Saturday, December 12, 2015

You Dont Have to be Nice

Ok, so yes- we should all strive to be loving and kind humans. Love people, accept people for who they are and treat them kindly whenever possible. There is a thing though that I've been noticing lately. One of my friends mentioned her struggle with it and I noticed today that I catch myself doing it- apologizing or being nice when boundaries are crossed.

As plus size women, we are often taught that just existing is a problem. That being fat is something we must apologize for and so we do our best to make ourselves as agreeable as possible so that we dont offend someone. "If you'd just lose a little weight, you could have any man you wanted!" Its something I've heard many, many times. Id be lying if it didnt make me incredibly insecure at the time. I didnt realize how deeply rooted it was in how I interacted with people until I started dating again. I find myself being extra nice, sometimes when lines are crossed, just so I dont upset someone that could use my fatness as an excuse to get out.

If you've done any online dating, like- Tinder for example- you know that it is the absolute worst of people. So when I got this message on a dating app it wasnt shocking. How I reacted to it was.




"I'm going to pass on that." was my first reaction. I'm so conditioned to seeing random men ask these things that I wasnt even bothered enough to be a little upset that he'd crossed several lines. Seriously- zero to phone sex in less than 10 min?  After this, he insisted and thats when I was over it- I told him to get the eff out of my face with that. His profile has since been deleted.

If you needed permission, here it is. You dont have to be nice. You dont have to appease anyone if they have crossed a line or if they are being patronizing for any reason.You are allowed to stand up for yourself because you are no less important than they are. You don't have to hide your snark when someone says "that's not a man's job. That's a woman's job." you don't have to keep pushing for someone to see the good in you when they find you "annoying" or "naive". If you're consistently making more of an effort to be around someone than they are for you, you don't have to keep doing it.

You are worthy of being able to stand up for yourself. If you don't stop people from treating you as less than, nobody will.


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