Chunky, fat and greedy: there is no navel in the world that they like

"Che is not a bit of a groncha to fall like this to a WEDDING," wrote a Twitter user about Emilia Mernes 's dress - which was seen in the photo with Lizardo Ponce - at the wedding of Stefi Roitman and Ricky Montaner that was the hit of the weekend for the number of celebrities. Also, Emilia went with her boyfriend Duki de Ella and they sang together As if it didn't matter .

Emilia had an asymmetrical, sexy, black, long dress, with slits and that she showed her navel. In that triangle of unstitched fabric is the center of the universe: the navel of the world. But not for narcissism, but for being the permanent center of criticism (from men and also from other women). If she shows it because she shows it, if he lets her go because he lets her go, if the belly has a shape because it's a roll and if it's flat because it doesn't show elegance.

Those who get pregnant and don't get smooth, those who don't get pregnant and are branded as selfish, those who give the tit and are no longer showy with their belly but with everything in the air and maternal stretch marks too, which are noticeable who had 9 months of carrying a person and those who prefer that their personal life does not end in motherhood. They all generate a bellyful of hurtful comments.

They are all criticized. Those who take care of themselves and those who are encouraged, those who cut cloth and those who cut chocolate cake, those who let go of their belly and get on the surfboard and those who don't need much cloth to feel attractive. Being chubby , fat or greedy can be an offense, a boomerang that women make proud or a word that is avoided because they do not want to accept it. Everyone decides how they defend themselves and what they consider an attack.

But beyond personal decisions there is no belly that suits them. And that shows that the problem is not only what is considered a problem -which always has discriminatory features that come from discrimination against slaves, poor women, fat women and those who enjoy food and sexuality- but that the problem is what comes when a baby's umbilical cord is cut: the navel of femininity always bombarded with hurtful comments and degrading looks.

“When we are not skinny, it seems that we do not directly qualify as women. If you are fat, the system sees a fat woman before seeing a woman. Agustina Cabaleiro wrote in the book I tell you for your own good (about being fat and occupying spaces in freedom), by Editorial Montena. Agustina Cabaleiro shows looks, photos, brands with availability of sizes and makes videos and reflections that go from theory to practice, but above all, and in the midst of the heat wave, she reaffirms that she is not going to cover up or suffocate because others want to make her feel bad about her body . Her body is allowed to breathe and she goes head-on (to the sea or to the hairy-haired woman).

“Today for me, feeling beautiful is an act of freedom and revolution. Because they taught me that I could never be one with this body, so feeling it and saying it out loud seems like a beautiful rebellion to me.” Augustine reaffirms. She has a first and last name but is even better known for her Instagram account (@onlinemami_ ) and recommends how to make all self-love not be a hallelujah that is diluted by the first aggression on networks: “Perhaps the first step is to forgive ourselves for how we have treated our body for years, for having criticized ourselves and self-generated so much stress and understanding that we were not the ones who failed for being fat and for believing that this was wrong.

She believes that personal and, sometimes, family understanding (if a mother said "I'm telling you for your own good", for example, that she should not wear white shorts) is a first step to not blame herself (or the environment without bad faith). ), but do know where the poison dart comes from: "All this discomfort is the result of the operation of a system designed so that we always run on this imaginary hamster wheel after the ideal body" , she synthesizes her.

The hamster wheel leads nowhere. But sometimes, the most painful, it can take you out of spaces that give pleasure or health. One of the most heartbreaking experiences about how the look and the murmur of others hurts is the expulsion from the world is by Salomé Wochokolosky fat activist, narrator and storyteller.

Her story is in the book Plunge (which can be read for free from her Instagram), self-managed edited and with a cover illustration by Malena Fernández (@Hexico). “When I was twelve years old, I decided to swim at the Villa Crespo club. The first day I went into the locker room and while I was undressing, a group of girls started looking at me and muttering something that I couldn't hear, but from my experience I knew what it was, ”she begins.

“ They debated whether I was a woman or a man , until one went to tell someone from outside and a lady came who rebuked me, asking me to confirm what I was and why she was in a women's bathroom trying to put a mesh on me. There was such a fuss that I got dressed crying, went home and for a long time I didn't try to swim, even though I love it. ”, wrote Salome Wochokolosky.

