Rousey: I’m going to kill the next person who calls me fat

The New York Times barely acknowledges mixed martial arts, but this Ronda Rousey story was recently the #1 most read on the site. Take that Putin and Obama and war.

Rousey’s next fight is body image in Hollywood. ‘Rowdy’ had planned to go into a recent TV commercial lean, “but because somebody said something really rude to me, I came into the shoot purposely way heavier,” she related.

“And the campaign ended up being amazing, even though I was heavier just to make a point.

Rousey declined to name the company, but did note that her breasts are way bigger than than any other commercial she has done. So that would be Carls Jr.

I swear to God, she said, shaking her head, if anyone calls me fat one more time in my life, I’m going to kill them.

Sheila Marikar has the story, for the New York Times. It begins with a snapshot of Rousey’s superstar crib.

Ms. Rousey lives in an 800-square-foot bungalow that she shares with a roommate, Marina Shafir, another mixed martial arts fighter.

Typical 20-something trappings were strewn across the apartment this particular morning: a magenta fleece blanket bunched up on the couch, a hookah in the corner of the living room, and clothes hanging from the rungs of a ladder that lead up, presumably, to Ms. Shafir’s loft bed. (One mark of celebrity: a video feed of four security cameras mounted on a wall.)

Ms. Rousey, who also has a loft bed, uses the entire lower half of her bedroom as a closet. Her closet spills out into the garage, which includes a wall of Reebok shoes that she sometimes gives to guests if they’re a size 8½.

Then it turns to the heart of the story.

Struggling with weight limits for judo tournaments fostered a fraught relationship with food and, for a time, bulimia. Her body didn’t match the ideal she saw in men’s magazines, and going to school in Los Angeles, she would wear zip-up jackets even on 90-degree days.

I was afraid to show my big arms, she said.

Sulking and self-loathing weren’t allowed at home, said Ms. Rousey’s oldest sister, Maria Burns Ortiz.

Whining was not really tolerated, Ms. Burns Ortiz said. We just kind of thought she was running around and doing judo all the time — that’s why she was in sweats.

In 2012, Ms. Rousey posed nude (save for a set of carnation-pink hand wraps) on the cover of ESPN the Magazine. She has been in similarly sultry shoots for Maxim and the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue, in part, she said, to embrace the body that used to embarrass her.

If I can represent that body type of women that isn’t represented so much in media, then I’d be happy to do that, she said. When women say that going on publications directed at men is somehow demeaning, I don’t think that’s true. I think that’s one really effective way to change the societal standard women are held to.

Here’s another: talking frankly about her weight. Ms. Rousey, who is 5 feet 7 and fights at 135 pounds, weighed 153 on this September day. She feels most attractive around 148. That’s like my favorite weight, she said. But she still likes to get a little bigger than that, sometimes, because she has to choose between the look of her abs and breasts. You can’t have both, she said.

We seem to be in this conflicting era for women, where women are doing so amazingly and taking over the athletic world, but we’re also in a time where — — Ms. Rousey said, and paused. How can I really put it? That women without any skills that freeload are being glorified. That’s something I was raised not to be. That you’re supposed to contribute to the world, not consume from it.

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