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Sexuality, Self-Identification, and Simon LeBon.

2010-03-02T19:52:00Z

There's a lovely woman I know through Facebook. I'll call her Belinda.

I recently made some status updates on Facebook that referenced my civil union last month. In response, Belinda sent me a private note.

"I don't want to sound ignorant or insulting, but I didn't realize you are a lesbian," she wrote. "I guess your devotion to Duran Duran is what threw me off." (That was my favorite part.) "Anyway," she continued, "I was wondering if any of your other FB friends (who don't really know you, like me), questioned you like I am."

In a later note she wrote that she's "fascinated by gender performance, sexual preference and issues of that nature, especially all of the ambiguities therein" and expressed a hope that I would write a personal essay about it.

So I guess this is my very first blog entry by request.

I didn't take offense to Belinda's message. In fact, I was impressed by her frankness. I don't have any shame issues around my sexuality, so it was no more insulting than if she'd written to say, "I didn't know you were blind/Asian/from the South/a mother." (And just to clarify, no, I am none of those things.)

Actually, I have wanted to write about this, for quite some time. Some people do seem gobsmacked when they learn I have a same-sex partner.

I guess I come off as very straight. And that's O.K. by me. I'm not out to make a point about my sexuality or anyone else's by looking or acting any certain way. I couldn't care less how I "come off", really, except that I resent the whole idea of labels ("labels, schmabels" as Belinda put it) and the stereotypes into which many people (gay, straight, and everywhere in between) expect other people to fit.

Yes, that's right. There are gay people with certain expectations about how other gay people "should" act, too. And I find it ignorant, unsophisticated, and irritating.

I remember being in my early 20s and sitting along a banquette at a lesbian nightclub called Hepburn's in Philadelphia. I was there with two friends; a very "gay-looking" gay woman, and a gentle giant of an African-American man, gay and Jewish in a beaded yarmulka.

A female ambled over to us. She was what you'd call "butch" in the extreme. Everything about her was harsh-looking. She wore a wallet on a chain, her hair was dyed platinum and cropped ultra-short. Her eyes were small, narrow and dark like a rodent's. Her nose was long and thin. Her teeth were small and perfectly even; their edges looked sharp enough to engrave small keepsakes.

She leaned over me and thrust her face close into mine, scowling.

"ARE YOU GAY?" she demanded.

I immediately felt foolish. I didn't know what I was. I usually dated guys, but I felt like I could be...well, anything. I was flesh and nerves and thoughts and emotions and electrical impulses. And all of it was caught off-guard.

"I..I don't know..." I stammered, trying to pull back and put some space between us, though it wasn't easy.

She shook her head and cackled. She looked at my lesbian companion and said:

"Certain people just have no business being here, ya know what I mean?"

To my dismay, my friend nodded, like she understood.

So for a long time I felt like I wasn't "allowed" to have a sexual and/or romantic relationship with anyone but guys unless I was willing to cut off all my hair, start listening to Melissa Etheridge 24/7, wear plaid flannel shirts and take up hiking. I'm still angry about it. Today, I'd tell that bitch where to get off.

Belinda was curious about my sexuality, and asked me politely to clarify it. I'll try.

I recently got civilly united (married, if you want to look at it that way) to a woman. However, in my 39 years of life, I've dated mostly males.

The "mostly" part is the result of:

a) having spent eight of my adult years in a committed relationship with a man; and
b) having lived in a highly homophobic household for all of my teen years and the very early part of my twenties.  Since I liked guys, it just felt easier back then, and safer, to stick with them.

So that you'll understand what I mean in part B, I offer a true story.  It was the day after Thanksgiving, I think. I was a young twenty-something and still living with my parents. A group of us were gathered around the dining room table playing Pictionary: me, my then-boyfriend Rob, my mother, my aunt, my sister, my brother, and a friend of my brother.  My dad was sitting in a recliner in the next room, watching TV.

Someone brought up Madonna. Opinions began to flit back and forth across the table -- she was a trendsetter, she was a skank. And purely as a joke (because while I dig Madonna, I don't really diiiig Madonna), I said, off-the-cuff:

"Well I'd do 'er."

That was all.

I'd do 'er.

Really, I was just kidding.

I think my mother, aunt and boyfriend all groaned. My sister, in her teens, went stiff in her chair, palms flattened to the air as though pressing it away from her, to the left and to the right, and bleated in staccato: "I, did NOT, just, hear that."

The next thing I saw was my dad's face, arms and torso flying towards me across the table, like an evil, angry, moustached Superman sans cape flying at me in 3-D.  His hands went for my neck, and as he groped for it, one of his hands pressed my Adam's apple and it produced a weird sensation in my throat, like the bonging of a bell. My boyfriend immediately shot out of his chair and I remember his voice shouting "Whoa whoa WHOA!" Rob was trying to push my dad off of me; my mother and aunt were trying to pull my dad back in the opposite direction. And then he said, with stiff jaw and spittle forming at the corners of his mouth:

"If you wanna be a fucking faggot, you won't do it under my roof!"

My mother kept saying his name, "Larry, LAH-ree!" Once they'd separated him from me, my mother said wearily, as though scolding a dog, "Oh, Larry! Go sit back down and watch TV, for Christ's sake...". She sighed heavily.

And that was just a joke.

For the most part, I liked guys. I was even engaged to marry one, but for various reasons I called it off. When I became an unattached woman in New York City (who also happened to be estranged from her parents -- their choice, and ironically, it had nothing to do with sexuality), I broadened my dating options to include women.

When I met my now-partner Lori, her face made me instantly happy. Big warm brown eyes, a kind smile. Even my grandmother, who has since passed away, observed sweetly in her child-like dementia, "This lady has a nice smile. Doesn't she have a nice smile?"

Lori brings out the best in me, because she inspires me to practice love, kindness, patience, understanding -- all on her. She makes me want to practice those things. Every day, I put more of that good stuff out into the universe, simply because she's in my life. And it spreads to other people. It would be a greater effort to suddenly switch to total bitchdom just because I've turned away from Lori and towards someone else.

But am I gay, bisexual, or what? Do I have to choose? Must the gender of my partner dictate my status? Does any of it really matter in the grand scheme of the universe?

Even when Belinda wrote to me and said she didn't know I was a "lesbian", I kind of laughed. Neither did I! I mean, I guess technically I am. I go to bed with a woman every night. And I don't mind being called a lesbian. But perhaps I confuse people like Belinda because lesbians don't often sit privately in their living rooms and shriek over Duran Duran videos. Do they?

Do lesbians maintain crushes on Johnny Depp, Colin Firth, and the Dyson vacuum cleaner man? Sometimes when I'm feeling down-in-the-dumps, Lori scans the web for particularly hot pictures of John Taylor and Simon leBon and e-mails them to me. And I love that.

Am I straight because I've enjoyed the way a cock feels when it's just the right length and thickness and stiffness so that I can really feel it filling me, because I loved that sweet ache when the head went a little too deep, because I loved feeling the thing trembling and jerking inside me when it exploded?

Am I straight because I've enjoyed the moment when I first took a cock in my mouth and he gasped like a little girl? (Or does that make me a pedophile, along with the 30-inch-tall Shirley Temple doll in my bedroom?) Am I straight because I know exactly how to give a downright artistic blowjob and have the instincts to know when every little move I make is precisely the perfect one for that very moment in time?

Am I straight because I loved how my soft, supple skin and abundant curves poured over a masculine body? Am I straight because the very contrast of my femininity against a masculine figure magnified my own beauty and sexuality to me, made me enjoy my own body as much as his?

Am I straight because I've enjoyed being wrapped in stronger arms than mine? Because I've treasured the sound of a deep voice laden with emotion reverberating through my body, or breathed down my neck?

Am I straight because I think "Jane Eyre" and "Pride and Prejudice" are the most romantic, heart-throbbing love stories ever written? Because I have a t-shirt that says "I (heart) Mr. Darcy"? Because I decorate, sew, and shop? Because I've got a Hello Kitty rice cooker?

