Hard to judge from two very short, unfortunate clips. But gosh, the woman looks uncomfortable. My hope is that he doesn't use her size as a controlling factor. I think these sorts of relationships sometimes strike people as unhealthy because they can go that way, especially when the woman is so large as this, and especially if there is a feederism aspect to the relationship. You can't really tell if either of those factors hold true just from watching these clips. But gosh, that woman does not look happy to be there. #tyramenobesewomen
@Adah: I have seen a documentary about this - how 'feeders' want to get their girlfriends/wives as fat as possible, which is beyond fetisj because it's also about control and power. It's beyond just having a prefecerence for 'fat' girls (or Asian, or whatever). #tyramenobesewomen
@BlondeGoddess: I weigh close to 300# and I am totally afraid of feeders. It's not about love or a relationship with them- it's about control until they leave you dangerously obsese for someone skinnier who they can do it to all over again.
When I first started dating the BF, he was a big eater- always wanting to go to restaurants and get dessert and eat, eat, eat. I sat him down one day and just plain asked if he was a feeder. He said no- that he just liked food and hated to cook for himself. Thank god he isn't but it's still something I look out for. #tyramenobesewomen
@BlondeGoddess: I think a lot of women (larger or otherwise) are just so happy that someone wants to be with them that they'll put up with anything. I feel really lucky that my boyfriend isn't a) a feeder and b) is really loving, honest and supportive of me at any size. #tyramenobesewomen
Whenever I hear somebody talk about sexual obsessions, I always hear Elaine Benes saying, "He's obsessed, he's obsessed with breasts". #tyramenobesewomen
@run_sunshine: Her pause for thought when George tries to sell her a computer is one of the few moment from that how that still makes me chuckle when I think about it.
I used to know a girl who worked as a prostitute while she was at NYU and continued after graduation. She started taking meds for bipolar disorder and gained a very large amount of weight--she said she went from skinny to obese, pretty much. She was very happy that she could charge more as a large woman because her services were now considered a fetish. #tyramenobesewomen
@Jezebabe: I once knew a woman who was 8+ months pregnant and working as a prostitute. She was working under a pimp and had little control of cost (to my knowlege) but i always wondered if he charged more. #tyramenobesewomen
wait, so being attracted to fat women is a fetish? because sex with a fat woman is an abnormal sexual expression?
does not compute.
also, TOTALLY disturbed by his description of sex "with a big girl" like boxing "you step in there and you knock 'em out" what the fuck is that supposed to mean?
and there are only two clips from the show but im wondering, does nikki ever get to speak about her sexuality? or is the focus just on him and how he has sex with her? #tyramenobesewomen
Tyra is ridonkulous. Why does she have people on her show just to gape at them?! When his girlfriend said sometimes she was on top and Tyra made that "whaaaaa" face. Like yeah I imagine they figured it out TyTy, they're both alive to tell about it, don't look so shocked. Sheeeesh #tyramenobesewomen
@lonewolfer: I know it is so annoying. I know that these people agreed to be on the show so they kind of knew what they were getting into, but what if they just wanted a chance to talk about their relationship? And not have questions about "like, how do you DO IT?" and looks of disgust thrown at them. #tyramenobesewomen
@chibirhm: I am a redhead with a chronic disease and surgery scars. Let me tell ya, there is so much more weirdness out there than chubby chasers. #tyramenobesewomen
As a fat girl I'm bummed that this seems to be my main target audience. Chubby chasing creeps me out. I don''t want to be someone's type because of my poor eating habits you know? #tyramenobesewomen
@kittens: I get that, except I love tall guys. Give me the same guy as 5'8" and as 6'3" and I will be waaaay more attracted the latter. Same if there is an Irish accent involved, or an insane I.Q. Just because one thing turns you on in particular, I don't think it necessarily negates that attraction. It just seems when it comes to weight and race, if someone is really attracted to it we find it odd - but yet if it is hair color or another aspect we are okay with it. It is one thing to refuse to look at someone who doesn't fit the criteria and another just to prefer it. #tyramenobesewomen
@Kali Mama: But this guy talking has had sex with smaller women and said he enjoyed it. I think we tend to throw the word fetish around when most people mean they just really like something. #tyramenobesewomen
