Eight hours after I read this article in The New York Times, I’m still trying to wrap my head around the idea that somebody out there at any time considered Renee Zellweger fat:

As Bridget Jones, she allowed us to embrace our wine-and-heartache inner insecurities. She made the fat, boozy chain-smokers and job-losers among us feel O.K. about ourselves.

Did I read that wrong? I don’t think I did. Did I? I mean, I totally get it that she was supposed to act like she worried that she was fat, but I thought that was mostly supposed to be a satirical send-up of the way that lots of women, or even just people in general, tear themselves down because they feel insecure about themselves. I thought that’s what the movie was about.

But the NYT article seemed to be saying that Bridget Jones, played by Zellweger, was fat. She drank, she smoked, she was fat. Really? Did anyone notice that she absolutely rocked a Playboy bunny costume in that movie? I suspect that she may have put on a couple pounds for the role, because as Roxy Hart in Chicago she wasn’t heavy enough to make a decent paperweight, but fat? If Zellweger is, or ever has been, fat, then I’m William Howard Taft.

And just so’s you know: I have nothing against fat. I’m against the notion that fat is bad, and I’m against the notion that women should always be worried that they might be fat. In fact, I’m against the notion that anybody should lose any sleep at all over being judged by other people based on their appearance. Be as fat as you want, as long as you’re comfortable with it. I certainly don’t care. But let’s not pretend that anybody the size of Renee Zellweger is fat. That’s just crazy talk.