This is the final part of a three-part series on the Monday Night Special at 9pm on Jan.31.
When popular culture tells us to be ashamed of our bodies, how can we resist buying into diet culture? The fat liberation movement has entry points for everyone — you just have to find yours.
“Bodies that look like this, also look like this!” Remember that TikTok sound? It was often accompanied by a relatively thin white woman posing in a flattering way, then contorting her body to reveal one or two small stomach rolls. The idea behind the social media trend was to promote body positivity, or the radical love of your body, but instead it de-centered fatness and Blackness from a movement rooted in those identities.
In response, another way of thinking about our bodies gained traction. Body neutrality, or the mindset that your body is not good nor bad, but just “is,” helps folks move from a bad relationship with their body to one that is peaceful. But for others, body positivity is an act of rebellion that allows them to celebrate the fat, Black or brown, disabled bodies that society told them to hide. Whichever approach suits you, both are ways to fight anti-fat rhetoric on a personal and societal level.
Find out more about this story HERE.