Or am I gay because I don't like the idea of having a dick head jammed into the back of my throat? Because the idea of swallowing makes me want to vomit? Or because I almost never paint my fingernails?

Maybe I'm gay because muscles do absolutely nothing for me. Because when somebody looks at a guy and says he has a "great ass", I have no idea what they're seeing -- to me, they all look flat and potentially hairy. Or maybe I'm gay because I fondle boobs other than my own and like it. Or because the place between a woman's legs can be sweet as candy and smell like flowers, or in some cases, Italian herb crackers, and not in a bad way.

Am I gay, perhaps, because the sensation of my buttery body writhing against another woman's is deeply arousing? Because I love the way my partner's hair falls over her face when she's laying on top of me? Because some mornings I can sit there and watch her sleep, and run my fingertip along the curve of her uncovered hip or the line of her calf and feel like my eyes will never get enough?

Is it gayness to be proud of my artful ability to bring my partner to mind-altering orgasm because I understand the terrain? Because innately I know how to move, how and where to apply pressure, when to ease up -- drive her manual transmission with awesome expertise on a road like a silk ribbon all the way to the finish line. Is that irreversible gayness?

And what are you -- gay or straight -- when you realize one day, hey -- my labia are like deflated balls, and my clit is essentially a tiny little dick! Are you just a little bit gayer because you can conceive of that clit being longer and extending from your body, because you can imagine a dark silky place like a giant curved tongue engulfing it, and understand how pleasurable that would be? If you suddenly get a clue about what it feels like to be a guy, should you throw away your heels and have an operation? Does it make you more gay than straight to be a woman who can imagine having a cock of her own, and the thought of having it sucked is a major turn-on? But if the idea of wearing a dildo does nothing for you, are you back to hetero again?

Are you gay when you're a straight woman who sucks her man's nipples?

If you're a woman who had girl-on-girl action only once, in college, and liked it, but then got happily married to a man, can you still claim straightness? Or have you been checking off the wrong box?

Having written all this, would you believe it if I said I'm really not that sexually-driven?

I like having sex when I'm aroused. I don't get aroused every day. Blame it on my English bloodline or the anti-anxiety meds. Either way, I can't say I'm unhappy.

Other stuff gets me excited, too. Ideas. Solutions. Imaginary characters. Psychology. Mysteries. How things work. Second-hand furniture. History. Making things.

And just because I can potentially enjoy sex with a male or female doesn't mean I'm a horndog. I'm not jonesing for everyone I meet. Shit, I'm so self-centered, most of the time I don't even notice you people.

I'm attracted to intelligence, cleverness, personality, something in the eyes. Especially brown eyes. Something about the way a body occupies space in a room.

At the same time, though, I can be non-romantically, non-sexually "attracted" to people with intelligence, cleverness, great personalities and pretty eyes and want them in my life. I can feel warmly about them, love them, even love touching them without it being sexual. I feel that way about people I admire, friends, children.

I'm simply not hot for everybody I lay eyes on.

It pisses me off that there are still so many rubes in society who see a same-sex couple and immediately think of fucking. Perverse fucking. The thought of gay sex makes them squirm with unease (or sends a shiver down their spine that's not altogether unpleasant, and that in itself disturbs them, so they instantaneously repurpose the feeling as disgust). Their uneasiness drives them to wage war on The Gays.

I find it all so stupid, especially since sex is a relatively small part of my same-sex relationship. Most of the time, we're busy talking. And laughing. We laugh a lot. We also comfort, inquire, make plans. We snuggle. We buy groceries and put them away. We watch American Idol. We agree, we disagree. We compare notes. We read to each other. We take turns cleaning out the hair trap in the shower. We drop in on her elderly parents. We share Duane Reade Rewards points. We spend time with friends, separately and together. We maintain our own interests.

Is that so creepy?

And yes, it's true that by making a sexually exclusive commitment to a woman, I've cut myself off from sex with men. But if I'd happened to fall in love with a man (which has always been possible), married him and agreed on complete sexual fidelity (which is my style), then I'd also have made myself unavailable to other men. And to women too, for that matter. With every commitment, you sacrifice something.

Oh, make no mistake. I'll have crushes all right. By the dozens before I'm through. But I figure I'll just work them out in fiction or something. Do you know how many times Rachel Maddow and I, and Michael Johns and I, have fallen madly in love in my daydreams?

So there it is. I'm a girl who most definitely likes boys and is in love with a woman. She's a woman who's rather boyish herself sometimes, but I prefer her to look like a girl. What does it all mean?

I wish it didn't have to mean anything. I wish ignorant grown women from Texas wouldn't snicker and try sneaking pictures of my partner and I holding hands on a tour bus. I wish politicians didn't want to deprive me of my human rights based on the gender of who I love most. I wish certain militant dykes wouldn't eye me so suspiciously, like a light-skinned mulatto sneaking into the back row of a KKK meeting. I wish old white ladies' faces wouldn't drop so dramatically when it dawns on them that Lori isn't just my roommate.

I wish people could all just be people without one's methods of reaching sexual climax being a big fucking issue.

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Of Fatness and False Benevolence: The Nightline Debate

2010-02-24T05:02:00Z

I recently sat in the audience for a taping of ABC's Nightline at Cooper Union in New York City. Juju Chang moderated a debate titled, “Is it OK to Be Fat?”

Arguing on the side of fat indeed being “OK” were plus size model Crystal Renn and Marianne Kirby, co-author of Lessons From the Fat-o-Sphere.

Arguing that fat was most definitely not OK were Kim Bensen and Meme Roth. Kim Bensen is the author of Finally Thin!, a memoir detailing her struggles with yo-yo dieting and her eventual triumph (so far) over obesity. Meme Roth is an emphatic woman who made up an organization called National Action Against Obesity, then gave it a web site and a mission statement:

“National Action Against Obesity is a non-partisan, all-volunteer advocacy group dedicated to reversing the obesity crisis by eliminating disease- and obesity-accelerators from the food supply; barring junk food from child care centers, preschools, and schools; and eradicating Secondhand Obesity ™ (obesity handed down from one generation to the next, as well as from citizen to citizen); while encouraging exercise across all ages. Success relies upon wholly re-imagining what the U.S. population considers 'normal' food consumption and 'normal' exercise. When the majority is overweight, America cannot be normal.”

The issues touched on during the debate were the same old same old, as far as I was concerned. Roth asserted that thin people are unfairly shouldering the financial burden of fat people and their fat-related diseases. There was bickering back and forth about the effects of dieting and food restriction, about eating disorders. It was argued that fat people are treated unfairly by the medical community, that cupcakes should be kept out of the classroom.

What no one was talking about, however – what no one ever seems to have the clarity (or perhaps the balls) to talk about – is fat hatred framing itself as humanitarianism, with society's hearty blessing.

Remember my essay “Fat is Contagious”? In it, I introduced you to a woman I called Miss Hostility. On a New York City bus, Miss Hostility harassed me, unkindly and openly, about my body size. And in the next breath, she had the nerve to claim an interest in my good health.

There are legions of ordinary people like Miss Hostility who give fat people a hard time, and attempt to mask the less charitable roots of their bad behavior by playing the insincere “but it's about their health” card. As if they really, truly give a damn. Heck, most of these holier-than-thou types are so thoroughly lacking in self-awareness, that in spite of all behavior to suggest the contrary, they actually believe they're doing us fatties a kindness. I suppose alienating us, stigmatizing us, and otherwise playing unfair is all done in the name of tough love.

But there's a higher profile, more destructive breed of the same animal, and the Nightline debate gave a platform to two textbook examples.

Kim Bensen and Meme Roth are individually building careers out of harming fat people and calling it “help”. Their methods differ, but the game is the same.

The commonality between Bensen and Roth and others like them is an egocentric delusion. Each believes she has the one and only true answer to the “obesity problem”. They see themselves as crusaders; Florence Nightingales to the fat masses who can't seem to help themselves, poor things.

But their “concern” for fat people is a sham – and not even the messiahs themselves are able to see it. To recognize it, and further to admit it, would shatter their apparently delicate psyches.