What is the difference between a fetish and just a preference? If someone is exclusively attracted to women between the ages of 18-30, between 110-140 lbs is it a fetish? "I've just always known since I was a small boy that I was into skinny chicks. Ever since that one skinny babysitter who molested me when I was 8" or whatever. That said, my computer is not letting me watch the clips so maybe these dudes are super freaky and I just can't tell. #tyramenobesewomen
@J.D.Regent: That same question seems to come up when discussing guys who prefer to date women of Asian descent - I don't think anyone can ever come to a consensus on the issue. #tyramenobesewomen
@Where The Mild Things Are: This is just another opinion thrown into the mix, but this is what I think is the distinction:
It's a personal preference if someone has been with a number of people, and in retrospect, notices that they all shared one particular quality. Example, every boy I've ever gone out with has liked Tool. So I guess my personal preference when it comes to boyfriends is guys who like Tool. And maybe if I saw a guy in a Tool shirt, that alone would make him more attractive to me. But it isn't really a conscious thing. And it's definitely not a factor in deciding whether or not I like someone.
It's a fetish (though this isn't what the word means, I think this is what people mean now when they say it) when you are aware of the quality that all the people you've been with shared, and it's the ONLY, or primary, thing you were attracted to or liked about them, and the only thing you're looking for in someone in the future.
Like if you set someone up with a blind date, and they have an asian fetish, the first question is, "is she asian?" or "what ethnicity is she?" Or if you're out and a guy with a redhead fetish comes up to you and says "I love redheads" and tries to hit on you when he doesn't know anything about you other than your hair color.
But then there are things like parents wanting their daughter to marry a "nice Jewish boy", or someone looking for a partner who has money, or gay men who like Bears, so it's hard to say if that definition of "fetish" is even a bad thing. I think it is when it objectifies people and limits them to one defining characteristic, or when it's based in something perceived as a "kink" like liking "big women".
But I bet that if we looked back at our dating history, we'd all be able to spot patterns and similarities in the people we've been attracted to. It only seems to be noticed as a "fetish" when society tells us the thing we are attracted to is not conventionally attractive...
@prismatism: Yeah, it's such a murkey area. The subject came up on Feministing not too long ago, and one commenter (Stephanie89) qualified it as:
"There's a difference between a preference and a fetish, in that someone with a fetish (correct me if I'm wrong) is turned on by the actual characteristic and not a person with the characteristic. For example, a man might have a preference for fat women because they find those women attractive or they are fat themselves, whereas a person with a fat fetish is actually turned on by the idea of fatness, and of someone being fat. Does that make sense?" [www.feministing.com]
Which is like what you said - what's the primary factor operating? #tyramenobesewomen
@Where The Mild Things Are: Yeah. A fetish is more selfish, and dehumanizing for the person being fetishized. It's more about the psychology of the person who has the fetish. The person they're with who has the quality they fetishize is interchangeable with anyone else who has it. And it doesn't have any practical reasoning behind it... you might prefer, for example, to be with Indian men because the cultural structure & identity that tends to be a part of the experience of being an Indian man is one that fits well with yours, regardless of your own race or culture. So for whatever reasons, they're the men that it is easiest for you to fall in love with, circumstantially and emotionally. Someone else could come along and say that that's right or wrong, but there at least are reasons that can be explained & make some sense. But if you have an Indian fetish, it's probably more about the excitement of a psychological taboo. It's about acting out on the issues in your own mind. Whatever ideas or beliefs you have attached to that experience, you get to live through & feel. Like, this is "exotic" or "bad" or "unconventional", or even if it's just an aesthetic fantasy... You go into it expecting something specific of the person, and that's what you're in it to find. Whatever it is that excites you mentally, you go in to it with the intention of translating that mental excitement into physical experience.
