Gay males make up a whopping (not whoppering) 42 percent of all men suffering from eating disorders. That’s saying something when it’s estimated that gays are only 5 percent of the total male population.
So understandably, companies that specialize in augmenting body parts and vacuuming fat are wise to reach out to the gay community.
Crass? A little. Good business? Definitely.
That was the mindset of Chicago Liposuction when they payed money to have a float in the recent Chicago Pride Parade.
How about we take this to the next level?
Our newsletter is like a refreshing cocktail (or mocktail) of LGBTQ+ entertainment and pop culture, served up with a side of eye-candy.
Except there are many crying foul over the way the nippers and tuckers chose to get out their message.
The classic “sign on a stick” usually reserved for words of love or protest instead read “We will suck your fat.”
And on the side of the float were banners saying things like “Don’t love your love handles?” and “Say NO to man boobs! We can get rid of them!”
It’s safe to say the float was insensitive — hard to argue that. But Chicago Pride has never censored a float, and if they did, what would that mean to an event that’s all about celebrating freedom?
From Chicago Liposuction’s side, it’s one thing to market the name of your business to the community, but you’d have to be blind not to see how preying on body image disorders at an event meant to unify and empower is tactless to say the least.
Or so you’d think.
Clinic operating director Jeanne Shocky told HuffPost:
The signs were not meant to be hurtful in any shape of form. They were meant to be fun. When you do something like this, you want to be seen and want people to read it. So maybe it was a little cheesy, but we really wanted people to see it.
What we like to do is help people love themselves and help them look how they would like to look. That’s really what we’re all about.
Self love doesn’t come from a slimmer waistline or a stapled stomach. Let’s not get that twisted.
I suppose when your entire work life revolves around sucking cellulose out of paying participants, you might become desensitized to how debilitating and even fatal eating disorders can be, especially in the gay community.
Chicago Liposuction is trying to make a buck, and that’s fine, but if they’re at next year’s parade I hope a group of body loving babes of all shapes and sizes walk next to them with signs like “Big is beautiful” and “I love my body and so can you.”
h/t: HuffPost
michael
I live in Chicago, attended the parade and saw this float. Yeah, I’m thin, but I thought it was funny. We will suck your fat – haha! And, yeah, apparently some people found it offensive.
What I find curious is that this post (along with one other on Gay Cities about an after-parade party) are the only posts about the Chicago parade. Parade attendance was estimated at 1 million people – perhaps the most highly-attended pride parade/celebration in the world. And… nothing positive (crickets chirping…) Don’t you have any Chicago reporters?
Apparatus
@michael:
Word. Also in Chicago…if you need someone to cover the gay things happening in the third largest city in the country I’ll do it dammit.
barkomatic
Is this the post where we pretend that physical appearance shouldn’t matter? We all select partners on their personalities right?
Hillers
I think it would be awesome to have a big ol’ contingent of bears in the float following them next year. Not only do they love their lovehandles, but they seem to be a far sight happier than most body conscious ‘mos.
Ben Dover
Would a float from a gym, or a running club, also be “offensive” because it somehow provoked fat people into eating disorders? I don’t get the logic here.
James Hart
If the size or shape of one’s body affects how much that person loves himself, then he is very insecure and really does need to see a shrink. Gay men shouldn’t be lemmings following each other off a cliff. Think for yourself and be yourself. STOP worrying about what other people think of you, whether they are gay or straight.
boring
@James Hart: Because it’s all on said person and not the superficial, kind of mean-spirited community surrounding it and reinforcing it, which really is spawned by an entire superficial culture.
Just sayin’ it’s not a one-way street necessarily.
Mike
Oh god -I’d type more but I have to go chase down my eyes because they just rolled right out of my head!!!
aaerobear
Ahem!! There were over a million at the San Francisco parade so maybe Chicago came a close second.