But I think it's time to call the bullshitters on their phony benevolence, to bring into question their misguided “aid”. Let's pull away the downy baby blankets that protect their deeper motivations to wage war on other people's bodies.

If they're made of even halfway-decent stuff, Bensen and Roth will find some humility, acknowledge where they've done their fellow beings a disservice, and do better.

Kim Bensen has a story with which many American women can identify. For years, she got suckered in by the threats and promises of the weight loss industry. She tried and failed, over and over again, to reach the promised land of her ultimate Goal Weight. For years, like most people who diet, she was unable to sustain any single weight loss program. Each time she fell off the wagon, she regained the weight she lost and then some. Eventually, she peaked at about 350 pounds. It's a classic story of yo-yo dieting up the scale.

But Kim Bensen isn't fat anymore. She tried dieting one more time – and succeeded. She reached her goal weight and appears to be keeping the weight off.

This is how Kim Bensen sells weight loss – and make no mistake, she is selling it, with a web store replete with specialty food items, scales, pedometers, “Believe” tote bags, kitchen tools, jewelry, and “premium” memberships that entitle one to online meetings, food plans, member-exclusive videos, access to 24/7 chat rooms and other features smelling curiously like Jenny Craig, Weight Watchers, Nutri-System and the like.

Bensen sells an empty promise – empty for most. “Believe”! It's the same tiresome product the weight loss industry has been peddling for years. It's the hope that some day this dieting thing really is going to click, and then I'll finally be thin, and life will be great.

The only fresh twist on this haggard theme is Bensen playing up the frustrations of yo-yo dieting specifically – the pseudo-tender “I've been there”, the seemingly no-punches-pulled confession that yo-yo dieting does make you fat – hey, it happened to her! I guess this is supposed to make fat, fed-up women trust Bensen more readily. I guess it's meant to set Bensen's weight loss plan apart in the minds of vulnerable women. Wow, she's admitting that yo-yo dieting is a loser's game! How refreshing – now here's a diet peddler I can trust!

Bensen is asking fat people to swallow the bullshit all over again. She's begging them to try just one more time, because the only way to guarantee you'll stay fat is to stop trying to get thinner.

Ironically, Bensen is saying just the right thing to keep fat people fat.

I believe that Bensen believes in what she's selling. At the Nightline debate, she spoke in pleading, syrupy tones about how she, personally, suffered as a fat person. “I couldn't put on my own shoes,” she said. “Crossing my legs was something I just dreamed about doing...I couldn't breathe when I slept at night. I had sleep apnea...my throat closed up, and I would snore so loudly, and I don't snore at all anymore.”

But there's an arrogance to Bensen's campaign to “help” others that's downright reckless. Meanwhile, she seems to think she's doing good.

Bensen will easily admit that yo-yo dieting makes people fatter and fatter, adds to their frustration, their sense of hopelessness, their misery. She lived it, all the way to 350 pounds. But her highly unusual success has gone to her head.

Bensen is the walking embodiment of the familiar diet disclaimer, “results not typical”. She's delivering false hope – and making a tidy profit in the process.

The fact is, most people who yo-yo diet themselves to fatness will never experience the One Diet That Permanently Worked. Most people will never be Kim Bensen. Sad but true. The statistics are out there. Furthermore, researchers point to the health dangers of fluctuating weight versus the benefits of weight stabilization. And let's not forget the psychological ramifications of repeatedly cycling through failure and false expectations, versus reaching a more empowering place of self-acceptance.

Meanwhile, the very nature of yo-yo dieting means that every failed attempt results in the packing on of even more pounds.

When Bensen begs us to try one more time, buy her premium membership, order her tote bag, foods, food plans and scales, she's asking us to take the risk of getting even fatter.

How dare she?

It's utterly irresponsible.

Bensen lives inside her own narrow, self-centered world, where everyone who's fat surely must feel the exact same way she once did; a fantasy world where her one-size-fits-all weight management plan is the answer to every fat person's prayers.

The woman's failure to see outside of herself is downright dangerous.

Even if Kim Bensen is able to help one person achieve permanent weight loss, it'll be at the cost of dozens, hundreds, probably thousands of other souls who failed, and who are consequently that much more miserable, and a few pounds heavier than before they put themselves in Bensen's “expert” hands.

Bensen is an expert in nothing but her own body, her own experience of the world – and she's free to talk about that experience, write about it, promote and sell it along with her special “light” bagels and plastic egg poachers. But just because Bensen wants to be a beacon of hope to others, doesn't mean she's doing right by her fellow human beings. In fact, her efforts just make her part of the same old problem. In the final analysis, she hurts people. She makes them fatter. She makes them sadder. She weaves fairy tales that are unlikely to ever come true. She puts bad joss out into the world, period.

Bensen would be better off championing improved eating habits and increased physical activity, outside the context of weight loss. She'd be far more trustworthy, far more credible.

If it's not about Bensen's ego, or a god-like belief in her singularly perfect ability to “fix” fat people; if Bensen is so selflessly true-blue about wanting to help fat people, then where are these disclaimers on her website?:

- Statistics show that my weight loss program will most likely be just another in a long line of programs you'll try in your lifetime that will fail to result in permanent weight loss.

- Just because I'm one of a very, very few people who 'did it' doesn't mean there's anything special, magical or advantageous about my particular weight loss program over others.

- If my products fail to get you to your goal weight and keep you there for life, you will experience disappointment, self-loathing, self-doubt, weight gain above and beyond your previous highest weight, and possible physical complications associated with weight gain.

- I don't know anything about your unique physiology, your private relationship with food, or anything else that might affect your ability to lose weight, and therefore my program is not designed with you in mind.

I guess if she did include disclaimers this honest and forthright, Bensen wouldn't sell too many “reflect-encourage-reward” bracelets, now, would she?

Americans have lived around the corner from Jenny Craig and Weight Watchers for decades, and in those same decades, obesity rates have steadily increased. How is this fact lost on Kim “premium membership” Bensen? If she's a smart woman with pure intentions who's also interested in her own personal growth, she needs to stop kidding herself that she's a selfless crusader for the unfortunately obese. Her efforts are clumsy, and her mini weight loss marketing empire is entirely self-serving.

Until she stops persuading people to follow in her footsteps, Bensen is contributing to the very problem she claims to be battling. She is hurting far more people than she is helping. She is naïve to believe otherwise.

Meme Roth is not as subtle as Ms. Bensen.

It's easy to dislike the woman. Sharp-tongued and sharp-featured, she comes off snippy and self-righteous.

Roth's communication style alone makes it difficult to take her seriously. She reminds me of a phony medium, as though employing that old trick meant to unsettle an audience and place them in a more suggestible state: speaking quickly, with a rapid-fire spewing of questionable statistics and the rushed quoting of university studies that may or may not be trustworthy. After all, it's old hat for individuals and organizations with something to sell (like weight loss products, for example) to commission sloppy university studies that support their shaky claims.

Roth made no friends when she rambled to a largely fat Nightline audience that “...the overweight person, their brain is four percent smaller than a healthy weight person...that's out of the University of Pittsburgh. That's how the University of Pittsburgh, the obese brain is eight percent smaller...by age seventy, than a healthy weight person. You can laugh, but this is...this is in the mainstream science.”

Roth rattles off a lot of names and numbers to create a seemingly credible context for her message. She hasn't quite perfected her delivery, however – she wins over far fewer people than she rubs the wrong way.

Like Bensen, Roth claims to be fighting obesity for the greater good of society. She cites obese family members as her inspiration:

“My father's 300 pounds. My mother in the '80s was 225 pounds and I assure you, back then, that was considered very large. My grandmother's over 300 pounds in a 24-hour care facility, my aunts and uncles were all overweight. My father used to do sprint track runs with me, and now can barely walk from one end of the Walmart to the other. My mother has type 2 diabetes, my grandmother...uh, it is tragic. She went from the point of being voluptuous, chubby, fat, obese, to morbidly obese, to a woman who stares out the window at a hummingbird feeder, who a few years ago decided it was too much effort to get out of bed to go to the bathroom. So I do know obesity takes people, and I assure you the people in my family aren't just a little overweight; they are dangerously, tragically overweight.”

