Should We Ban the Phrase “Skinny Fat”?

Equinox gym is known for having provocative advertising. Remember these ads – a photo spread, really, shot 70’s porn style by noted perv Terry Richardson – that drew so much fire for using catwalk models in sexually submissive poses to sell fitness memberships? (Of course the outcry wasn’t about how the women were being dehumanized and belittled in every picture but rather that they were so skinny they couldn’t possibly know what the inside of a gym looks like outside of the spa.) Well, they’re at it again with a new ad campaign taglined “Are you skinny fat?”

Ah skinny fat. There was a time when I aspired to be skinny fat. I thought muscle-less ultra-skinny Mischa Barton and Portia Di Rossi were the epitome of gorgeous. This period was followed by my introduction to weight lifting and I grew to vehemently hate the “skinny fat” look and decried the “unhealthy” skinny girls to anyone who would listen. And now? Now I feel like it’s come down to woman hating. We girls aren’t allowed to love our bodies if we’re fat, like, duh.  And we’re not allowed to love them if we’re skinny either. Heaven help you if you’re just, blah, normal. But if you “tone up” too much then you’ll be accused of looking like a dude and lose your woman card altogether!

What’s a girl to do? No matter what we look like, we’re not good enough. I was reading an article a few days ago about Giselle Bundchen and the writer said “she has always looked manly” and therefore “must watch her angles closely.” Giselle freaking Bundchen isn’t good enough!

Every time I blog about how people can be bigger than a size two and still be healthy (and how it may actually be healthier to be “overweight” according to the BMI standards), I always get a few people commenting something like “Hey, now! Don’t dis skinny people either! Some of us are truly naturally really thin and we don’t have an eating disorder so stop making us feel bad!” And they’re right. Well, not that I’m making them feel bad – that’s never my intent – but that healthy bodies come in all shapes and sizes. This even came up quite a bit in the comments on my post about Crystal Renn with people questioning whether or not she could be called “skinny” at her current size and whether or not she was “healthy.” (You guys gave me SO much to think about with your comments on that one!) Not to mention the fact that all people deserve to be treated with kindness and respect whether or not they’re fat, skinny, muscular or even “not healthy.”

I believe the phrase “skinny fat” came into being to describe someone who is thin but doesn’t exercise or eat healthfully. And while I do think people can be skinny and unhealthy – heroin chic, anyone? – I think this is even more evidence why exercise is great for everyone, regardless of its effectiveness as a weight-loss tool. The problem with labeling someone skinny fat is that you can’t tell just by looking at them what’s going on inside.

Having been in the health and fitness industry for a while now, I’ve seen this phrase thrown around a lot. And let’s face it: regardless of how it started out, it is now a pejorative. Everyone wants to be skinny. Nobody wants to be skinny-fat. So what’s the difference between skinny and skinny fat? The eye of the beholder.

What do you think about “skinny fat” – am I getting worked up over nothing or do you hate this phrase too? What do you think of Equinox’s pattern of outrageous ads? They are really good at grabbing eyeballs…

44 Comments

  1. The ads are ridiculous and I would go out of my way NOT to work out there. I’m more of a YMCA girl myself. We wear clothes there 🙂

  2. I don’t think we need to label a person skinny fat, but it’s a pretty good term. My mom used to brag about how skinny she was (she’s overweight now). Now she acknowledges that skinny isn’t the be all end all, and she doesn’t feel sorry for me that I have to exercise to not gain weight. Now she brags that I deadlift. It’s an important reminder that exercise is important, but it shouldn’t be an insult. Although I still do that. My dad eats junk instead of the healthy food my mom makes, doesn’t exercise, and doesn’t have any health issues other than his beer belly. Mom exercises, eats healthy, and had to get stented. I take after my mom. That’s why I hit the gym so much and obsess over healthy food. Darn genetically working against me.

    As for those ads, I tend to ignore them. I have tunnel vision, and I don’t find those models attractive at all. Why would I want to workout to look like a walking cost hanger? I’ll take athletes over models anyday. They will survive the zombie apocalypse better than any fashion model. 🙂

    • My last paragraph came out like I’m judging. I meant that short of genetics, I don’t believe that I’ll look like that, so I don’t bother trying. I can look like an athlete, Or at least aspire to, so it makes sense for that to be my goal. And athletes look tougher to chew on, should a zombie have a choice between the two.

