Michelle Thomas is a young women who enjoys
life to its fullest. When she meets a man on an online dating platform, it
leads to a date with her chat partner named Simon. The two spend a wonderful
evening together, laughing and having good conversation over a delicious
dinner.
Michelle
is in seventh heaven! On the following evening she receives a message from her
Simon. And her 7th heaven falls to the devastating ground of reality. The
supposedly charming date writes her THIS:
“Hey
Michelle, sorry been super busy at work today hun.
Thanks
for a wonderful evening last night. I really enjoyed your company and actually
adore you. You’re cheeky and funny and just the sort of girl I would love to go
out with if only my body and mind would let me. But I fear it won’t.
I’m not
going to bulls–t you… I f–king adore you Michelle and I think you’re the
prettiest looking girl I’ve ever met. But my mind gets turned on my someone
slimmer.
Shallow?
It’s not meant to be. It’s the same reaction you get when you read a great
author or see an amazing image, or listen to a piece of music you love, it has that
instant reaction in you that makes you crave more.
So
whilst I am hugely turned on by your mind, your face, your personality (and
God…I really, really am), I can’t say the same about your figure. So I can sit
there and flirt and have the most incredibly fun evening, but I have this awful
feeling that when we got undressed my body would let me down. I don’t want that
to happen baby. I don’t want to be lying there next to you, and you asking me
why I’m not hard.
There
are certain triggers that fire my imagination into life and your wit and
intelligence are the beginning of that process which would inevitably end up in
the bedroom. With just one result….
I’m so
disappointed in myself Michelle because I’ve genuinely not felt this way about
anyone in ages, but I’m trying to be honest with you without sounding like a
total knobhead.
We
could be amazing friends, we could flirt and joke and adore each other and… f–k
me… I would marry you like a shot if you were a slip of a girl because what you
have in that mind of yours is utterly unique, and I really really love it.
I guess
what I’m trying to say is that I’m trying to avoid bigger pain in the future by
telling you now so we don’t have to go through that embarrassment. I’m a man…
With all the red hot lusts of a man and all the failings of a man and I’m sure
of my own body and its needs. Please try and forgive me. I adore you xx”
But how
Michelle Thomas, the oh-so-creepily-addressed object of worship, responds to
this message is simply brilliant! Read it for yourself:
“Dear
Man I Met On Tinder.
I was
on another date when I received your message. He returned from the loo to find
me in a flood of tears. He was lovely, but baffled, and hasn’t been in touch
since, funnily enough.
You
don’t have to fancy me. We all have a good friend who we look at ruefully and
think “you’re lovely, but you just don’t tickle my pickle”. We wish we were
attracted to them, but our bodies and our brains don’t work like that. And
that’s fine.
What
isn’t fine is the fact that, after a few hours in my company, you took the time
to write this utterly uncalled-for message. It’s nothing short of sadistic.
Your tone is saccharine and condescending, but the forensic detail in which you
express your disgust at my body is truly grotesque. The only possible objective
for writing it is to wound me.
And I’m
ashamed to say, for a few moments, it worked. You stirred a dormant fear that
every woman who was ever a teenage girl has – that it doesn’t matter how funny
you are, how clever, how kind, how passionate, how loyal, how determined or
adventurous or vibrant – if you’re a stone overweight, no one will ever find
you desirable.
I like
the way I look. I don’t look like Charlize Theron, and that’s fine – I look
like me, and I like myself (I’m sure I’d like Charlize Theron, too if I ever
met her. I hear good things).
You may
think are all my profile pictures are “FGASs” (That’s Fat Girl Angle Shots –
pictures from angles that slim and flatter the girl. Because men only ever use
candid, brutally-lit, unfiltered pics). But I think they’re a fair
representation. And I’m pretty upfront about who I am: I describe myself as a
woman who loves pizza, and include links to myInstagram page, where I have the
#everybodysready bikini shots I took on my 30th birthday. I like to think I
come across as a confident, happy woman. But could this be the very reason you
have targeted me? Did you see me and think “She has far too high an opinion of
herself, she needs bringing down a peg or two”? I have to ask – we all know the
internet is a dangerous place to be a woman with opinions (I discovered this
first hand when I ventured a response to those obnoxious bloody adverts).
I
showed your message to friends who expressed shock, horror, embarrassment on
your behalf, and a desire to cause you actual physical harm. One male friend
told me I have a lovely bottom “if unmarriageable”. I laughed with them. Then I
cried in my Slimming World group. That’s right! Slimming World! You see, I
already KNOW that I’m overweight. I can tell you exactly how overweight I am –
20 pounds. I’ve already lost 15, and I’ve a stone and a half to go. I’m happy
with that. I will get rid of it, safely and healthily. Does that mean that I
can’t love and enjoy my body now? F** no.*
I’ll
never see or hear from you again (you may feel the need to respond to this
blog. Please don’t. There’s nothing you can say that will make me think that
you’re not a disgrace to your gender).
What
truly concerns me, the real reason I’m responding so publicly, is the fact that
you have a 13 year old daughter. A talented illustrator, who collects Manga
comics and wants to visit Japan as soon as possible.
I want
you to encourage your daughter to love, enjoy, and care for her body. It
belongs to her and only her. Praise her intellect, and her creativity. Push her
to push herself and to be fearless. Give her the tools to develop a bomb-proof
sense of self-esteem so that if (I’ll be kind. I’ll say “if”.) the time comes
that a small, unhappy man attempts to corrode it, she can respond as I do now.
Simon.
Kiss.
My.
Exquisitely.
Unmarriagable.
Arse.
P.S.
“Slip of a girl”? CHRIST ALIVE, that’s creepy.
P.P.S.
You’re not 5’11”
Wow.
This exchange makes you really speechless.
It is
simply brilliant how this confident young woman answers and how she defends her
body - or, well, maybe man just wanted to be honest and express his feelings!?
The story of this botched romance has split opinions in the social media stratosphere.
When you want to take participate in this opinion-splitting
story then share it with everyone you know!
H/t: hefty