[Benoit]

http://www.salon.com/2013/10/02/my_embar...ent_viral/

Quote:

I logged onto my Facebook one morning to find a message from a girlfriend. “You’re internet famous!” it read. She sent a link to a very public page whose sole purpose was posting images that mock people’s appearances. There I was in full glory — a picture of me dressed as my hero Lara Croft: Tomb Raider for Halloween — but written over the image were the words “Fridge Raider.”

Quote:

I don’t generally view my body size as positive or negative — it simply is. I eat right (most of the time) and I exercise (an inordinate amount), but it does little, thanks to a struggle with polycystic ovarian syndrome and a failing thyroid gland. I’m strong, I’m flexible and my doctor assures me my health is good, but the fact remains: I’m larger than someone my height should be.

...

Perfect strangers pointed out that there was nothing wrong with a woman of large size dressing up to have a good time. Some commenters even accurately guessed that I had polycystic ovarian syndrome. The disease is characterized by an accumulation of fat in the stomach, making it look, as one insensitive doctor told me, “like you’ve got a basketball shoved under your shirt.”

Those are not the arms of someone with a basketball shoved under their shirt. What is a sensitive way to say this? "You will look like you've been blessed with a real woman's body"?

Quote:

In the months since, my attitude toward these throwaway images of mockery on the Internet has changed. I no longer find them funny. Each one of those people is a real human being, a real person whose world imploded the day they found themselves to be a punch line on a giant stage. I speak up whenever a friend gets a cheap laugh from one of these sites. I ask one simple question: “Why do you think this is funny?” Very few have a good answer. Mostly they just say, “I don’t know.” Reminding people of our shared humanity hasn’t exactly made me popular, but it feels like the right thing to do. I know what it’s like to be the person in that horrible photograph. I can’t inflict such pain on someone else.

A good way to suck all the joy out of life! That's how jokes work, there always has to be someone or something as a target.

Quote:

Caitlin Seida has been writing professionally since 2006. Her work has appeared on Livestrong.com, The Daily Puppy, and Case to Case, among other publications. She lives in Ohio with her husband, daughter and a menagerie of rescued animals.

Beta and cats?