However, Roth's energetic crusade may be fueled by a loathing of her family roots, rather than a bleeding heart on their behalf. Her efforts to “help” fat people may be, in actuality, the twisted acts of Roth's angry, embarrassed inner adolescent.

If Roth was genuinely interested in improving the health of fat people and those in danger of getting fat, she would fight for things that are an inarguable physical benefit, while simultaneously steering clear of supporting anything that stands between fat people and a better quality of life.

Roth's battles are schizophrenic. On one hand, she believes fat people should lose weight because god forbid they should get as sickly and immobile as her beloved fat relatives – that would be tragic.

On the other hand, this compassionate spawn of giants works hard to egg on the marginalization of fat people. She encourages fat hatred by spreading the idea that fat people are making health insurance more expensive for everyone else. She's trying like hell to popularize the idea, and to what end? So that fat people will eventually be unable to get insurance and thus health care, either because insurers will refuse them coverage, or charge amounts that are unmanageable? Is that caring about the health of fat people?

If you believe Roth's statistics about the alarming number of fat people in America today, how is denying affordable health care to such a huge segment of our population promoting a stronger, healthier nation? Rather, it reeks of eugenics. Perhaps Roth wants to concentrate on the prevention of fatness in children and let the existing fatties die off from neglect, sparing her of the uneasy transference of her familial humiliation onto fat society as a whole.

When fat people don't devote themselves religiously to weight loss in precisely the ways Roth deems appropriate, she has the arrogance to accuse them of being defeatist.

In the Nightline debate, Marianne Kirby attempted to make a sound point about the diverse causes of obesity:

“It is almost impossible, I think, to sum up the reason why people are fat...There are a huge number of complex factors that go into human biology, and that go into the way our bodies process food and store fat, and respond to activity...To believe that we have some sort of conscious control...through the power of...absolute will...is, I think, a very socially irresponsible position to take.”

Roth's prompt response was,

“I think defeatism is a socially irresponsible position.”

Accusing fat people of being defeatist does not support Roth's self-professed mission of “reversing the obesity crisis”. It is presumptuous, disrespectful, and dismissive.

Even if one assumes that eradicating obesity is the way to a healthier America, Roth's refusal to hear fat people isn't going to help anybody lose weight. The reasons why people are fat can be complicated and varied. Anyone with a sincere, unclouded agenda to simply make people healthier would be willing to entertain flexible approaches to improved health. They would understand that unforgiving rigidity doesn't work for most people.

Fat people have been trying to tell Meme Roth what's working and what isn't. She isn't listening. She's married to her ideas. It doesn't matter that they're far from being the most effective in creating lasting change in the population. It doesn't matter if her suggested initiatives are the least likely to be permanently adopted by the majority. And it doesn't matter that throwing a floodlight on the most ridiculous claims of all – like fat people having smaller brains than thin people, thus suggesting inferior intelligence – puts most of the fat world on the defensive, unwilling to listen to anything Roth has to say.

There is ego involved here – not clean benevolence, not sainthood, not public service. There's a deep-seated personal agenda that has nothing to do with saving my fat ass or yours. If this weren't true, Meme Roth would be working with fat people, not against them.

It's a shame Roth has chosen to foster a repellent, hard-edged persona, because some of what she says makes sense, but is unlikely to be heard. Her point about food and the prominent place it takes in American culture harkens back to observations made by David Kessler in his eye-opening book “The End of Overeating” (read my review of the book here).

Kessler spoke to people from other countries who found the presence of food in settings like business meetings and classrooms distinctly odd. They marveled at our tendency to put a platter of sandwiches or bagels on a conference room table for every office gathering. They didn't understand why college students would bring snacks or even cups of coffee into a lecture.

I'm not opposed to questioning our culture – why do we feel the need to insert food into almost every social situation? Aren't our interactions with one another enough? Can't social occasions be centered around enriching activities rather than the consumption of food? I think it's a subject worth further discussion – though I'd probably leave Roth out of it.

I don't believe fat-fighting generals like Roth and Bensen are truly evil – I don't believe they wake up every morning and ask themselves, “Hmmm, now how can I torture a fat person today?” Rather, they just have their heads far up their own behinds. They're more invested in their own PR than they are in creating real beneficial change for other people. It's their way or the highway, simply because they say so. And their way – at least in their eyes – has taken on an almost holy shimmer. They couldn't possibly be doing wrong by other human beings when they're feeling so darn right.

Winter Walking: Conquer Excuses & Keep Moving!

2010-02-16T23:08:00Z

Are you one of those people who's not particularly fond of exercise, but you know darn well it's good for you (and that's the only reason you consider doing it)?

Is it ridiculously hard to get yourself motivated just to go for a walk (the simplest and most no-nonsense of all exercises, in my opinion)? And is it ridiculously easy to find any excuse not to?

Yeah. We have that in common.

You may already have watched Episode #2 of my video series "Kim Weighs In", where I shared with you some of my favorite excuses not to exercise...and that was in pleasant weather. Winter can make it even more challenging to get off your butt for a healthy stroll.

Besides the obvious deterrent of the cold, two things that tend to keep me sedentary in winter are: 1) wheezing caused by cold air, and 2) fear of slipping and falling on ice and/or snow.

Asthmatics, and even many non-asthmatics, may have experienced severe wheezing upon inhaling cold air. At the very least, it can cause an irritating impulse to clear your throat due to the thickening mucous there; at worst, it makes it difficult to breathe -- not what you want to feel while walking.

The fact that I've experienced this even sporadically is enough to keep me at the window, looking out and rationalizing, "Yeah yeah, I know I 'should' go for a walk...but it's cold out there, and what could be less healthy than suffocating to death? Yep, that makes perfect sense. Hey, I wonder if The Golden Girls are on!"

Well, that excuse doesn't work for me anymore -- and it doesn't have to work for you, either.

See, I discovered the Cold Weather Mask from I Can Breathe! Masks. It's a well-designed, lightweight polar fleece mask that fits over your nose and mouth and prevents cold-air wheezing.

I love this thing! The Cold Weather Mask from I Can Breathe! Masks allows you to breathe freely while walking, and the air you inhale is warmed as it passes through the mask. It works perfectly.

Two adjustable straps fit comfortably over your ears, and a covered flexible wire at the top allows you to pinch the peak of the mask into optimal position against your nose. It fits securely -- I had no problems with slippage whatsoever as I moved -- and at the same time, it's light and non-binding.

The mask is silk lined, which is soft, comfortable and non-chafing against the cheeks.

The mask is specifically designed to wick dampness away from your nose and mouth, too.

It's latex-free, washable, dries quickly and is made in both Adult and Child sizes.

My Cold Weather Mask from I Can Breathe! Masks has really has freed me up to walk in even the most brutal cold. The manufacturer claims the mask has been tested in -40 F wind chill.

If cold weather wheezing has been a problem for you, consider investing in an I Can Breathe! Mask for $30 (Adult size). Check it out at www.icanbreathe.com.

I've also had a grand time reasoning that physical activity is best put off 'til spring when the danger of slipping on ice, slush and snow is past. (And with those pushy sea salt salespeople lurking around every corner at the mall, walking indoors is simply not an option.)

But thanks to ICEtrekkers, I can fit that walk into my schedule in even the worst of winter weather.

ICEtrekkers makes rubber slings that slip over your favorite athletic shoes and add traction, allowing you to plow ahead on frozen surfaces.

This is something of a mixed review. I took three varieties of ICEtrekkers for a test drive -- Chains, Diamond Grips and Spikes -- but I would only recommend one.

In short, buy the Spikes; avoid the Chains and Diamond Grips.

The Spikes were mad functional. They allowed me to walk over slick patches of ice at a respectable clip, without even the slightest slip. With the ICEtrekkers Spikes slings, I was a winter walking machine. Without a doubt, they gave the best traction out of the three. They also have a stronger, more substantial rubber sling than the others.