  3. LOL at Giselle Bundchen being “manly”. Good lord, what article was that in??

  4. Nah, I think it’s a useful term.; imparts lots of info in three little syllables.

  5. So while I understand how people dislike the term, I do find it is the best way to describe people of a normal weight who aren’t necessarily healthy and don’t have great body composition.

    Just because you are a healthy weight doesn’t mean you are healthy. You could be a “normal” weight but have as much fat as someone who is classified as “overweight.”

    I think the term also really helps to shed light on an issue that is often ignored.

    • “So while I understand how people dislike the term, I do find it is the best way to describe people of a normal weight who aren’t necessarily healthy and don’t have great body composition.”

      Of course, the issue with what you’ve just written is that the ‘fat’ part of ‘skinny fat’ is being used as a shortcut to mean ‘unhealthy’. People can be fat and healthy, and having fat itself if not unhealthy, just as someone can be skinny and unhealthy in a way that has nothing to do with their body composition.

      • While I do understand your argument, I think the phrase skinny-fat sheds light on the fact that BMI is inaccurate – that it isn’t an accurate indicator of “health” which we use it as.

        So if we use BMI as an indicator of what is a “healthy” weight why shouldn’t we use skinny-fat as a term to also shed some light on the fact that being a “healthy” weight may not be as “healthy” as we believe?

  6. I’m just over people making a big deal or judgments over anyone of any size. Size is not an indicator of fitness or health–physical or mental–and it’s ridiculous that people still spend so much time and energy to dissecting the topic (not you, but society in general.) I never pay attention to ads anyway, as they’re all usually crap (except the Slowskys. LOVE the Slowskys.)

    Anyway, I’m skinny, but not “skinny fat.” I wish I wasn’t skinny. I wish I could be strong and muscular and at a much healthier place than I am and do feel like people judge me because of how I look. This rolls right off my flat ass, but it’s annoying that people pigeon hole someone no matter how they look.

    But I do have to add that “skinny but unfit” is most certainly a description, just as “overweight and unfit” or “skinny for the wrong reasons” or whatever. Yes, that’s how ridiculous it is.

  7. I’m on the majority side here: skinny-fat is not a flattering term (but neither is skinny), yet it’s accurate and parsimonious. I know a particular person or two of whom I always think when I hear the term. Narrow, bony shoulders, weak forearms, pudgy belly. By most cursory standards a “healthy” weight, thus no cause for alarm they think, but the body composition points to just as high a risk of disease as if they were sporting bingo wings.
    Man Bicep has a point that naming this situation brings it to light so people can’t fool themselves that, as long as their t-shirt size is in the second half of the alphabet, they’re good to go.
    Oh and that ad campaign is digusting. I can see where they were going with it, but the photographer missed it entirely with those models.

  8. I hate the term “skinny fat” too! People seem to use it to describe people who are skinny, but still unhealthy…thus implying that fat=unhealthy, which is, of course, not always true. “Skinny fat” isn’t really an insulting term for the “skinny fat” person…it’s really just another layer of insults layered on actual fat people.

    • I agree with the idea that it’s actually not as insulting for the skinny person as it is for the overweight, since society will still view those “skinny fat” as having a much more desirable body shape than just the “fat.” You said it much better than what I was thinking though.

    • I agree.

      I’m not really a fan of body judgment in any form.

      However, I react to “skinnyfat” on a pretty visceral level. It is both demeaning and unhelpful to suggest that someone’s body is unhealthy because of the ways their body looks like mine.

  9. I think it’s a good term that is misunderstood. It doesn’t mean skinny with a bad lifestyle, it means someone thin with bad body composition. It’s possible to be skinny fat and not have horrible habits, just not great ones either.

    I think it can be used as an insult, but so can anything. It’s all in how it’s used.

  10. I don’t like the term, but I’m admittedly biased after a (what I believe to be flawed) unexpectedly high body fat percentage on the Bod Pod. I exercise 6x a week, 3 of those days I lift weights, and yet this thing was telling me my body fat was so high I was “skinny obese”.

    That sent me into a tailspin where I was ridiculously depressed (and I didn’t think I got that way) and couldn’t even be bothered to exercise for a week. After all, what was the point if all I was was “skinny obese” anyway?

