Episode 5: Pleasure is Power with Shay Neary
Shay says food is a witness.
Transcript:
Virgie Tovar: Hey everyone, it’s Virgie.
I wanted to take a minute to acknowledge the stress we’re all going through right now. This moment of uncertainty is bringing up all sorts of stuff for everyone - I’ve been hearing from a lot of friends who are feeling drawn to old restriction habits or have deep-rooted fears coming up around not having enough food.
I know those feelings can be really unsettling, and I also know that everyone needs a reminder that they are not alone sometimes. So I’m gonna say it:. You are not alone. I’m here. We’re all in this, together.
I wanted to return to how Rebel Eaters Club started -- with the hopes that we could help you thrive through fearless interrogation and intimate conversations that centered the human relationship to food. When the Coronavirus state of emergency was called last week, I went back and listened to each episode. If I’m honest, I think I was doing it out of fear that everything we had discussed was now irrelevant,. But what I realized as I listened was there is nothing farther from the truth. Family, history, sustenance, wisdom, humanity, love, justice. These are what’s at stake in this show, and they’re what’s at stake in the world right now. I hope that as we finish out the season, you will be moved - maybe in a different way than before - to ask important questions of yourself and our culture. And, I hope, that the show can be a source of laughter, fun, and comfort.
If you want to Reach out our email address is Rebel Eaters Club AT gmail dot com and our phone number is 862-231-5386.
Alright - here’s the show.
Interstitial Music
[1:53] VT: When I was four years old I had a boyfriend named Ray Ray. We’d met in our Tiny Tots preschool. Ray Ray was the smallest kid in the class. And I… was the biggest. I can’t entirely remember how our love connection began, but knowing me, I probably initiated with a pickup line that went something like, “Guess what? I like you. You’re my boyfriend now.”
Back then I lived in a world where I was the hottest, funniest, smartest girl on the planet. I had swagger, and Ray Ray was 100% there for it.
My friends in Tiny Tots hadn’t been taught body shame or fatphobia yet. So, no one thought our relationship was weird or worthy of commentary. None of Ray Ray’s friends told him he shouldn’t be dating a girl who was way bigger than him. Ray Ray didn’t feel like he needed to hide his love for me. And I didn’t think twice about the fact that this boy I was in love with probably wouldn’t be able to pick me up and carry me across the threshold on our wedding day, like I’d seen on TV..
I hadn’t learned shame about my BODY and he hadn’t learned to be ashamed of his innocent DESIRE. It all just flowed.
But As I grew up I learned just how special my relationship with Ray Ray had been.
After Ray Ray I would go on to learn that my body was seen as undesirable. And that made me forget how to sparkle. I forgot how to live my life unapologetically.
Today, I’m talking with someone who lives her life with zero apology.
Shay Neary: Hello!
VT: Shay Neary is a plus-size model who lives and works in New York City.
VT: Shay, do you have your treat?
SN: I do have my treat.
VT: I have a treat, too.
SN: I see Honchos and cheese fries.
VT: So what I have is chili cheese fries And then I got the tater tots upgrade,
SN: What is these special fries you have over there?
VT: Yeah, I know. It's like magical fries. I ordered them from a computer.
SN: Tater tots and onions and sauce and shit. Bitch, I'm in Brooklyn. I got— I got french fries with white American cheese melted on.
VT: I wanted to talk to Shay about desire... about how we are drawn toward the things that give us pleasure and comfort and healing… including… FOOD.
VT: So do you want to take a delicious loving bite together?
SN: Sure.
VT: Make sure it sounds extra delicious.
SN: Make it sound sexual? I am a former sex worker— I wonder if I can make cheese fries sound sexual.
VT: I'm sure you could.
SN: These are really good.
VT: So like, wait, so can we back up? So when we're talking about the snack, we're gonna get you, you were like honchos, but only the ranch flavor. Let's discuss your relationship to this item.
SN: Honchos are my drug like if I— I can't describe the innate love I have for honchos.
VT: But they're like they’re a tortilla chip? What is— They're like a dorito?
SN: They're like, you know, they're kind of like Doritos, but like the old school ones, before before they started like spraying on the flavoring, the hand tossed Doritos. That's exactly what they taste like.