Unfortunately, as excellent as the ICEtrekkers Spikes were, the ICEtrekkers Chains offered an opposite experience. First of all, one of the rubber slings on my pair of Chains broke upon only the second wearing! The rubber snapped at the toe grip, see?:

Very disappointing. And since the rubber sling for the Diamond Grips is essentially the same as that of the Chains, I find myself distrusting the Diamond Grips to last as well.

Furthermore, the Chains provided very little additional traction. If anything, they made me feel a little less stable than if I'd been wearing no slings at all.

It was telling when, as I stood on linoleum, I kicked off my sneakers with the Chains slings on them, and the shoes went sliding across the floor on those smooth, shiny chain links.

By contrast, kicking off the same sneakers with the Spikes slings on them resulted in the shoes grinding ahead for a fraction of an inch and then stopping stubbornly in place. Those shoes weren't going anywhere.

If it wasn't for the apparent weakness in the rubber sling design of the Diamond Grips (same as the Chains), I might have recommended the Diamond Grips based on their traction. It was almost as good as the Spikes.

But when the ICEtrekkers Spikes are this good, why bother with anything else?

ICEtrekkers Spikes slings go for about $24.95 a pair. For info on where to buy, visit www.icetrekkers.com.

And no matter what the weather...breathe deeply, and keep on trekkin'!

(Disclosure: I Can Breathe! was kind enough to provide a sample of their Cold Weather Mask at no cost for this review. ICEtrekkers provided samples of three varieties of shoe slings at no cost for this review.)

Paranormal Moments: Ghosts I've Seen & Smelled

2010-02-02T16:10:00Z

Someone on Facebook today asked, "Have you ever seen a ghost or experienced a haunting?" What a delicious question.

Maybe I have.

I'll let you be the judge.

The Mystery of the Merchant's House Smoker

First, a story about the Merchant's House Museum in New York, an exemplary antebellum house which has been on television for its alleged paranormal activity, most notably on "Ghost Hunters". I adore this place.

Some years back, I attended docent training at the Merchant's House Museum. Early on a Sunday morning we were having a docents' meeting, in the hours before the museum was open to the public. For a few minutes before we gathered in the basement kitchen, some of us early-bird volunteers killed time roaming through the house. A couple of women wanted to look at a new exhibit that had been assembled in one of the bedrooms. I wandered into the master bedroom at the front of the house and looked out the windows and into the street below.

Sniff, sniff.

Who's smoking?, I thought. There's no smoking allowed in here.

No paying visitors were in the house yet, so it couldn't be a guest's careless faux pas. And the staff certainly knew better than to light up.

I moved my face closer to the window pane and peered down to the sidewalk, expecting to see a lone smoker, or perhaps a pair or huddle of them, standing directly below. There was no one.

It was a strange sort of smoky smell, too. Not quite like cigarettes. More like the sweetish pipe tobacco an elderly relative used to smoke when I was a little girl. I think he was my father's uncle, a red-cheeked man with a model railroad running through a cardboard-and-plastic utopia in his basement. I hadn't seen or smelled anyone smoking a pipe since.

The smell was crisp and sharp at first, like tobacco just lit and repeatedly puffed to its fullest aroma in a quick sequence of dove-gray clouds. Then it faded, gradually and so gently. It was infuriating. The harder I sniffed, the less of it I smelled. It couldn't be traced, it couldn't be followed.

I have no explanation for it.

It's interesting to note, however, that I was standing in what had been the bedroom of Seabury Tredwell, owner of the house from 1835 until his death, after which his daughter Gertrude inhabited it until her death at ninety-something years of age. Might Mr. Tredwell have been a pipe smoker? Was this what they call evidence of a "residual haunting", an olfactory recording of a moment in the distant past, in replay?

Phantom Girl of Somerton Train Station

It was a bitter cold Saturday night in the late '80s. This time of year, if I'm not mistaken -- January, February. My friend Kurt picked me up at my parents' house to go see a movie.

In those days, we lived near the Somerton train station on the R3 West Trenton Line of SEPTA, Philadelphia's commuter rail system. There's a short stretch of road that runs parallel to the tracks at one point. Then the road veers off to the left and the tracks disappear into a short tunnel under an overpass.

Kurt's car sailed around a curve in the road and we briefly rode alongside the tracks before they were out of sight. We came to a red light at Bustleton Avenue. We were silent for a moment when Kurt turned to me and said,

"Did you just see what I saw?"

I met his eyes.

"You mean the girl standing on the train tracks who totally doesn't look like she belongs there?"

His eyes widened. "Uh-huh."

"Kurt," I whispered, urgently. "We need to go back around there. Right now. Hurry!"

The girl we'd both seen had hair hanging below her shoulders, and she was wearing one of those straw boater hats with a red-white-and-blue striped ribbon around it. The cheap kind you might see at a political rally. She was holding a balloon, and standing in the middle of the train tracks. Not on the platform, not on the side of the road. Just standing there, completely serene, with her feet planted firmly between the railroad ties. And despite what had to be temperatures in the teens or twenties at best, she was wearing 1970s-style short-shorts, a sleeveless shirt, and knee socks.

Kurt glanced quickly into the rear-view mirror and over his left shoulder, then put the car in reverse and turned around.

We drove past the station again, slowly. He rolled down his window. We craned our necks in every direction looking for her.

He inched the car alongside the tracks a little further, and we squinted through the darkness. We looked back through the tunnel opening, we studied the shadows around the little train station building that was still standing back then, but has since been demolished.

The girl, whose appearance didn't make sense in the first place, had vanished.

Kurt rolled his window back up, sealing out the unforgiving winter air. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" My voice was the only sound above the whoosh of heated air blowing from the dashboard vents. Kurt's eyes were open so wide, his dark brown irises were like two drops of ink at the center of white salad plates. He nodded slowly.

"Let's get out of here," he said simply, and we did.

I always said I would eventually do some digging; try to find out if a girl was killed on those tracks. Maybe you know a librarian or research guru who'll find this mystery irresistible.

You'll let me know if you learn anything, won't you?

Stupid Things Scammers Do in Fake Job Ads on Craig's List

2010-01-28T15:02:00Z

They put the dollar sign after the number, like this: 12$

They open their job ads by talking about how their company is the "leader" in such-and-such industry. (Oh, PLEASE, Mr. Scammer, can't you come up with something NEW? We are SO tired of reading this one...)

They use spaces instead of colons in the work hours, like this: 9 30 to 5 30

They tell you to call or send your resume to a specific name at the end of the ad, like this: "For consideration, send your resume to Joan Smith", or "Call Mary Evans to set up an appointment." Notice they don't provide a phone number for Mary Evans. That's because she DOESN'T EXIST.

They capitalize words in the middle of Paragraphs that don't Necessarily need to be capitalized.

They have a tendency to type an unnecessary space before closing a set of parentheses, like this: (Jersey Shore ) See that?

Instead of correctly using two capital letters for state abbreviations (like NY, MD, or CA), they like to do this: Ny, Md, Ca, Nj, Mn, etc.

They spell things wrong -- even common words related to the job like secrtrary, recptionnist, frontdesk, responcible and compitent.

They use non-existent terminology to make their ads sound "business-y" and real. Like this winner: "We're looking for a multi-line candidate." Well, there are multi-line PHONE SYSTEMS, but not multi-line CANDIDATES. Some genius.

They like to describe the company as "relaxed" and "low-pressure". And they do it in so many different ads -- but they think we won't notice they're recycling the same phrases. WE NOTICED.

They over-write their job descriptions to make them sound more "business-y" and real, like this: "Must be comfortable speaking on the telelphone to people." As opposed to speaking on the telephone to...monkeys?

Their identical ad appears in other cities -- just google the text and see.

Their spacing is really sloppy when they're typing things.

They refer to applicants as "Inquirers", like this: "Inquirer must be able to type 40 words per minute." Which inquirer, the National Inquirer?

In the beginning of the ad, they tell you the company is rapidly expanding or growing, and that's why they need somebody quickly. Same scammer uses this line OVER and OVER and OVER again.

They advertise for someone for their Minneapolis office...in the NEW JERSEY Craig's List. OOPS.

They refer to the wages as "for every hour". For ev-er-y hour? Who SAYS that? Wow, you sound REALLY wordy, you MUST be a professional office person!!!