Lvng1tor
You can have self love at any size but why not look the best you can? If you do it thru exercise or surgery or nothing at all it’s your choice. They made funny signs..they didn’t say “you suck cause you’re fat” If you find offense at a float that was selling a product then stay inside and never watch tv or read a magazine or see a film cause you’ll be offended all the time. Hell if it’s good enough for Dolly! However, if your only proud because of your appearance or think you are better than others because of it you’re just a dick (not the good kind of dick either)But if you’re shoving a cake in your mouth and getting pissed at hot guys with good bodies and better lives get over it and do something.
Geoff B
@Lvng1tor: Great post. I could definately could stand to drop some wieght myself, and I look at pictures of myself when I was in my 20s and wish I still had that body, but this didn’t offend me in the least. Yeah, I’m 40 and have a little bit of a gut, but I’m a hell of a lot happier than when I was 25 and was “hot”. This really is much ado over nothing. If the biggest problem the gay community ever faced was a float with questionable taste, we’d be running the world by now.
James Hart
@boring: Mentally healthy people, gay or straight, don’t care what the culture around them or society thinks. If they’re happy with themselves, that’s all that matters.
DrewEurope
A couple of things here:
1. Isn’t gay pride about a community celebrating its achievements and identity? Great though it is to have the support of businesses we interact with daily, I just don’t think that celebrating ourselves as a demographic target market is what the day should be about. That being said, the float didn’t invite anyone to be down on themselves, and if someone really was that sensitive would they not already feel intimidated by all the other forms of body perfectionism that we perpetuate as a community?
2. I think the “love who you are” mantra is great, affirmative, but ultimately simplistic. to argue that “Mentally healthy people, gay or straight, don’t care what the culture around them or society thinks. If they’re happy with themselves, that’s all that matters” is to willfully deny that we are social animals who live in a context. Many sociopaths are probably “happy with themselves”! It is not enough to simply say people “shouldn’t care” about social judgments passed on them- if lots of people warned me against an habitual behavior, the “mentally healthy” response would not be to ignore them because i feel happy with myself, but to ask myself whether i was mistaken or whether they were. In the case of worrying about carrying some extra pounds – heck, life is too short. Gimme self-love. But we cannot apply that formula uncritically.
justSomeGuyFromNJ
From the article:
“That was the mindset of Chicago Liposuction when they payed money to have a float in the recent Chicago Pride Parade.”
“Payed?” You’ve got to be kidding me with that kind of typo.
Ben Dover
Also, the author seems weirdly misinformed about what liposuction actually is, or does.
It’s intended for (ahem) “problem areas” where genetics have perhaps been unkind to a person. Or for a formerly obese person who has already lost a LOT of weight and is therefore (ahem) kind of “sagging” in places. It’s never presented as some kind of magic short-cut for general weight loss. For that you would still need the usual boring tactics of diet and exercise, or in extreme cases stomach surgery a la Chris Christie. Liposuction wouldn’t even have much effect on a generally obese person.
For the record, eating disorders tend not to work! Yeah, let’s make that clear.
@justSomeGuyFromNJ: And to think, his parents and Pell Grants “payed” for him to go to college.
boring
@James Hart: To an extent I would agree. Going full bore “fuck everyone” is sociopathic.
Culture will have an impact on you, whether you like it or not.
vive
@michael, yes, not to mention World Pride in Toronto, likely the biggest event in North America this year, which was (almost) completely ignored by Queerty.
vive
The author seems like a bitter person with a weight problem. Liposuction has nothing to do with eating disorders unless your logic is rather twisted. It is like saying there should not be a family float because it is insensitive to those who may have lost a child or a partner, or there should not be drag queens because it makes some trans people angry.
maxlovesrio
@michael: Chicago has a great parade, but others are larger like São Paulo, Madrid, Toronto, and San Francisco. São Paulo gets about three million at theirs and it is truly amazing.
Paco
I probably would not have even noticed or thought much of the “offensive” sign on the float had I been there. I am comfortable enough with my body to not take offense to an advertisement for liposuction (and I could benefit from some for sure lol).