VT: Oh I love that. So let's back up like pre honchos. Who are you?
SN: Shay is a 32-year-old plus sized transsexual from Pennsylvania in the Poconos. And she's a busy gal. She works as an office manager for a large advertising company in flat iron. And as a model, when she's not doing those things, you know she is a busy gal. She got things to do.
VT: So I want to drill down on something you said. So you're known as being the first trans plus size model to be featured in a major fashion campaign.
SN: I am. Doesn't that sound fancy, Lord?
VT: It sounds very fancy. It is. How did you get into modeling?
SN: Um, it wasn't intentional. I, uh, a friend I saw, I was working in the food industry for 20 years, and a friend of mine, uh, who I worked with saw this ad in timeout magazine, and it was like at this trans modeling agency, and he was like, girl, you need to apply. And I was like. I am not applying like they are not taking my fat ass. I literally had this moment where I was like, um, no, I'm not doing it. And he like forced me like the next day to like send my pictures over and this like girl responded. She's like, Oh, she's like, aren't you pretty? And she's like, come in, we'll do some test shoots. And I got booked that like next week to be in the agency for trans models. And I came across this, um, advertising for Cover Story.
It was this woman looking for a plus trans woman to put in her ads. And I remember going to the go see to meet her. And I point blank was like, why do you want to put a fat trans woman in your ad? And she's like, I have tons of plus trans friends.
None of them are model-worthy, but in reality she's like, they all have wonderful personalities and they deserve to have imagery out there. And I was like, well, that sounds friendly enough. And it did like when the, when the, when the shoot went live, Refinery 29 picked it up, Mic.com picked it up. Um, AOL, Yahoo. It was like, like it went all around the internet, hardcore viral. It kind of like spread like wildfire. And then I was getting contacted to do other stuff and then a UK company contacted me and then I became the first plus size trans model to book a UK campaign.
VT: I will say you give really good face. But this actually brings us to our meet cute. Um, so the first time I laid eyes on you was when we were both doing that shoot for a plus size company called Dia & Co. in New York. Um, it was this, I just remember it was this huge loft space in Chelsea. Was it Chelsea?
SN: It was Chelsea
VT: And I remember like walking down this long corridor for what seemed like half a mile, and then all of a sudden I heard like dozens of people, lots of people. And the craft services table was the first thing I clocked after that. And it was, it was pretty impressive.
SN: Shoots are fun. Don’t get me wrong. They're hard work, but it's fun.
VT: Yeah, no, it's true. And I've been, I mean, I remember that day like I had never seen so many lights and cameras. There were racks and racks of clothing, dozens of shoes. There was like a bunch of tables smushed together, covered in every imaginable accessory, and there were about half a dozen hair and makeup artists. And the person who did my hair named Chucky put about 20 pounds of glorious hair extensions into my head.
SN: Yes.
VT: And then, um, yeah. And I just, I just remember like the photographer just asking me to hop around like a bunny. It just like, it's just like amazing, right. And absurd. And anyway, so you were there that day and I probably heard your laughter first and before long I was listening to you tell stories and entertain everybody there. So you remember this day?
SN: Yeah, yeah, for sure. You know, it's funny, it's so funny I didn't want to intimidate the other girls. And I felt bad because like I had modeled all the time and these women in the room, they had not. Never modeled before. I become very different on shoots. Um, like I take my modeling really seriously, but when I'm behind a camera, um.
I always say I become my character. It's like my drag persona is Shea butter, but when I'm behind the camera is when Shea butter comes out. That's been like shape. It is like I'm a make some money now.
Like pay attention to me. I will steal your focus.
In the frame and any shot like I will make you find me. So like a lot of times women at shoots, they'll, they'll like, they get like intimidated by me because I'm not afraid to like step in front of you. I will like literally shift in front of you to get this shine. Like I'll be respectful, but know who know who's who.
VT: Yes. I mean Shay can I ask, how did you become this person?
SN: I think years of hating yourself and then finding a re- like finding a reestablishment for your identity really like puts you in a different head space. Before my transition, I very much, um. I didn't like who I was. Like I didn't like my personality.