They use goofy characters and squiggles and asterisks in the titles of their job ads, like this: ~!~Office Manager Wanted~!~ or ;';Receptionist Position Opening';' or ***!!!Secretary Needed!!!!*****

They say that a position is "interviewing" in their job ad title, like this: "Receptionist Position Interviewing" Positions don't interview. People do. And people who work in real companies and compose real job ads know this.

They tell you that a job requires excellent leadership abilities, and other ambitious qualities...and it's a receptionist position. Or a janitor. Leadership abilities? I know every great man or woman has to start SOMEWHERE, but I think somebody got their cut-and-pasting mixed up.

The job description includes "entertaining clients". What is this, "Mad Men"? Dude, I'm not even sure that's legal...

They use bad grammar. Example: "Seeking A Administrative Assistant". Are you sure you're not seeking B Administrative Assistant?

They use hyphens where they're absolutely-not appropriate, and forget to use them when they are. Sorry, am I nit picking? Or am I multi tasking? Maybe I'm just in a bad-mood.

They post their ads at odd hours. Like 3:00 AM. And as we know, most legit employers wait 'til they have insomnia to fill that vacant position. Check the time on the ad. It might indeed be a sensible time to be posting...if you're in NIGERIA. (Thanks, Debbie C.!!!)

For more information on the stupid things scammers do, read my earlier post about this unfortunate phenomenon: http://blog.kimwrites.com/2010/01/15/crooks-victimize-the-unemployed-with-phony-job-ads-on-craigs-list.aspx

Good luck out there!

-- Kim Brittingham

* Want to keep up with what I'm doing? Before ya go, sign up for my mailing list! I'll never steal your identity, and I don't send stupid spam.

* Seeking permission to reprint this article? Drop me a line: hello@kimwrites.com

Self-Help Audio Books Sent to Haiti Instead of Medical Supplies?

2010-01-23T20:55:00Z

On a recent flight into Haiti, much-needed medical supplies like antibiotics and pain medication were bumped to make room for something deemed far more urgently-needed: audio versions of a self-help book.

The book, "Answers to Life's Questions (In One Handy Volume)," was written by Jerry Nazarene, a motivational speaker with an emphatic fan base.

After Nazarene published a plea on his web site for fans to help Haiti, Doug Ballad, one of Nazarene's followers with a regional "fan club" of sorts, managed to score space on an outgoing supply flight to Haiti for his contribution: hundreds of audio recordings of Nazarene's book. The recordings were packaged much like the ready-to-use audio books sold in airports -- disposable, pre-powered, cassette-like things with earbuds included.

"Right now, what Haitians need is comfort," Ballad told one journalist. "Nothing has inspired me as profoundly or given me such lasting comfort as what Jerry Nazarene has to say. I just knew that if I could get Haitians to feel the way I do when I walk out of one of Jerry's seminars, they could overcome anything life has to throw at them."

One news blogger suggested that Mr. Ballad coordinated the shipment to get publicity for his own series of Nazarene-inspired seminars, which he calls "Working The Answers". Upon questioning, Ballad didn't exactly deny the charge. "What I teach are the principles of 'Answers to Life's Questions' -- which can and will transform anyone willing to learn them," Ballad said confidently. "The more people those principles reach, the more love, peace and charity we'll have in this world. And I'll never apologize for trying to promote those things."

Bliss Semple is another fan of Nazarene's work who gives local seminars in Tampa, Florida promoting his book. She contributed money to Ballad's effort to ship the audio books and was quick to defend him. "How could Doug (Ballad) consider himself committed to living a better life if he didn't take every opportunity to help other people do the same? How could he dare call himself a teacher of Jerry Nazarene's work if he didn't at least attempt to teach those Haitians how to better deal with their crisis? We're lucky to have been taught a better way through this amazing book. The kindest thing we can possibly do is to help others find that better way, too."

But what Ballad did in filling valuable space on a supply plane with books instead of bandages was, in my opinion, far from kind.

Admittedly, I haven't read Nazarene's book, but several friends have and I asked them for feedback. They were uniformly adamant that what Nazarene's "Answers to Life's Questions (In One Handy Volume)" encourages more closely resembles selflessness than selfishness.

One friend commented, "The book actually has some decent things to say, and that Nazarene dude is a really decent guy. I can't imagine he approves of what these people did. They sound really misguided and, well, frankly -- fanatical."

Yet another friend, a self-declared Nazarene "fan", said: "I just don't think these people get it. They can read the book in private and interpret it any way they want to, but they shouldn't be out there trying to teach seminars on it to other people. Then it's not Jerry's word any more; it's tainted by their whacked-outedness. It's just wrong. Jerry shouldn't let people have these local fan clubs anymore. I hope he puts his foot down."

* * *

If we were to ask Haitians what they want most to alleviate their immediate suffering, I'm willing to bet they'd respond with "drugs to save our children's lives", long before they'd request "propaganda, please!"

Ballad, Semple and any other members of the Jerry Nazarene fan club responsible for this shipment of audio books are operating from a place of selfishness, plain and simple. Ballad and his ilk aren't thinking of anything but their own interests. *I* want other people to live this way. *I* think the Haitians need philosophical guidance first. *I* want to be seen as a committed Nazarene seminar leader. *I* have an agenda of evangelism and nobody else's pain or life-and-death needs could possibly be more important.

IT IS THE HEIGHT OF ARROGANCE.

What I want to know is, how did those books ever make it onto that plane? Whose call was it?

Mr. Nazarene has yet to comment on the situation, but one major newspaper did some preliminary digging, and it doesn't appear the author is connected in any way with the shipment of his own audio book to the devastated island nation.

----------
No, this wasn't a real news story. But this is.

NEW VIDEO! "Kim Weighs In" Episode 4 -- Have a Bawl

2010-01-19T19:21:00Z

Kim Weighs In: The Video Series

Episode 4
"Have a Bawl"
January 2010

It’s interesting how when we start to cry, someone’s usually quick to tell us, “Awww, don’t cry.” But you should.

Giving yourself permission to cry is one of the best things you can possibly do for your health and wellbeing. Find out why in Episode 4 of "Kim Weighs In" -- and while you're learning why to cry, you might have a laugh, too.

More Info

Some plus size fashions provided by:
Making it Big
www.makingitbig.com

Filmed in part at:
The Falls Restaurant in Tinton Falls, New Jersey
www.thefallsrestaurant.com

About crying:
Possible health benefits of crying by Dr. Kevin Keough
The miracle of tears by Jerry Bergman

I'm Reading in Asbury Park, NJ on 02.07.10

2010-01-18T16:06:00Z

The Provincetown Fringe Festival in Asbury Park presents:

The First Annual Writers Festival

I'll be reading a five-minute piece along with many other fine writers presenting monologues, essays, poetry, short stories, even ventriloquism! (Wanna get up and try exercise some new material? Slots still open for performers!)

Restaurant Plan B
705 Cookman Avenue
Asbury Park, NJ

Sunday, February 7, 2010
4:00 PM

Tickets are $15, which includes an all-you-can-eat buffet (B.Y.O.B.) and the performance.

Seating is limited, so make your reservation soon at (732) 807-4710

Information: (732) 807-4052

Hope you can make it!

Crooks Victimize the Unemployed with Phony Job Ads on Craig's List

2010-01-15T18:34:00Z

On Craig's List, it's really getting out of hand.

Every day, hundreds of advertisements for job openings are posted nationwide at www.craigslist.com. The problem lately, though, is that the majority of them are fake.

A particularly low breed of cyber-criminal is targeting the vulnerable, despairing throng of the unemployed across America. They use the convenient no-cost ads on Craig's List to lure desperate job seekers to respond to postings, only to rip them off or attempt to steal their identity.

There are a number of scams currently working through these job ads.

One scam directs the job seeker to an online "job application". The form collects personal information (including social security numbers), providing the scammer with a perfect collection of identity-stealing tools.  Some even use the job descriptions on the resumes they receive to help craft realistic-looking job ads.