The navel is always judged. To show or to hide. And that generates aesthetic and also sports, work, sexual and creative inhibition. “They judge women for being fat, whores, fat women. For this reason, we created the campaign Hermana Solta, la panza so that women occupy places and do not let themselves be intimidated by criticism”, evaluates Lala Pasquinelli , visual artist and founder of Women who were not a cover, which, on Instagram, has 320,000 followers.

The Sister let go of the belly campaign is one of the successes of the summer. It is because now we do not have to reach the summer, but stop judging and limiting the bodies that do not fit with the mirror or that want to show themselves as they want without letting themselves be defeated, frustrated, kicked out or absorbed by frustration as a permanent mold. The photos encourage women to have sex with the lights on, wear a bikini or exercise without seeing how it looks, but rather what it does well or is enjoyed.

In Plunge Salomé Wochokolosky returns to that childhood moment where she was stunned by her pejorative looks in a swimming locker room: “ From that moment on, I drastically limited myself . I avoided going to public toilets, and if I did, I often experienced situations that confirmed to me that it was preferable not to go in, that my presence made me uneasy. Another alternative was to use the boys' bathroom, although I didn't like it”.

She did not lower her arms (and luckily she uses them to swim and write) and recounts: “Despite various impediments, I felt like swimming again and decided to do it. I'm not going to hide anymore, I thought. I decided to find a club close to home. I went to find out and I didn't pay attention to the looks, or the murmurs, which are sometimes constant. I looked for a mesh that would fit me, that took me time because in addition to not having a defined gender for others, I am also fat. If I am not excluded for one thing, it is for the other”.

There is not a single wish to ask for, but one of her wishes is in Zambullida: “I would like not to have to wear the typical women's swimsuit, I never felt comfortable, but that is too much to ask. In the end I found a fairly sporty one, black, that has shorts at the bottom”.

She describes: “When I put it on I feel ridiculous, I don't like it at all, but I think it has to do with what I was taught to think about myself. While using it, I make a great effort to feel good, very rarely I can, most of the time I fake it”.

We no longer want to pretend, or cover up, or wear clothes that we don't like, or please rather than enjoy. But criticism is not innocuous and racism and fat-phobia are a limit to eating, dressing, singing, enjoying and disputing power. And that is the point: that we have power over our lives and that criticism does not narrow our horizon or cover our own desires.

Brenda Mato is a plus size model, body diversity activist, television columnist and promoter of the size law. On her IG, she told what happened to a friend after giving birth to her: “She went to buy new clothes because hers from before didn't fit her. She more or less checked the size and approached the person in charge of sales, who looked her up and down and almost mockingly said “are you sure? I better bring you a few more sizes” .

How to STOP being broke: 1. Set financial goals 2. Automate your savings 3. Build an emergency fund 4. STOP spe… https://t.co/0JoNOIjgOf

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Motherhood is supposed to be a mandate. But there is no must be, but desire and that desire implies changes. Women gestate, give birth, breastfeed (or not) and all of this is easier than getting a pair of jeans that can be fastened without crying out of the fitting room like a torture field.

“In a country where 7 out of 10 people have problems finding clothes in their size, it is urgent that those who work in clothing customer service be trained to avoid situations of discrimination. ”, suggests Brenda Mato.

The body of women speaks for itself and for others. The singer Mon Laferte undressed to denounce that "in Chile they torture, rape and kill", with a green scarf around her neck and the lyrics written between her free breasts, at the Latin Grammys in November 2019. It is impossible to think about the change political and social life of Chile without her audacity and that of thousands of women.

In 2022, the Chilean singer (resident in Mexico) did a brilliant intimate recital in a wedding dress and pregnant and showed her belly at the new Grammys, in November 2021, exactly two years later, with a roundel that showed her belly .

It is not about wanting to have children or not having them, about putting on a handkerchief or showing your navel, about carrying a pregnancy, more kilos than those set by the aesthetic parameter or the flat belly, but about getting out of the mold. It doesn't matter if it's her boobs or her belly, if she fights for legal abortion or for a wanted and cared-for motherhood, what bothers us are women who don't shut up with their bodies, but rather scream through their skin.