I didn't like my identity, my appearance. And then when I started my transition, I started seeing myself in the mirror the way I wanted to see myself. Not that I needed to change to be happy, but I was finally recognizing the person in front of me instead of it being this like mystery individual. I felt like I was living in this shell of . So a lot of my attitude, a lot of my strength has come from leading a very challenging life.
VT: Growing up, shay says her family was pretty poor. then, when she was six or seven years old, the river next to their house flooded and shay and her family literally watched their home float away. after that they moved from place to place to place, which only made a bunch of difficult family dynamics worse.
[11:46] SN: Like my parents were really they were heavy alcoholics. Heavy trauma-built individuals like that didn't understand their past, nor did they want to deal with it. And like cheese fries, it's funny. Like we talked about cheese fries, how that's one of my favorite foods. It’s one of my favorite foods because it's easy to bring home from a bar. Because you didn't really have time to cook that much when you're out drinking at a bar all day long. My parents always could bring home cheese fries or something like chicken cheese fries and chicken tenders that was like a regular dinner for me if my mother wasn't cooking. I think food is kind of a witness in some sense to your experience and our lives are kind of catered around that. We have foods that bring us in a cult like in comfort, because there they were with us in times of struggle or times of positivity.
SN: And sometimes it can bring us great pleasure and sometimes it can remind us of pain and things we've been through and I think you kind of view food as you have experienced it in your life. But if you become aware of when you do these things and how you eat them or what you choose to do when you are in pain or in pleasure, then you kind of start to choose things based on that.
VT: More on that, after the break.
[Midroll Break]
[14:46] VT: Everyone’s got “comfort foods.” Things that bring us warm feelings of home, of plenty... feelings of being held and loved. Because MY GOD there are few things that make me FEEL more amazing than a warm apple crisp with a scoop of vanilla ice cream, or hot cheetos with slightly melty brie, or menudo - the way it feels to top off the bowl of soup with a small fistful of onions and cilantro, to squeeze little slices of fresh lime… the little bit of juice that dribbles down my wrist and out to anyone close enough to be in the “Menudo Splash Zone.” I even love being part of the elite club of people who understand the GLORY of tripe - menudo’s secret ingredient.
We all know how strong our associations with food can be. Because food is a witness to our experiences. A witness to the sweet memories...and the difficult ones.
[Interstitial Music]
SN: You know what I mean like eggplant parmesan literally is like things I will never eat again. Like the amount of fights my mother and father had over eggplant fucking parmesan. And then I remember this one time a tray of eggplant parmesan fell out of the stove because my father didn't use like a proper thing and he burned his hand and it created this massive, massive fight. My dad got belligerently drunk and it got very abusive and my like because my childhood is so built upon that like food- food has become so tied into those experiences. My life has kind of been in disarray so many separate times where I got thrown out when I was 14. And I lived with my drag mother for a large period of that time and kind of started escorting at a very young age. And nowadays, like we— Like even then it was considered like child prostitution, but then it was like survival for me, you know. And I mean, like, I wasn't looking at it like that.
VT: I was sort of thinking about, you know, going back to escorting and sex work, And there's kind of this. I don't know, like this fascinating binary of like, good, bad, secret public, um, those kinds of binaries that I feel are really at work when we're talking about sexuality and, and sex work. Um, I was thinking about, um, when I first moved to San Francisco and I was dating someone.
And, uh, and we had this like really incredible sexual chemistry and he just worshiped my fat body in this way that was really extraordinary and that I kind of, I don't think I'd ever really experienced. And it gave me so much freedom and I was sort of falling for this person because he was so clear about his desire for, um, my larger body.
And then, you know, a little bit of time goes on. And he straight up tells me like, listen, you're my ideal body. You're really awesome, but I do not have, he said this phrase, I don't have the balls to deal with the shit my friends are going to give me if I date you publicly.
SN: I’ve been there.
VT: So that might make me a coward. But that's just the reality of the situation. And just kind of thinking about like, right, how, I mean obviously how hurtful and dehumanizing it is to hear something like that. But the other side of it being like, wow, you know, this, there's so many layers of the secrecy, hiding, the closeting whenever you want to call it.
