But is there really more to love?

I just got around to watching More to Love — yes, I realize it has been a few days since it aired, I’ve been busy, plus, I was not so sure I wanted to watch it. I haven’t been so thrilled with some of the snippets from the teasers. I don’t like the term “normal women” being used to describe fat women, as if thinner women aren’t normal. I despise the forced us vs. them mentality of fat and thin women, when the reality is that women exist in a whole continuum of sizes and shapes and body types, and the ad campaign’s size 4 vs. size 14 shtick played on that artificial division. There were lots of reasons I didn’t want to watch, but after hearing the comments of some friends and reading Lesley’s recap on Fatshionista, I sucked it up and watched.

I will confess I was a little afraid. I am a fat single woman, and for about 20 years of my life I suffered under crushing self-hatred, not just because of my size, but that was a factor. The thought that “no one will ever love me because I’m fat” is one with which I am well familiar. Although I did go to a couple of formal dances in high school, I didn’t go to my prom (I have been to 6 since then, it’s so much more fun as a chaperone), and of course I was sure it was because I was fat. Then again, if I were to catalog and post all the things I have blamed on my fat, the sheer volume would crash these here interwebz. Fat is such a handy scapegoat. I have actually sometimes wondered what thin girls irrationally blame their problems on. Come to think of it, they probably blame their bodies too, since American women are conditioned from birth to believe they aren’t thin/pretty/sexy/otherwise attractive enough. So I was a little nervous about watching because, despite the fact that I no longer suffer with self-hatred, and I have called bullshit in my own life on so many of the lies about being a fat woman, there is always the possibility that something will take me back to that time. When a friend asked me if I was going to watch, my response was “I’ll probably cry a lot”.

My fears were unfounded.

I’ve never watched dating “reality” shows, with the exception of some Bachelor/Bachelorette viewing parties hosted by friends, and I mostly attended those for the same reasons I go to playdates despite having no children — to hang out with people I enjoy and drink wine. Ok, so there’s no wine at playdates, more’s the pity. The point, though, is that I don’t watch dating shows. They are not my style. My DVR is filled with teen soaps like Gossip Girl and old episodes of Star Trek. I don’t do reality TV. This was my first foray, and so I have no idea of my observations about MtL are standard on this sort of show or not. Feel free to enlighten me.

I’ll start with what I liked. The dresses. Oh, the dresses. I want them, I want them all. I actually looked on Fox’s website to see if they had any info on the dresses. They don’t. The girls were all beautiful, and they were portrayed in a pretty positive light, particularly for TV.

I started with what I liked because it was shorter. Now for the stuff I didn’t like.

From the beginning I was struck by how silly all the women seemed to be. I understand that they may have just been edited to look that way, but I saw very little of substance. The way I see it, they all had the opportunity to meet 19 other potentially fabulous women. Obviously you don’t spill your guts to strangers, and yeah, yeah, let’s meet the guy too, but I seriously would have been putting together an email list and talking about where to buy clothes. For most fat women, connecting with other fat women is hard, and so I would hate to pass up the chance to have so many on one room. Once again, I know they could have been doing that too and it just wasn’t shown, but it mostly looked like they were talking about how desperate they were to be picked and swooning over “his eyes!” giggle giggle.

That brings me to another observation — the desperation. In so many of the interviews, the girls talked about how this was their only chance, how they just wanted to find love, how they couldn’t believe he was being nice to them, how great it was that he was willing to “look past” their appearance, etc, etc, ad nauseum. The whole ring thing blew my mind too — they all seemed to act as if it were an engagement ring or something. I know we all love sparkly jewelry, but it’s the same ring he gave to 19 other women, and I am pretty sure the show’s producers picked up the tab.

Look ladies, desperation is nobody’s friend, except for maybe the skeezy guys who are looking to take advantage of you. It’s fine, and normal, to want to find love, but in the meantime, have some self-respect. This guy is not the only one on the planet, this isn’t your “last chance”, and really, do you want to be with someone who just “looks past” your appearance? A good relationship is one in which a guy loves all of you, including your body, and dismissing appearance altogether is just as bad as dating someone just because of how they look.

Here’s another fact to remember: Yeah, dating sucks for fat girls, but dating sucks for everyone. For every fat girl crying about being alone, there is a thin girl crying about the same thing, and 3 medium sized girls. Attraction and love are about so much more than the way you look, and have a heck of a lot to do with luck, and being alone doesn’t mean there is something fundamentally wrong with you — maybe it means you should enjoy the perks of being alone.

Remember the skeezy guy I mentioned earlier? The one taking advantage of desperation? Well, as sweet-sparkly-eyed-cuddly-teddy-bear-y as he may be, I am greatly afeared that Mr. Luke is one of ’em. I actually liked the guy until he used the whole “you know, I have to cut five people tonight” tactic to get one of the girls to kiss him. After that I pretty much wanted to kick him in his neck. We’ll see how it goes, but I predict a lot more of those sort of tactics in the future, just like the guy in high school who told you he would dump you if you didn’t do whatever it was he wanted you to do that you knew you weren’t ready for. That guy wasn’t worth your time then, and he still isn’t.

I didn’t cry the way I feared I might. I yelled at the TV a few times though, and there were some things that made me sad, not for myself, but for the women on the show who seem so fragile. I want to have them all over and hug them and tell them that it will all be ok, and that the key to being happier is to love and accept themselves as they are, man or no man.

So the jury is still out on this one. I am going to keep watching, if for no other reason, to see if my predictions about Mr. Sparkly Eyes are true. I am also curious about some of the women — Bonnie, for instance, with the rockin’ hair and tattoo — I think we could be bffs. We’ll see how it goes. In the meantime, if anyone wants to get me those dresses, I will love you forever.