    Then I got a clue, looked at the amount of volume of fat that would have to be on my body for that measurement to be accurate, and there is just no way the Bod Pod analysis was correct. But the label still stings…

    We need to promote healthy food intake with good movement habits, not work on body shaming.

  11. I don’t like the phrase. It’s just another way of insulting a woman for not “looking right”. I get the intent, but I still don’t like it. I have a few friends who are (very annoyingly for me) naturally very thin and they eat well and are healthy and constantly are made to feel bad for how they look. It’s crazy…they are built in a way I could never physically obtain, and to have them belittled like I was when I was fat? It’s just rediculous.
    In the end, if you’re healthy, why does it matte what shape you are?

  12. Yes, I think we should. But then I also think we should ban all body talk outside of doctor’s offices. The way someone looks is just not an accurate predictor of health or lifestyle. I have one of those body types that doesn’t want to tone up no matter how much I workout or what I eat. And add on top of that a really long history of cycles of binge/starve while I was still growing and you’ll never, ever see me in a bikini. Yet I know these days I eat healthier and have a healthier workout schedule than a lot of friends who have “perfect” bodies. So labeling someone as something, whether or not it’s meant to be hurtful, is offensive in my eyes.

  13. I hate the term. It’s just another way to shill a product by making people (especially females, and ESPECIALLY young females) feel badly about themselves. Because Equinox decided that, OK, we’ve got the hip urbanites, the stay-at-home-moms, the executives, now let’s go after those skinny girls who’ve been swaggering around since the heyday of “Ally McBeal” feeling all stylish and confident. If we break them down enough, we’ll get ’em in here!
    I used to work at Equinox. At first it was great, but then corporate decided they needed to be more aggressive, so they fired the managers, most of the staff quit, and the atmosphere became competitive and hostile. This is ONE location, and I know there are hundreds. And the competition for fitness clubs is pretty fierce, so by this type of marketing they garner a lot of attention.
    Bu I still hate this ad.

  14. I agree with Melissa’s comment above. I hate the term “skinny fat” because “fat” it supposed to mean “unfit” there. It’s as thought “fat” is being used as universally derogative, when it doesn’t have to be.

    Re: Equinox, I hate their ads! My gym was actually bought out by Equinox a few months ago, and I left. For several reasons, but partially because of their ad campaign and the atmosphere they try to create around the gym. A lot of the clientele at that gym are older people, due to the location and the price point, and they plastered the gym in uncomfortable pictures of young models in sexual poses. Very very odd. I don’t mind inspirational workout posters (Gold’s Gym posts pictures of attractive people and their success stories), but these pictures were mostly provocative with zero indication of having to do with fitness.

  15. I actually really like the phrase. I think it takes the emphasis off the skinny part and implies that skinny isn’t always associated with healthy. this coming from a skinny girl. I do weight lift a ton (more than I do cardio), to avoid this very thing. Even when I first heard it, I thought it was a great way to shed light on it.

  16. I totally agree with you on this one! Every body is different, and health can look a lot different from one person to the other! I personally eat healthy and exercise 5x a week, but I still have a curvy shape (big boobs big but) at a healthy weight.. And I know I will never look like a model. We all look different, and all we can do is take care of the body we have! As for Gisele looking manly, pleeease!
    And anyhow, how is it my business to judge if someone else is healthy, of fits into a certain category! My health should be a private matter between me, my doctor and maybe my family
    So society, butt out of my business please

  17. I have to admit that I like the term skinny fat, and I use it often. I don’t assume that every skinny girl I see is skinny fat, but you can certainly tell my looking closely at someone whether they are. Just today I was at the gym with my husband and we commented about this skinny girl who is *always* running on the treadmill for hours on end. She is thin, sure, but she has absolutely zero muscle definition whatsoever. With every step you can see the fat on her body jiggling. Now, as horrible as that sounds, I try not to judge people unless I feel like I could help them! I know that if I spoke to that girl and told her about the damage she’s inflicting on her body through all that cardio, then I could change her life.

    Sometimes I think the term is overused, and just another way women can express hatred towards one another. I think it definitely has a time and a place though, especially considering how passionate I am about women lifting heavy things and laying off the cardio!