The critics are not innocuous, they seek to make a difference between the others and those who are believed to make up a us that is superior to the appearance, the body, the color of the skin and the clothing of those who criticize. The word groncha, beyond the intention of the person who says it, marks a distinction between classy ladies and those who cannot reach the status of the catwalk of the accepted ones.

The word groncha has a clear racist connotation. In the dictionary it is defined that it has a colonial and clearly derogatory use in Argentina. “That he is vulgar and coarse, or lacks manners due to his low social status.” Low social status is being poor and being poor is not by chance, lottery or lack of merit, but, generally, by descending from the ships that brought the slaves and by having origins that did not need to cross seas, but were of those who inhabited the land that today we consider Argentina before someone dared to discover where those who already lived lived.

It probably comes from the lunfardo use of the word "negroncho" . The use of the word groncha to say that a woman does not dress well, that she is not up to the task of a social event or that her dress is not suitable for a wedding, is derogatory and has the racism of considering that what is not comes to qualify as whiteness -as aesthetic hegemony- is, therefore, inferior and must be subordinated.

In 2012 Alexander Caniggia had said, in the magazine Caras, in a nouveau riche position chatter, apology for caviar (against mortadella), branding (to reaffirm an identity that needs to be flaunted because it does not behave naturally), fatphobia and transphobia: “For me to like a girl she has to be nice, pretty, I would never go out with a 'groncha' (sic). If she's not that cute, but she's a really nice person, I'm also attracted to her. I love that a woman is skinny, I don't like her fat. And she would prefer that she didn't have such big 'lolas', otherwise she would look like a transvestite”.

To be or not to be is not the question, but to seem. And -today- post to be. Being a groncha is a classist and racist derogatory sign that differentiates those who have money and are white from those who are poor, have a popular origin and their origins are Afro or indigenous. In Argentina, racism seems diluted, but it is much stronger than is assumed. The groncha category to judge someone by her clothes reaffirms it.

It is not uncommon for the word groncha to be used to criticize the way a woman goes to a wedding because getting married was a way of ascending socially for some women (recategorized as ladies and with honor) or to ratify class endogamy -the white circle- for those who do not leave the private love neighborhood but took advantage of the "yes I want" to show the "yes, I can" (pay and show off dishes, shows and costumes) of the love ritual as a setting for power.

Summer is also a social thermometer (and not just temperature) . Tanning was imposed as a class mark because it differentiated between those who had money and the right to rest (and could get a tan) and those who could not access the sea, spread out on the sand and sunbathe as synonymous with lying around doing nothing and just waiting the rays (which we now know are not good for the skin).

The whiteness changed to bronze as a status symbol for the rest. This reflects that it is not about the color, or the heat, but about the mark of power of some over others, what is tried to flaunt or disqualify when a groncha woman is treated contemptuously.

In the same vein, on January 12, the former MasterChef posted on Instagram: “ The Argentine coast is a pestilence... And I don't give a damn who bothers him... Whoever wants it to cost him blue... I'm of the high, summer in Punta del Este”. Caniggia says, argues and plays the game that she likes: to provoke.

Although it seems like a parody. The narrative of contempt is a style that jumps from show business to politics with the vindication of what seemed wrong to say and that, in a vintage right, returns to stand on a stool to be petulant with what one has and contemptuous with what others do not have.

In addition, pretending that the majorities are the plague -just in times of pandemic- where the other as an enemy appears visualized in infected mode and the free one as the one who can walk, travel and infect (because he is from the wealthy class and the one who can, can ). And he demonstrates the ABC of those who pretend to be ABC1: it is not to enjoy their pleasure (summer vacation), but to enjoy a pleasure that others are prohibited from accessing.

If the plague is global, the new plague is the Argentine coast, it is not just a play on words, it is a transfer of responsibility, fear and the usual suspect. If in Pinamar the vacationers defended a churrero so that they did not confiscate his basket, in Punta del Este Caniggia defended elitism as a crude way of differentiating oneself by purchasing power. In this rhetoric, it can be interpreted that “if I can also have the plague, better than the plague is you”.

That is where we women want to swim to get away from prejudices and that the G-spot is to find pleasure but no more so that they brand us as fat, fat and greedy . And if they tell us something, we return to words and bodies, pride, because we don't hide anymore.

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