Another scam requires job applicants to submit a credit report as part of a "job application", then directs the unfortunate jobless sucker to a site where he or she can purchase that report. There is no job opening in this equasion. The scammer is merely pocketing cash on those credit reports.

Some scammers are simply collecting e-mail addresses so they can spam you later.

It is indeed sad that on any given day, a job-seeker can click into a single category of local jobs on Craig's List, and find one legitimate opportunity out of a dozen total job listings. The others? Lures. Every one. Criminals are trying to increase the odds of getting what they want by casting a wide net.

Craig's List employs people behind the scenes to delete illegitimate ads, in any category. Unfortunately, this latest problem has gone so far that these monitors obviously can't keep up.

In some areas, frustrated job seekers are taking a vigilante approach.  They're trying to confirm as many illegitimate job ads as possible, and then posting warning messages on Craig's List exposing the phonies.

Some would-be victims are posting disgusted editorials on Craig's List, asking publicly why Craig's List isn't doing more to screen job posters. And it's an excellent question.

One simple way to discourage fake job posters would be to charge a fee for listing employment opportunities. It would weed out the majority of scammers. In some large cities, Craig's List does charge a $25 fee to advertise a job opportunity. However, for every geographic area in which there's a fee, there are at least a dozen suburban areas in which the advertising remains free. With no fee, it's ridiculously easy to post hundreds of these ads, all over the country, every day. And that's exactly what the scammers are doing.

Meanwhile, job-seekers continue to do their best to discern the few real ads from the many fake ones. It isn't always easy, but here are some tips that might help:

PROTECT YOURSELF: Spotting Phony Job Ads on Craig's List

-- BAD GRAMMAR. Many of these fake ads reveal bad grammar, poor punctuation, incorrect capitalization, sloppy spacing, and inappropriate use of "big words". Most people who post real job ads -- office managers and recruiters -- are capable of composing an ad that's grammatically correct and to-the-point. If it reads like it was written by a moron, it's probably a fake.

-- BIG WORDS & FLOWERY VOCAB. As more job-seekers catch on to these scams, scammers are working harder to fake us out. Consider it a red flag when the ad contains unnecessarily fancy, "business-y" vocabulary. If it reads like they're trying too hard, they ARE. They're trying to scam YOU.

-- OVERLY DETAILED, LIKE A RESUME. If the job description seems overly detailed to you, pause. Does it read like the kind of thing a job-hunter would put on his resume, to describe how specifically qualified he is for the job? There's a good chance that what you're reading was stolen from somebody's real resume. Scammers collect resumes from suckered-in victims and recycle the text to make their ads sound "real". They don't have time to do all that composing from scratch.

-- NAME, BUT NO NUMBER. There's at least one busy scammer who works a real-sounding name into his ads, writing something like, "Call Anne Green to apply", usually at the bottom of the ad -- but there's no phone number provided with which to call "Anne Green". The name is meant to make the ad sound genuine. It isn't. This isn't an employer who simply "forgot" to include a phone number. This is a scammer who had no intention of ever including one -- he just wants to snow you.

-- REAL-SOUNDING COMPANY NAME, ADDRESS, OR OFFICE PARK NAME -- This is the newest trick. Scammers put the name of the (fake) company in the ad to make it sound more real. If you took the time to google the company name, you'd probably find it was fake. If it's real, then you can phone that company and ask for confirmation that their ad on Craig's List is legit. If it isn't, that company's got a great legal case against that scammer -- you should tell them about it.

Variations on this technique include "casually" naming a company address (example: "We need a secretary for our office at 13 Corporate Circle in Jerseyville") and throwing in the name of an office park -- all done to take advantage of you at this high point in your life. Besides, think about it -- most legitimate employers don't want to be flooded with phone calls and drop-in applicants. They tend to be more protective of their identities and locations until they're sure about who they want to interview.

-- ASKING YOU TO HURRY. Any ad that encourages you to apply quickly is probably a scam. Believe me, unemployment is so high right now, NO employer needs to ask applicants to rush. The minute an ad hits the web, it'll have more responses than the advertiser can handle. So phrases like "Apply immediately" and "Send resume right away" hint at a fake ad.

-- UNREALISTIC WAGES/SALARIES. Some scammers are still using this old trick: they advertise wages or salaries that are way higher than the going rate. If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.  Remember, their goal is to attract as many people as possible. They're trying to do everything they can to make you respond to them, including dangling dollar signs before your eyes.

-- TOO HARD A SELL. Again, the market is flooded with job applicants. Right now, no employer needs to sell themselves to you. If the ad seems like they're trying hard to make themselves look like a desirable place to work, it's probably a fake. Employers have their pick of qualified, educated, desperate job applicants. They do NOT need to expend so much energy crafting salesmanly language in their job ads.

-- GMAIL, YAHOO, "ROCKETMAIL" E-MAIL ADDRESSES. If the ad is asking you to respond to an e-mail address through Gmail, Yahoo, or any other free e-mail hosting service, chances are, the ad is totally phony. Scammers like to create free e-mail accounts which they can use liberally and hide behind for their scamming activities. Real employers most likely wouldn't publish an e-mail address. Craig's List allows them to anonymize their address when you respond directly to the ad anyway. This is usually a dead giveaway to a fake ad.

-- SCAMMER'S FAVORITE PHRASES. There are some very prolific scammers out there who tend to re-use the same tired phrases. If you know what some of them are, you can spot a fake ad instantly. For example:

    -- Leader in the industry. One scammer just LOVES to open his ads with the following phrase: "Over the last decade our company has become a leader in ______ industry. Our reputation has been achieved by having an effective response to our clients needs and by utilizing the proper industry procedures. Now that we are expanding we are seeking some extra help." If you see this phrase of something similar bragging about how the company is a "leader" in its industry, run.

    -- Gym membership and company outings. One lazy, unimaginative scammer still pulls this one: his job supposedly includes a "gym membership" and the additional benefit of "company outings". If you see that combo, trust me -- it's a scam.

    -- For every hour? Another hard-working scammer uses the phrase "$___ for every hour" to describe wages. People just don't say it like that. For e-ver-y hour? No. This is a scammer trying to make his ad sound more wordy and "professional", but if you see this phrase, either in the body of the ad or in the small print towards the bottom, don't respond.

    -- 10$, 11$, 12$... One scammer has a tendency to put the "$" sign after the number in the hourly pay rate, either in the body of the ad or in the small-print section towards the bottom of the ad. For example, "12$" instead of "$12".

When you recognize a suspicious ad, do your fellow job-hunters a favor -- use the "flag" function in the upper right corner of the ad to let Craig's List know it's "prohibited". In theory, Craig's List will delete flagged ads, although this doesn't seem to be happening lately. Perhaps the more flags Craig's List receives, the more likely they'll be to act against these scammers.

* * *

None of the above clues guarantees that a job ad is fake, but they're pretty reliable red flags.

If you decide to take your chances and respond to a job ad on Craig's List, a good guideline is to avoid filling in any electronic forms.

Also, don't purchase anything that was introduced to you by way of a job ad, especially a credit report.

When communicating with a potential employer, let them know you'll be happy to provide your resume and other personal information if he or she can provide a way for you to confirm that the opportunity is legitimate. Ask for the name of the company and the name of someone specific there who can confirm the ad is real. Then, look the phone number up yourself online, independently, and ask for that person through the main switchboard. Don't use the number provided by e-mail. A scammer could have you calling his cell phone and pretending to be anybody, and say anything.

You might consider writing to Craig's List and suggesting ways that they might fight back against this problem. They have become the primary tool for these crooks, and it's in their best interest to stop this. People will eventually stop using Craig's List as a resource if its reputation is so badly eroded by crooks.

Finally, if you know how, consider promoting the cause of catching and prosecuting these soulless people who are preying on the unemployed.

Good luck, and be safe out there!

-- Kim Brittingham

SEE ALSO, "Stupid Things Scammers Do in Fake Job Ads on Craig's List"

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When Your Friend Smells. Bad.

2010-01-13T13:46:00Z

So, you've got a friend with offensive body odor. What are you supposed to do?