Which I still can't say is necessarily bad, because if you HAVE that sense of "other" you might as well examine it & work through it. Like I don't have much of a problem with girls who get drunk and kiss each other because it's better than being homophobic, even if it is hypocritical and stupid and they're just doing it for the shock of "oh my god, I kissed a girl". Better that it come out as fascination than hate, I guess. But it should be between people who respect each other as humans and are both aware of what kind of game is being played...
And I don't think that the experience should be used to validate a person's psychological delusions as actual fact, because that's how we end up with people who say stuff like "I'm not racist, I slept with a black guy", when they continue to hold racist beliefs, say racist things, and act in racist ways. If the thought of "sleeping with a black guy" excites you, then do it, I guess, but you should come out of the experience changed. It shouldn't become a situation where you're like a mouse in an experiment, continually pushing the lever to get another shot of a drug, just re-affirming your conceptions because you can't see beyond them... Because it's wrong from an outside perspective, but also because it's a scary world for someone to be in, psychologically, when they're so completely wrapped up in their own mind.
@J.D.Regent: I'm late here, but wanted to add that the concept of fetishism emerged out of the colonial relationship between Portuguese traders and West Africans. Fetisso was a pidgin word denoting a small, portable religious object believed to be endowed with magical powers. It had negative connotations because the Europeans saw the Africans as attributing misplaced value to these religious objects. Right about the time that Freud was picking up on the concept for his ideas about sexual fetishes, Marx was also adapting the idea of the fetish to economic theory. For Marx, commodities are fetishes because they are emptied out of their "use value" and are only revered for their "exchange value." In a way, he saw comodification as a problem of misplaced value in which goods are endowed with magical properties. Freud saw a similar problem with sexual fetishes: the fetishist is interested in the fetish object, not what Freud saw as the proper sexual object (penis in vagina sex). That is, the fetishist places value on what Freud deems not to have that value. (And I say "he" on purpose here because only men are fetishists in Freud's work, since the purpose of a fetish is to ward off male homosexuality and make heterosexual sex tolerable.) What stumps Freud though is that fetishists are pretty happy with their fetishes and try as he might, he can't seem to convince them of their misery.
So maybe the difference between a fetish and a preference is that the fetishist is unabashedly happy. #tyramenobesewomen
@overnightly: Is that what's different? I thought she looked less scary than usual but I did not know there was a quantifiable reason! #tyramenobesewomen
This whole thing is pretty offensive. Tyra and the audience are asking these personal questions and acting all grossed out about their sex life because Nicki is obese, while she (Nicki) just has to sit there and take it and doesn't get to say anything.
Then again, I suppose the Tyra show is not where you go when you want to be treated with tact and subtlety. #tyramenobesewomen
@AcadianDriftwood: It's infuriating, really. I mean, I know people are curious, because we are often curious about things that are outside of our experience, but did Nikki (Nicki?) say anything at all, or did she just sit there uncomfortably? I wish they had handled it differently :/ #tyramenobesewomen
If this situation had been reversed, they would have intervened and helped her to escape from him. I'm just not sure why he's not "worth" that.... #tyradomesticabuse
10/27/09
10/27/09
10/27/09
When I first started dating the BF, he was a big eater- always wanting to go to restaurants and get dessert and eat, eat, eat. I sat him down one day and just plain asked if he was a feeder. He said no- that he just liked food and hated to cook for himself. Thank god he isn't but it's still something I look out for. #tyramenobesewomen
10/27/09
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10/26/09
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10/26/09
George: It has porn!