SN: You know, you said, you said that you felt good about yourself, like you felt like you, you, and then all of a sudden they didn't want you and you're like, Oh, well, they were like, I'm being a coward because of this, because of what society thinks I should date and should have. And I deal with that every day. People find me attractive or want to be with me, but won't facilitate their desire. They won't actively pursue it. What they want is a societal picture. They want the imagery that will make everyone in their life happy for them not what actually makes them happy. Because a lot of times what we desire is not innately what we want.
What we want is typically a picture of what our families want for us, what our friends want for us, who will judge us to make us into who we are, not exactly what we desire, which is sometimes outside of the spectrum of what one is considered normal. I've never lived in a position where I've been considered societally normal.
I'm a freak. An outcast, you know what I mean? Um, and that no, someone doesn't want to fall in love with an outcast.
Anything that doesn't fit within the white lines stream of what is supposed to be and what isn't is going to be considered fetish. Which is why there's such a huge amount of sex work and pornography because people have desires that they're not actively willing to push.
[Interstitial music]
[19:35] VT: For a lot of people in American society, there’s an unspoken rule that some relationships are meant to be public, and some are meant to be private. There are the relationships that are acceptable, that align with our class standing, that don’t shake things up. Often it’s relationships with thin people… white people… cisgender people, able-bodied people- we learn those are safe to make public.
Then there are relationships that we are told to hide… people that we’re supposed to feel ashamed about desiring -- about accepting, even. We’re told that we should not desire to be close to people who are fat, people of color, people who are trans or gender expansive, people who are disabled, people who do sex work.
In our culture, we’re taught that having desire for these kinds of people is taboo or “deviant”... so they are fetishized. They are stripped of their full humanity and reduced to a source of sexual release or pleasure.
All That... TOTAL POOP GARBAGE.
People are capable of finding beauty... sexiness... appeal... in all kinds of bodies and personalities! That’s normal. It’s natural. And burying that desire is harmful - to ourselves, to the people we love, and to our culture.
SN: Like we're all turned on by something. I'm, Oh my, my key question always is, is like what? What gets you hot if you're not, if you're not. Seeing something or facilitating a relationship with something that doesn't get you hot. You may want to check why it's not going to work out in a year or two. Like cause you're, you're trying to fit the cookie cutter and not everybody fits in a cookie cutter honey. Some people are a Bundt cake. Some people are a fricking Italian loaf. They're not all cookie cutters. You know what I mean? Like some bitches are pumpernickel, get you a slice.
VT: Yes. I mean, I think you're getting at, I mean, to me, right? I think for a lot of people, they believe that attraction and desire are things that are, we're born with, right? They're innate. They're perhaps evolutionary. Um, at the end of the day, though, most attraction is socially constructed. We learn who to be attracted to. By our culture, we get a thumbs up when we're doing the right thing. We get the thumbs down, we're doing the wrong thing. We get the carrot, we get the stick, right? I don't know. I'm just thinking about like how, like how we end up in these, in these situations where people are incentivized to act inauthentically to not pursue pleasure, to not do things that feel good.
And I feel like this is- in a big way, the big sort of the big takeaway from this conversation in general, but I kind of want to, to really dive into the fact that like the culture really fucks us up by telling us that there's something wrong with our desires. And so we end up denying them and repressing them.
And I think this goes to this concept, like the, the metaphor of taste, right? I don't know, like this, this, so the metaphor of taste reminds me of going to college. Um, for the first time I was in a white world, in a white, affluent world, having grown up in a mostly immigrant suburb of the Bay area. And all of a sudden I'm at UC Berkeley. It was a very rapid education in how to, um, perform taste how to, how to perform and how to perform that through food choices. Right. Like I could perform that I was passing, or like I could imagine in my head that I was passing by mimicking the foods of the people that people around me were eating.
I remember even, and obviously it's so tied up in my own, um, you know, experience with disordered eating and dieting and stuff like that, but I remember actually developing physical aversions to food that I knew was. Um, like food that was quote unquote off limits to me at that time.
