We have all experienced some form of discrimination in our lives. I’ve learned, though, that people have this tendency to just accept certain forms as being okay, while they will be ready to “cut a bitch” on others. For example, in Jenn’s entry on weight discrimination, she had some fairly good points, but most people seized on the opportunity to tell her off because she made some generalizations. Oddly, in their comments, they generalized or, in so many words, accused some people of exaggerating what goes on in their lives.
For a little over 10 years now, I have been on a fairly constant stream of psychiatric medication. Now, while I was obese before taking the medicine, my weight skyrocketed on it. In the first year, I gained over 50 pounds. Later, I lost the weight after I had gastric bypass, only to start gaining again after certain medications were added into the mix. A combination of medication-induced hyperthyroidism, the removal of said medicine from my treatment, and the addition of a mood stabilizer [Depakote] at a dose that caused concern for everyone who saw it, except the psychiatrist, seemed to contribute to the regain. I kept telling the doctors that I was gaining weight because of medicine. No matter what doctor I saw, the doctor would say that the gain couldn’t possibly be related to the medicines. They would accuse me of being in denial of how much I was eating, much like this comment. Sometimes, I would doubt myself and think that they might just be right.
When I quit taking Risperdal a while back, I stopped gaining weight. A few times, I would lose the weight, except when I would be close to my period. In the past year, my weight has pretty much stabilized. I have taken 1 form of psychiatric medicine, Effexor, and I have stayed within a limited (20 pounds, which is my general weight gain amount prior to my periods) weight gain & loss range. My eating has stayed about the same, with me only eating more on very rare occasions. So, I would say that that would be fairly good evidence for the cause of the weight gain being related to my medicine and not me gorging on Ding-Dongs and Ho-Hos. (I’ve never had either, btw.)
And, as I pointed out in my response to Angel‘s comment regarding any possible studies linking a difference in treatment with weight, there actually has been at least one. A group of Johns Hopkins researchers actually did a study that was reported on in ScienceDaily. The study reported that, “In a group of 238 patients, each 10-unit increase in BMI was associated with a 14 percent higher prevalence of low patient respect.” Now, this might just be something that applies to doctors, but I have a feeling that it might also apply to some people who work in non-medical fields.
I know that when I was at a skinnier weight, my mom had a sales person almost refuse to let her buy a pair of size 12 jeans for me because they could tell that my mother wasn’t that small. This wasn’t at some high fashion store. It was at Walmart in a state with an extremely high rate of obesity. You would think there would be less judgment in a Walmart. Of course, I’ve written about disrespect at Walmart, when my mom was pretty much laughed at because she asked for assistance and refused to get a wheelchair cart/scooter for her. (I know that a lot of people have a bit of a preconceived notion about obese people who use scooters, but my mother didn’t have the strength in her ankle to walk and [a month later] had broken the other ankle because of the lack of strength in her bones.)
And for those who say that the cause of the difference of treatment is related to self-esteem, I must say this. I hate that kind of statement. People claim that low self-esteem leads to people being more disrespectful, which I think is shit. I have a poor body image, but my self-esteem probably borders on too high sometimes. While a person might hate the way that they look, it doesn’t mean that that person is suffering from some great amount of self-hatred. A lot of us grew up learning that we are more than our outward being. My shell may be ugly, but that doesn’t mean that I think I’m unworthy of respect. And saying that a lack of self-respect might warrant a lack of respect from folks who work in retail is utter crap. If a customer walks into your store, it is your job to be nice to them. Even if you think they are ugly, smell bad, have bad hair, talk funny, etc., you are supposed to service them in the same way that you would service someone who is more to your liking. You don’t get to pick and choose who you’re nice to. As an employee at a retail store, you become the face of the company and you really do not want to represent the company as being snobbish. Why? Blog entries could be written, tweets could be made, but more importantly, the business might lose (potential) repeat customers and you might lose your job.
None of us will ever know what any other person goes through on a daily basis. None of us would really want to know it either. We can’t walk a mile in someone else’s shoes, and we shouldn’t judge them based on their circumstances either.