  18. “Skinny fat” came into existence to describe people (like I used to be) who appeared skinny to the world but will still measure about 30% body fat if taken to the calipers. It was a way to say “you are not a healthy body composition” without having to call a thin person “fat”.

    That said, I don’t like the Equinox ads. Those ads make it seem as if nobody can be good enough. And I truly despise gyms selling their services as weight/fat control centers instead of selling the healthy aspects of exercises.

  19. I hate this phrase mostly because it also seems to imply that if you are fit you won’t be skinny. So many girls I know describe themselves that way because they don’t want to exercise and get “big”.

    I have had girls tell me to my face that they would rather have skinny legs that are all fat than my “big” legs…even though they later assure me my legs look great (I can say when the comment was made that I was very happy with how fit I was, but I do a lot of exercises like biking and hiking that mean you develop solid muscle). I can’t tell you how many times I have had girls around me talk about how they don’t exercise because they don’t want to get “big”, all the while knowing I count as “big”

    Skinny fat just perpetuates “big” or “fat” muscle or big and fit. Lets just go for things like athletic or fit. The girls I know wouldn’t be insulted if they were told they weren’t athletic. I would be happy to be described as athletic. I am not happy to be described as “big” just because my legs are not sticks (I know some people’s legs are super tiny naturally. I have no issue with that. I just have an issue with defining everyone else as “big” automatically)

  20. I think you hit the nail on the head when you said that, basically, no matter what we look like, we’re never quite right. We’re either too fat, too skinny, too muscular, too hippy, not hippy enough, etc. And, by extension, we’re also never good enough workers, mothers, students, wives, etc. And you know what? I just think it’s all so TIRING, and in my opinion manufactured to keep women from focusing on IMPORTANT concerns, like our reproductive rights or equality at work or empowering women to achieve positions of political, economic, and social influence. Am I suggesting a conspiracy of sorts? Maybe. … I’m going to put on my tin foil helmet now and go stand in the closet.

    (But seriously… )

    • PS Charlotte — I just wanted to add how much I love your blog. You always post such quality content like… EVERY DAY. It’s wonderful!

  21. I try to stay clinical and not use derogatory terms for size. I suppose that is an advantage we have as doctors. Of course, if the lay public starts using our terminology too often, I suppose the profession will just have to make up some new official language to use 🙂

  22. As a girl prone to skinny fatness, I use the term affectionately about myself. Which is maybe odd because I find the word “skinny” offensive. I’ve been naturally thin my whole life and started exercising on the regular in my late teens. Now that I’m in my mid -30s and have had a couple of kids, I just accept that I’ll be fighting the belly fat the rest of my life. And partly it’s my apple body type. It’s hard for me to put on muscle and what I do have, I have earned. When I gain weight, it goes straight to the tummy and breasts. (I like to think that the breasts distract from the tummy ;)) And although I am a very small person by most any definition, I think I have more body fat than you’d expect on a weight lifting, marathon running vegetarian. I know I’m not fat, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t still have fat on my body.

    Maybe I’d feel differently if some else were calling me skinny fat, but I find the term unoffensive.

    As for the posters, I’m not into anything that uses shame as inspiration.

  23. Skinny fat to me is a person that looks skinny to all of us but is actually not healthy under it all.. maybe a higher body fat due to no resistance training or already starting to lean towards osteoporosis due to no resistance training AND not eating enough and/or the right combo of foods. Many people look thin but really are unhealthy & we need to be aware of that….

  24. I’m sure there is a better way to put it than “skinny fat,” but it is a very descriptive phrase. From what I could gather, it’s supposed to get across the point that even if you are naturally thin you still need to exercise. I thought it meant you were thin but had “jiggly bits.” (I have no clue how else to describe it, really.)

  25. Once again, you bring up a topic I was just discussing with someone. A friend of mine has been comparing herself to me A LOT recently and she has no need to — my job is fitness, thus I work out every day, most of the day now, and she is already beautiful, skinny, and pretty fit. She was talking about how she just wants to be a little better — just toned a little more here and there (we’ve all been there) — and I told her it won’t ever stop there if she keeps thinking like that. I remember your post on this, that you will never be happy w/ your results, and tried to give her a good example. The one I gave? My mother. She’s “skinny-fat”/just plain ‘ole skinny and not super healthy. I don’t like the term “skinny-fat,” but sometimes it’s the only one to use — or at least its description — when trying to talk to people about the priority of health over looks when it comes to fitness. I know many people who are skinny but do nothing for their health, and I know many who try very hard to be healthy, but are still considered overweight. The sad truth is, we just need more cases of these publicly “skinny-fat” people having health-related issues that lead to them having to take better precautions with their health and diet… but I feel absolutely horrible just by typing that!