Like I would, I would literally develop like nausea when I thought about or got close to food that I thought would, you know, lead to like my worst case scenario, which at that time was that I would stay a fat person. Or that I would regain some of the weight that I had managed to through some method, through some terrible method to lose.
SN: Right. Our relationship with food in society is so torn. It's like it's just a sensibility that like you're being— you're better than someone. The difference between shopping at Whole Foods or shopping at Stop and Shop. Like the difference between shopping at Trader Joe's via shopping at Aldi's. Like they're all selling the same exact shit. But it's like we look at people who kind of who buy their stuff at cheaper stores as like trashy. You see FoodTown on someone's cheddar. And you're like, oh, you went to a FoodTown? Ew. I think there is— I think food is very elitist.
[Interstitial Music]
[25:01] VT: So, you know how “Taste” has more than one meaning? Like your literal sense of taste … the party in your mouth when you take a bite of a red velvet cupcake. and it also has a second meaning that’s all wrapped up in class… indicating the ability - or inability - to tell if something is “refined.”
Taste is defined by tastemakers. And in food, for a long time, one of those tastemakers was Gael Greene. She was a New York Magazine food critic for more than 30 years.
Shay told me, when she was young, she wanted to be just.. like.. Gael Greene.
SN: I went to college to be a food writer. I wanted to make a lifetime writing about food and sex and how those two are so innately the same and how, like the control between making a good meal and the patience to establish a great recipe, between a compromise of making passionate love to your partner, or sharing a free moment with a sporadic individual, and how food is so innately combined with that. I wanted to master that. And then I worked for— I worked for Red Farm for a while and the owner was best friends with Gail Green. And I met her in person and I realized how unlike this woman I was. Like, I didn't come from a wealthy background. I didn't come from money. I didn't know the difference between good, great food and good food or fancy food. Like the difference between Per Se and McDonald's? Do you think I gave two damns back then? I didn't. I just loved cooking. I loved enjoying myself with food. I’m Sicilian so food is love. I want people to enjoy food for what it is like. I don't want them to over absorb themselves in the nutritional value of food, because in reality, any food you're putting in your mouth is good food.
VT: So you have a special relationship to cereal, if I'm not mistaken.
SN: Yeah. I fangirl for cereal.
VT: You’ve identified cereal as a soothing food for you. And I’m curious about this.
SN: Absolutely because it was easy to get. Like if my mother had made food that I didn't want...If I didn't want to eat what she put on the table, she would literally send me to my room without anything. So like my grandmother would always give, always give me Cheerios or like frosted flakes, like a bowl of it. She’d pour me some. And she'd act like she was going in the kitchen for herself, and then she’d end up bringing it to my room. So a lot of like my comfort and joy. I always eat cereal - it's the first thing I did yesterday. I got home himself a bowl of shredded, uh, Trader Joe's maple, whatever the hell they are.
VT: The frosted mini wheats.
SN: Yes. The maple ones? Yes. They're so nummy.
VT: So like, cereal is a food that still gives you all these yummy good feelings. It sort of reminiscent of like this really special caring behavior that your grandmother did for you. And I'm sort of like, right like what's the power in being able to give ourselves what we want?
SN: The power in giving us what we want. Um. Like, I feel like adulthood is like finally making choices for yourself that you actively wanted to make as a child, but couldn't. The positivity that's blossomed from my relationship with food is because I don't— I don't want to look at it negatively anymore. I don't want to— I don't want to have a negative relationship with food, because it's not— it doesn't control my life. I control it. So like, if I want to have and enjoy a piece of pizza, because that's what I want today, that's what I'm going to have. And whether I have to suffer through the thoughts of eating that piece of pizza and what the terms mentally that come along with it, I'm going to try to reshape those mentalities. Like eggplant parmesan is not something I can reshape. You know what I mean, that's a box that's closed. She's not eating that ever. But like, there are things that I'm kind of reworking. And I think we all can do that within our power. We all have the power to re-foster things mentally for ourselves. And it requires work and effort and like everyone wants things to be easy. And there is nothing easy about your mentality. Not a damn thing.Things don't happen overnight. You have to work on your mental health. You have to work on fostering healthy mental relationships with everything you have. And if you don't do that, you're kind of you're leaving yourself on the disadvantaged side of the scope. And I have no want or desire to do that. Not anymore, at least.