Elaine:......still no. #tyramenobesewomen
10/26/09
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10/27/09
10/26/09
does not compute.
also, TOTALLY disturbed by his description of sex "with a big girl" like boxing "you step in there and you knock 'em out" what the fuck is that supposed to mean?
and there are only two clips from the show but im wondering, does nikki ever get to speak about her sexuality? or is the focus just on him and how he has sex with her? #tyramenobesewomen
10/26/09
10/26/09
10/26/09
10/26/09
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10/27/09
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10/26/09
It's a personal preference if someone has been with a number of people, and in retrospect, notices that they all shared one particular quality. Example, every boy I've ever gone out with has liked Tool. So I guess my personal preference when it comes to boyfriends is guys who like Tool. And maybe if I saw a guy in a Tool shirt, that alone would make him more attractive to me. But it isn't really a conscious thing. And it's definitely not a factor in deciding whether or not I like someone.
It's a fetish (though this isn't what the word means, I think this is what people mean now when they say it) when you are aware of the quality that all the people you've been with shared, and it's the ONLY, or primary, thing you were attracted to or liked about them, and the only thing you're looking for in someone in the future.
Like if you set someone up with a blind date, and they have an asian fetish, the first question is, "is she asian?" or "what ethnicity is she?" Or if you're out and a guy with a redhead fetish comes up to you and says "I love redheads" and tries to hit on you when he doesn't know anything about you other than your hair color.
But then there are things like parents wanting their daughter to marry a "nice Jewish boy", or someone looking for a partner who has money, or gay men who like Bears, so it's hard to say if that definition of "fetish" is even a bad thing. I think it is when it objectifies people and limits them to one defining characteristic, or when it's based in something perceived as a "kink" like liking "big women".
But I bet that if we looked back at our dating history, we'd all be able to spot patterns and similarities in the people we've been attracted to. It only seems to be noticed as a "fetish" when society tells us the thing we are attracted to is not conventionally attractive...
I don't know, sorry for the rambling. #tyramenobesewomen
10/26/09
10/26/09
"There's a difference between a preference and a fetish, in that someone with a fetish (correct me if I'm wrong) is turned on by the actual characteristic and not a person with the characteristic. For example, a man might have a preference for fat women because they find those women attractive or they are fat themselves, whereas a person with a fat fetish is actually turned on by the idea of fatness, and of someone being fat. Does that make sense?"
[www.feministing.com]
Which is like what you said - what's the primary factor operating? #tyramenobesewomen
10/27/09
Which I still can't say is necessarily bad, because if you HAVE that sense of "other" you might as well examine it & work through it. Like I don't have much of a problem with girls who get drunk and kiss each other because it's better than being homophobic, even if it is hypocritical and stupid and they're just doing it for the shock of "oh my god, I kissed a girl". Better that it come out as fascination than hate, I guess. But it should be between people who respect each other as humans and are both aware of what kind of game is being played...
And I don't think that the experience should be used to validate a person's psychological delusions as actual fact, because that's how we end up with people who say stuff like "I'm not racist, I slept with a black guy", when they continue to hold racist beliefs, say racist things, and act in racist ways. If the thought of "sleeping with a black guy" excites you, then do it, I guess, but you should come out of the experience changed. It shouldn't become a situation where you're like a mouse in an experiment, continually pushing the lever to get another shot of a drug, just re-affirming your conceptions because you can't see beyond them... Because it's wrong from an outside perspective, but also because it's a scary world for someone to be in, psychologically, when they're so completely wrapped up in their own mind.
I don't knoooooow. It's tricky. #tyramenobesewomen
10/27/09
So maybe the difference between a fetish and a preference is that the fetishist is unabashedly happy. #tyramenobesewomen
10/26/09
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10/26/09
Then again, I suppose the Tyra show is not where you go when you want to be treated with tact and subtlety. #tyramenobesewomen
10/26/09
10/19/09
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10/19/09
Still can't watch him. #tyradomesticabuse
10/19/09
10/19/09
The patriarchy hurts everyone. #tyradomesticabuse
10/20/09
It's a systemic failure, not something that can just be fixed simply by tweaking a few design elements here and there. #tyradomesticabuse