“But why do the fat bother? What is the problem ? »Asks humorist Christine Morency in the new documentary series I love you big, which she co-hosts with singer Mélissa Bédard. Those who display their forms without complex tackle grossophobia head-on and try to break down prejudices.
“Racism, it no longer has its place now, there are words that can no longer be used in public because they are too heavy with meaning. But grossophobia is so accepted […] I’m tired of associating the big ones with prejudices that stigmatize them, ”laments the comedian from the first minutes of the series.
Through the six thirty-minute episodes, she discusses with Mélissa Bédard what grossophobia is, the ways in which it manifests itself on a daily basis and all the harm it can do. The two facilitators do not hesitate to draw from their own personal experiences to illustrate their remarks.
Because if they say today that they love each other and find themselves beautiful with their “extraordinary” body, the road to get there has not been easy. Hateful comments about their weight, they’ve gotten tons of it every time they show a patch of skin on their social media or make a simple TV appearance. It is a constant struggle, they stress, to accept oneself and to be accepted by others.
Putting the problem into words
Over the course of the episodes, several voices join theirs to put words into the problem and find solutions. The two hosts give the floor to comedians Lise Dion and Matthieu Pepper, singer Renée Wilkin and columnist Jean-Sébastien Girard. In the form of intimate interviews, the guests discuss topics as varied as their diet, their health, the bullying they have been subjected to, but also how difficult it is to seduce or to dress when you are a fat person. .
In the first episode, which the media were able to watch first on Friday, Lise Dion reveals for example never to have undressed in front of her spouse, embarrassed by the look he could wear on her naked body. For his part, the circus artist Mario Cadieux recounts having had to undergo an MRI in a veterinary hospital, “on a cow table”, because his body “does not fittait not ”with traditional medical devices.
Through the various testimonials, the series seeks above all to deconstruct prejudices that are still stubborn in our society, such as the fact that we still hear that fat people are lazy, that they never exercise, that they eat a lot. or that they are not in good health.
The researcher at the University Institute of Cardiology and Pneumology of Quebec Benoit Arsenault comes to bring his expertise on this subject, he who is interested in the relationship between weight and health. It shows those who don’t yet know that, yes, it is possible to be fat and healthy.
A word still taboo
Journalist Mickaël Bergeron and blogger Edith Bernier – who wrote respectively Life wholesale and Fat, and then? – also bring their thoughts. It must be said that their books are at the origin of the existence of the series, according to the admission of the producer Isabelle Maréchal.
“Their books touched and troubled me,” she said in an interview. She adds that she realized that “we are all a little grossophobic. Not because we are bad people, but because we are ignorant ”.
Isabelle Maréchal hopes that the series will make it possible to start a dialogue on grossophobia, a word still taboo, and that it will help to change the way society looks at fat people.