  26. I don’t like the term either. It’s a combination of the fact that I really just don’t like the word “skinny” and also because it uses “fat” as a synonym for unhealthy.

    I do actually appreciate that the concept exists, though, because it shows that there is an awareness of the fact that being skinny does not automatically correlate to healthiness. I just wish there was a different way to phrase it.

  27. I’ve actually never understood the phrase, “skinny fat.”

    I used to jokingly say that I was the fattest underweight girl you’d ever meet… because I’ve never eaten particularly in the manner in which people assume underweight people eat (or don’t eat) — hello rice krispy treats, wishing I could have an IV of hot chocolate, and an addiction to pumpkin bread. However, that’s not quite the same… hmm….

  28. I used to strive for the skinny no muscle tone look but the only way I could get there was by being very unhealthy. I have come to realize that healthy comes in all shapes in sizes. A person can eat clean, exercise, and live a healthy lifestyle and not be a size 2 and some can be a size 2. We need to be the BEST healthy version of ourselves rather than someone else. I think that is the hardest thing to except for people.

  29. I have never heard of skinny fat before. I don’t know why people all worked up about stuff like this.

  30. I think the term is being co-opted to be yet another criticism of women’s bodies – now we aren’t skinny the right way!

    Its a term that is supposed to define body composition and comes from men’s bodybuilding/weightlifting circles. Its about how much muscle you have versus fat and bodytype scale on that. The problem with the way its used in women’s fitness circles is that its out of context. When you see it used like this:

    http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=124209111&page=1

    the term makes sense. And it does seem that they have fun with it.

    http://i.imgur.com/hzmw6.jpg

    Unfortunately the only charts about women’s bodies are just “which type” rather than the idea of a scale of body composition. Although, perhaps women’s bodies don’t lend them selves to that kind of scale due to the higher body fat percentage in general and the fact that our secondary sex characteristics are pretty much fat based (ie breasts and bum).

  31. If ‘skinny fat’ moves the general population towards an appreciation of fitness and health – even if for aesthetic reasons – it’s the lesser of many evils.

    One virtue of the phrase is that it offers a vocabulary to articulate dissatisfaction with one’s body that has a hope of being addressed in a way that serves health. A woman or girl who finds herself not naturally at the very low end of BMI might be aware of ‘jiggly’ bits (and, contrary to what family and friends might say, actually have some).

    ‘Skinny fat’ awareness might now mean she’d turn to fitness/weight-lifting, instead of continuing on a path towards a potentially fatal eating disorder. I’m not saying that disordered behaviours might not still occur – she may now obsess over protein intake – but at the very least, she will avoid wasting her heart.

    (I am probably skinny fat, and unlikely to move from it without a level of commitment I’m not prepared to offer. But thanks to this new awareness of body composition, I know that what I *don’t* need to do is try to live on 1200 calories.)

  32. Skinny fat is the term used, not for someone who is ‘skinny but unhealthy’, but actually someone who is skinny and has more than 30% body-fat. Depending on the person this could be because of poor diet or poor exercise habits but this varies from person to person. Skinny-fat is a person like me; I eat healthy, I do cardio twice a week, but because I was scared to do weights at the thought of looking too manly, I look skinny, but am not toned and as a result I’m still unhealthy— hence “skinny-fat”. It’s not a ‘dissing’ term; it’s simply the truth.

  33. Hi, I believe many of you are not understanding what ‘Skinny Fat’ means nor do most Americans which makes this a great Ad from a marketing standpoint. It refers to someone who appears thin but actually has too high of a fat percentage level.

  34. Pingback:Is “Skinny Fat” A Legitimate Fitness Term? | Words To Sweat By

  35. Pingback:Equinox Made Me Do It: I Had to Write About Their New Funny-For-All-The-Wrong-Reasons Ad Campaign [Because PICTURES]

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