VT: Shay, you are amazing and wonderful. You shared so much.
SN: Stop! you sassy sassy lady, stop! Are you looking in the mirror when you say those things?
VT: Oh, I'm so grateful. I got a little bit of time to argue with you about your food history of your life. And thank you. Just thank you so much.
[Interstitial Music]
[30:25] VT: I love how Shay talks about our power to re-construct and re-imagine things that are painful - to turn things that suck into things that work for us.
We live in a culture that loves to label things as good or bad… a culture that uses those labels to control our actions and our desires… there’s “good food” and “bad food.” “Public” relationships and “private” ones. The “right kind” of desire, and the “wrong kind.”
There’s so much pressure to make the socially acceptable choice! When we want something else, we get some pretty strong messages that there’s something wrong with us… that we should feel guilty and ashamed.
If you’re sometimes debilitated by those feelings, you are not alone. Defying all that pressure is especially hard work if you’re also dealing with things like classism, trauma and fatphobia.
Well, Rebel friends, I am here to say that you can go at your own pace. Find your own way through it. And I am here to say that it’s work that’s worth doing. Standing up for what you want and need is a powerful kind of transformation.
For this week’s prompt…. Shay talked a lot about how food has been a witness to her experience. What foods have been witnesses to your life? Remember, try not to see the food you write about as “good” or “bad.” Focus on the details of the story and leave room to honor what you’ve been through.
For the past few weeks, I’ve been closing each episode with a journal prompt, and encouraging you to share your stories. And many of you have written and called in! Thank you, so much, to each of you for sharing your personal experiences with all the diet culture poop garbage. Here are a few of the calls:
Voicemail 1: My name is Callie and I'm calling from Raleigh North Carolina. My family's food is doritos and cream cheese. Plain nacho doritos chips and just a block of cream cheese. We had this snack at every party, every gathering, every TV night where we watched American Idol together a family… we would just devour two solid rectangles of cream cheese and like four bags of Doritos. Definitely try it and thank you.
Voicemail 2: Hi there, Virgie. My name is Jesse and I'm twenty-five years old and I live in a town called Sudbury and I'm in Canada. My food that I'd like to talk about is mashed potatoes. When I think of mashed potatoes. I think of comfort, I think of home. I think of my mom making my favorite food when I was young. Buttery goodness, family. So quickly unfortunately, it turned into carbs, starch, quote unquote bad foods. Potatoes = bad. Indulgence = bad. As I worked into my own personal journey with eating disorder recovery. I realized white foods are fine. Now again, mashed potatoes = revelation. Yummy. Comfort. Buttery. Fluffy. Versatile. Indulging in every aspect that I need want and desire. Mashed potatoes for me are my special family food. Thanks for listening Virgie. I love your podcast.
Thanks again to everyone who called. If you’d like to share your story, call the Rebel Eaters Club hotline at 862-231-5386. That’s 862-231-5386. You can also write us a note and send it to rebeleatersclub@gmail.com. I can’t wait to hear from you.
When you’re done, don’t forget to give yourself the merit badge you earned : the PLEASURE IS POWER badge. You can print it out on our website: RebelEatersClub.com. And show us what you’re eating! Tag us on social with hashtag rebel eaters club or @transmitterpods.
Next week, we’re talking to Soleil Ho about being a new kind of food critic.
Soleil Ho: If I can change the way people think about for instance, Vietnamese food. And maybe the next time they get a banh mi, they think about colonialism. They think about, oh wow, the resilience of these people, that’s so interesting. To me, that’s really important.
VT: Rebel Eaters Club is an original podcast from Transmitter Media… the podcast company that’s like a surprise lasagne your friend brings you when you’re sad. I’m Virgie Tovar. The show is produced by Lacy Roberts and Jordan Bailey. Our editor is Sara Nics. Gretta Cohn is our executive producer. Like what you hear on the show and want to sponsor us? Send us a note at rebeleatersclub@gmail.com and let us know.
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See you next week!