Should you inform them of the situation, gently, so they can do something about it? Or should you keep your trap shut, to avoid hurting their feelings? What's the kindest possible move?

Well don't ask me. See, I used to have this friend, a woman I'll call Rita. When I first met Rita I noticed a slight unpleasant odor about her person, but I didn't think much about it.

It's easy for me to dismiss and forgive these smallish, smelly social infractions because I have a paranoid belief in my own stinkyness, the seeds of which were planted in the 8th grade when a mean little girl named Dana told me I had B.O. Back then, I probably did. No one taught me how to use deodorant; I had to figure it out for myself (it was the next thing I did after asking my mother what "B.O." stood for). But since that day, I've asked many an intimate companion to "smell me, just smell me. Tell me honestly, do I smell?"  I try very hard to keep personal odor in check.

So anyway, my unfortunate 8th grade incident and that resulting hypervigilence have made me more readily forgiving of others who do stink a little. I always think, "that could just as easily be me!"

But eventually, Rita's odor required no hypervigilence. It got a little worse each time I saw her, until it was a bold, sour cloud traveling with and around her. And I wasn't the only one noticing anymore.

One day Rita and I decided to scare up some cash by sharing a table at a local flea market. She asked if she could sleep on my sofa bed the night before, so we could get an earlier start together in the morning. I told her no. I lied. I made a lame excuse, and felt like a jerk about it. I'm just not that kind of lie-teller, game-player, y'know? I'd rather just shoot straight. But I didn't want to hurt Rita's feelings, and I didn't want my one decent piece of living room furniture contaminated with that awful smell -- and it was awful. It made me think of rotting vegetables, and the smell of certain varieties of baby food my mom used to serve to my siblings when they were infants -- peas, maybe. Like peas and milk that's turned.  No, not inside my sofa bed. I just didn't have the confidence Febreze could handle it.

The morning of the flea market, I loaded my sellables into the back of Rita's van and took the co-pilot's seat beside her up front. I'd never been inside Rita's vehicle before.

The stench was nauseating. And I mean this literally. Rita's bad smell filled the space of the van, in concentrate. The second I sat down, I could feel it crowding around me like a lecherous ghost, clinging and stifling, licking at me, laying upon my skin. I wondered if I'd carry it with me into the flea market, wondered if people would smell it and think it was me. I felt the urge to vomit rising from those deep pink trenches under my tongue, and I swallowed hard. The market was only three minutes away -- I could hold it.

At the market, I tried not to sit too near Rita, without seeming to be avoiding her. I took walks to "exercise my legs", went to the bathroom often, browsed at nearby tables. Every time someone came to our table and just casually touched a finger to something Rita was selling, she shot up from her chair and hustled over to them to be of saleswomanly service, and each time she stood, the stench wafted anew into the air -- a knock-out bullhorn of odor. I watched with a heavy heart as some people made contorted, sickened faces as they walked away from her.

At this rate, I didn't think I could tolerate being around Rita again. She suggested subsequent get-togethers, meeting for coffee. I made more dishonest excuses, and couldn't bear doing it.

I talked the situation over with others.

"If I tell her she smells bad, her feelings are going to be hurt. There's just no way they won't be," I said. "But if I don't tell her, and she continues to go around smelling like that, it could be really bad for her. She hasn't made a lot of friends in this area yet, she's only lived here a few months. She wants to make more connections, she wants a job. But is she turning people off and she's not aware of it?"

"You have to tell her," everyone agreed. "It won't be pleasant for her to hear, but she has to know."

"I'm kinda worried about her too," I said. "I've heard some diseases can cause foul body odors. She's had a lot of health issues in the past. What if something's wrong internally?"

"Even more reason to tell her," they told me.

Besides the fact that almost nobody likes to smell bad, I thought Rita might be especially sensitive to the issue, because she's a very fat woman. She was already self-conscious about the size and shape of her body -- I didn't want to add another layer of shame. And it's hard enough to win acceptance when you're obese; almost impossible when you're obese and have an alienating issue like body odor.

"But if anybody can tell her in a kind and gentle way, Kim, it's you," my friend Stephanie said. "Who better?"

So I did. It took me several weeks to get up the nerve, but what finally pushed me to act was the picture of Rita in my mind, wondering what she'd said or done to make me upset, wondering why I was ignoring her.  That was unacceptable to me. I didn't want to be responsible for making her feel so unceremoniously rejected, and besides, I wanted Rita for a friend. It was the smell alone I couldn't stand.

I was too big a coward to call her on the phone. I didn't want to hear any hurt that might be in her voice. If she cried, I didn't want to hear it.

So I sent the kindest, most diplomatic e-mail my heart could compose. I told her I couldn't stand the thought of hurting her feelings, and how hard it had been for me to broach the subject. I told her I was worried that the odor might be a symptom of something internal gone awry.  I reminded her that as a fellow fat woman, I was mindful of keeping certain fleshy places clean and dry, powdering under breasts and bellies and such, and that I understood how some places on the body might be difficult to reach if you were apple-shaped like she was. I offered her links to web sites that offered extra-long back brushes and other grooming products for large people. I reminded her that I wanted her for my friend. I told her I wanted her to have every opportunity for friendship and employment in her new community, and that I would hate to imagine anyone being distracted from her wonderful qualities by a mere odor that might be easy to take care of.

Rita did not take it well. She said she felt humiliated. She even remarked that it was ironic I should say these things to her, considering I did so much fat-positive writing.  That comment, I didn't quite understand. Fat or thin, if you smell unbearably unpleasant, I'm going to tell you so I don't have to lie about why I'm not hanging around with you anymore. I guess it was the hurt talking.

"You couldn't possibly have said it better," friends told me. "She'll come around some day."

But she hasn't, and I don't think she ever will.

Several months later, I posted a Facebook status update for the singular amusement of my friend Stephanie. She was coming over to write with me, and I warned her I was a mess and I didn't plan on showering for her, either, so she'd better be prepared to take me as I was. I think the Facebook status read, "A true friend will come over and tolerate your unshowered STANK." Rita, whom I hadn't heard from since the "you smell" e-mail, saw it, and simply commented:

"Nice."

That made Stephanie angry. "Unfriend her now! Unfriend her!" she raged from my dining room table.  "I felt sorry for her before, but not anymore. Okay, so the news was hard for her to take at first. But now she's giving you 'TUDE? Look bitch, we're all fat around here, but I'd sure as hell want to know if I was choking people everywhere I went, so I could DO something about it. Unfriend her, Kim, unfriend her today!"

I did unfriend Rita, mainly so she wouldn't have to see any future comments that might be hurtful to her.  And frankly, I felt I could live without her sarcastic comments, too. And Stephanie's tirade made me think maybe Rita was being ungrateful after all.  Sure, I might be really embarrassed if someone told me I smelled. But if they delivered the message as kindly as I had, I imagine I'd eventually get over it and be able to face my friend again.   I hope I'd at least refrain from being snippy.

Is this one of those things that can never be taken well? Are we damned if we do, damned if we don't, no matter who we're dealing with? If you don't tell a person they smell, then they're left to think poorly of you when you suddenly stop spending time with them. If you do tell them, they're left to think poorly of you for embarrassing them.

It seems like a no-win situation, but there is one potential positive outcome.  If the message was heard, and Rita has started doing things to eliminate her odor problem, then she wins in the long run. Unfortunately for me, the messenger gets demonized either way.

My Mysterious "Law of Attraction" Experiment

2009-12-03T13:58:00Z

Nat Couropmitree, host of "The Law of Attraction Works" on Blog Talk Radio, interviewed me for thirty minutes about my shockingly successful experiment with the "Law of Attraction", as well as my lifelong daydreaming habits, my striking OMG revelation about fear, and more.

Listen in as we contemplate the nature of the universe and blow our own minds, below!

Listen to Me on BlogTalkRadio: "Goddess Talk" Interview

2009-12-01T18:37:00Z

Juanita Kelly of the "Goddess Talk" show on BlogTalkRadio interviewed me about being fat, body image, plus size fashion and more. Have a listen below! (There are several guests this episode -- I'm the last one, starting at the 30:55 mark.)