Here come the femitubbies - Sizeable Reflections: Big Women Living Full Lives (edited by Shelley Bovey)

Reviewed by Julie Burchill

Can you believe I was asked to contribute to this book? The cheek, me and my perfect 10 figure! (snigger). I didn't, of course, because I'm a very off-message type of fat girl; one who gladly admits she reached the size she is now solely through lack of discipline and love of pleasure, and who rather despises people (except those with proven medical conditions) who pretend that it is generally otherwise. Gluttony and idleness are two of life's great joys, but they are neither honourable nor political - no more than their opposite, dieting and exercise. "Big women" do themselves a disservice when they attempt to become the Righteous Fat; the Righteous Thin are bad enough, all that running around and sweating, and somehow believing that it means anything.

Fat Righteousness also led to the nasty habit developed a couple of years back by overweight women who constantly boasted about what brilliant sex lives they had - Dawn French, Vanessa Feltz and moi, as I remember, were particular culprits. (The difference being that no sucker's ever going to cheat on me, because I'm so goddamn hot! There you go, it's that Fat Girl Boasting again).

Dawn French even went so far as to claim that fat women have more and better sex than thin women - fair enough, but that's probably because the thin women, especially the blonde Australian hotel reception-ist ones, are having it with her husband. I remember thinking at the time how incredibly bigoted and pointless a thing this was to say, and how uncredibly unfeminist, not only one woman being catty to others, but implying that the amount of sex with men you had somehow validated you as a human being. I always hoped that Lenny Henry and the equally boasted-about Mr Feltz would get caught doing the dirty with some skinny chicks, and this year my dream came true.

I know this sounds mean, but it's probably because I don't give a toss what I weigh that I don't feel any fat solidarity. Perhaps it's because I've been in uxorious relationships with men all my adult life; when someone's trying to shag the stuffing out of you day and night long after you've gone off them, it's hard to feel unlovable and shunned. (I'd love to know where these mythical men are who don't want sex with their wives when they start piling it on; chance would be a fine thing).

Because I've been thin and fat, unlike these women who've been fat all their lives, I can see both sides of the story. Perversely, though I have no desire to be thin, I wouldn't sleep with a fat girl (or boy). I think Kate Moss is the most beautiful woman in the world, and I wouldn't half mind looking like her - but I'd far rather look like myself than Jodie Kidd, Calista Flockhart or Courteney Cox, all of whom I consider extremely unattractive. Thin girls can be ugly; fat girls can be beautiful - but fat is not attractive in itself, any more than skinniness is.

Sizeable Reflections queers its own pitch in its press release; if this is "a coming together of 24 successful, powerful women" (Dawn French, Miriam Margolyes, Jo Brand, Jenni Murray? - since when did entertainers become "powerful"? Are Steps powerful too? And Richard Whiteley?) "who show that happiness need not wait until 'I lose half a stone'", then what's their beef? Either they're persecuted and downtrodden, or they aren't. The latest twist in the victim culture would appear to be groups who claim to be at once oppressed and powerful - sorry to typecast these gals, but I can't help thinking that this is just a tiny bit greedy.

Wheel 'em on! The fun starts in the introduction by the editor, Miss Bovey, who, without qualification, claims of fat women: "No other group in society is discriminated against so blatantly; it's always 'open season' on the overweight." Women are raped every day for being women, blacks killed every day for being blacks; a bit of name-calling seems rather beside the point. Her points about "our thin-worshipping society" also ring hollow considering the recent media harassment of poor Posh Spice, who has done us fat girls a real favour by proving that even the prettiest woman looks a fright when she gets too thin. Jenni Murray concludes her essay by bitching that even the thinnest women have cellulite (very sisterly) - while Susan Stinson brings us the gripping news that she "is in a swimming pool with 17 fat women. We have our arms around each others' waists and are circling the centre of the pool". Selfish, fat cows! - what about people trying to do their laps? Stephanie Jones "became an Amazon around the age of 25". Say what you like, but I don't think there's any need in this day and age for young women to cut off their right breast, just so they can shoot a bow and arrow better. Look at Geena Davis; she's a world-class archer, and she's got a lovely pair. So it goes on, in simultaneously self-adoring and self-pitying mode. But perhaps taking the prize for embarrassing drivel are Dawn French and her partner in an outsize clothing company, Helen Teague. Dawn reveals that she likes Helen because "she wasn't at all in awe of me" (who was?) and goes on, cattily, to state, "I know she would never bad-mouth me, and among my women friends that sort of loyalty is rare." Why are they still her friends, then? Never mind, Dawn, they're probably just in awe of you and feeling bad about it. Helen, for her part, more than lives up to the kiss-ass billing: "Dawn has a very well-developed sense of style that spills over into everything (her home is impeccably furnished ... Dawn works very hard ... still shy and a very private person ... a loving wife and mother ... a star, brilliant in her work ... a huge impact on people's lives." Girls, girls; there's this thing called "Valentine's Day", when people who like each other lots drool embarrassingly over each other. Can't you wait another few weeks and do it in the personal columns?

Any "big woman" worth her salt would know that you can get a decent box of chocs for £8.99, the price of this book - on the back of which the editor boasts that we fat girls have "survived" against all the odds. But then we would have, wouldn't we, with all the lard we've laid down for winter. "Enjoy!" - as joyless fat people invariably say.