cut to display ginormous boobs that I don't have. All those square-neckline "peasant" tops would be great if they didn't display a giant square of flat ribcage on me.)

Then again, I can't ask society to create the Holly Pervocracy Beauty Standard in which short big-bellied B-cup girls with weightlifter biceps and frizzy red hair are the most sexiest thing ever. There's not enough girls like me, and anyway, where would that leave girls with frizzy blonde hair? You can't make the beauty standard cover everyone or it stops being a standard.

So I'd rather raise the question, why do we need a standard anyway? It's hardly fair to demand a breed standard in the shows when the breeding is random. More importantly, though no group has ever held my type up as a paragon, plenty of individuals have been quite enthusiastic about it. There may not be Holly-type porn sites, but I know a few guys who liked my naked pictures just fine.

Individual preference isn't the only problem with standards. The other problem is that it's really unhealthy to create the idea of the perfect mate in your head and then try to find humans who match. I didn't know that short blond men were sexy to me until I met Tommy. In fact I still don't know that they are--I just know that Tommy is, and I think a tall dark Tommy would appeal to me more than a short blond random guy. We don't live in a world of types but people.

So "standards" suck, but that doesn't mean everyone has to find everyone equally attractive. That's silly and it's not going to happen. Plus it leads to creepers going "you can't find me unattractive, that's discrimination!" This also doesn't mean that "everyone's got someone"; the vast majority of people do but I can't make you promises. What it really means is that sexiness is the chemistry between individuals. "Society" isn't going to date me no matter how thin and busty I am; the intersection of one person's unique appearance and one person's unique and malleable preferences is all that matters.

Asking if I'm "sexy" is, ultimately, like asking if I'm "a friend." The answer isn't yes, no, kinda, or even "depends by what standards"; it's "to whom?"