Fat-positive Feminism and Weight Loss

technobunny

Obesity is the #1 killer in America, 2nd to Cancer. So yes, it is probably the worst disease you can have. There is no pill for it.

ghhosstt

Hello all,

I'm writing to see if there are any other people out there who consider themselves fat positive but are still trying to lose weight. I consider myself a feminist and part of that is accepting and loving my body as it is, at any given time, so I'm finding it difficult to reconcile my desire to lose weight and be healthy and remaining fat-positive. I'm feeling like a hypocrite and wondering how much of my desire to loss weight comes from societal pressure to conform to a thinner silhouette.

Any other fat-positive feminists out there? How are you dealing with this?

Thanks for your thoughts!

hey, absolutely. I believe the underlying message is self-acceptance, which doesn't have to mean complacency when it comes to your health. It just means loving yourself and wanting to take care of yourself to the best of your abilities. There is room in that for diet and exercise if it makes you feel good and improves your quality of life.

lndsylck

Hello all,

I'm writing to see if there are any other people out there who consider themselves fat positive but are still trying to lose weight. I consider myself a feminist and part of that is accepting and loving my body as it is, at any given time, so I'm finding it difficult to reconcile my desire to lose weight and be healthy and remaining fat-positive. I'm feeling like a hypocrite and wondering how much of my desire to loss weight comes from societal pressure to conform to a thinner silhouette.

Any other fat-positive feminists out there? How are you dealing with this?

Thanks for your thoughts!

hey, absolutely. I believe the underlying message is self-acceptance, which doesn't have to mean complacency when it comes to your health. It just means loving yourself and wanting to take care of yourself to the best of your abilities. There is room in that for diet and exercise if it makes you feel good and improves your quality of life.

Thank you, that's exactly the sort of feedback I was looking for

toutmonpossible

Just like being 320 pounds didn't make any valuable as a person, being 160 pounds won't make me any less valuable as a feminist.

:flowerforyou:

toutmonpossible

I am trying to fight my natural urge to roll my eyes at someone declaring themselves a feminist. I am a humanist, I believe in empowering all people.

Feminists do believe in empowering all people, but they focus on women because women historically have been disempowered and ignored. Similarly, blacks, gays, and other oppressed groups have focused on the unique struggles of their groups.

toutmonpossible

Your life does not have to be a socio-political statement.

The personal is political, to coin a phrase. Individual concerns frequently have to be articulated at the group level for anything to change.

toutmonpossible

Is fat positive the same as the fat acceptance movement?

I don't know, but that was my assumption. Obesity is a disease. "Fat positive" is an oxymoron. Would you say you're "cancer positive"? "MS positive"?

At some point in America an idea took hold that everyone has to feel good about about herself or himself all the time, to the point where one is not only supposed to tolerate obesity, but argue it's a good thing. It's not.

I'm offended that you compare obesity to cancer and MS. Those are legitimate diseases. Obesity is how much one weighs. Not a disease.

Actually the AMA just recently categorized it as a disease.

Obesity IS A DISEASE. And it also CAUSES disease. It is the WORST disease you can get.

Thank you, it is considered a disease. It's a disease of overaccumulation of fat cells in the body. It may not be caused by overeating in all cases, but be the result of the way the body processes (or has learned to process) food. It's bad for an individual's health and it can be reversible.

If you have cancer, you can temporarily accept yourself as having it. That doesn't mean you don't want to beat it in the long-term. It's going to kill you and severely impair you life before it succeeds.

kaseysospacey

You can love your self and want to lose weight.
I love myself.I'm awesome. My fiance loves me. But I want to be healthier, and being healthier means eating better etc etc. If I was fat looking but healthy bodied I wouldn't care. Its whats going on inside that matters to me.

Cheechos

Fat acceptance advocate, feminist, and body posi person here. c:

It is perfectly okay to be body positive and still want to lose weight! One of the core principles of body positivity is that it's your body to do with what you choose. If you want to be thinner, fatter, tattooed, pierced, etc., then go for it! As long as what you're doing is something that you truly want and something that is coming from a place of self-love, you're right on track with what body positivity teaches. :]

dominaproelium

Big thanks to everyone, all of these posts are extremely helpful

To me, being fat positive is about knowing what it means to be fat (or big, or overweight, or curvy, or whatever other adjective does it for you), including the negative health effects, and choosing to be that way anyway. I've recently been conceptualizing choosing to be fat as a way to "fight the power" so to speak, to challenge societal standards of beauty and femininity. However, I really do want to be healthy, and to feel physically comfortable in my own skin.

I think instead of struggling with whether or not to lose weight I'll choose health and comfort over obsession with body weight and dress size.

Thanks again everyone!

Okay, I'm sorry, but I'm really not seeing how this is changing society for the better. You say you are "fighting the power" and "challenging standards". I do not think that it is POSITIVE in any way to focus on weight whatsoever. If you truly want to "fight" societies standards, do so by proving that being HEALTHY (as opposed to weighing a set amount) is a better way to live. There are "fat" people who are healthy. There are "skinny" people who are healthy. Every person's body is different, and everyone has their own ideal weight. "Fat-positive" is probably the most ridiculous excuse I've ever heard. I am a strong believer in feminism, and I completely disagree with you on this.

Stop trying to be skinny or fat. Try to be healthy in YOUR body's way.

laele75

I am trying to fight my natural urge to roll my eyes at someone declaring themselves a feminist. I am a humanist, I believe in empowering all people.

Feminists do believe in empowering all people, but they focus on women because women historically have been disempowered and ignored. Similarly, blacks, gays, and other oppressed groups have focused on the unique struggles of their groups.

But white men are a no? They're frankly the most maligned minority group out there. Every other group throws a pride rally, and it's a cause for celebration.

A group of white guys try to celebrate being white and they're called a hate group.

Kindly stuff your rhetoric. When I see more empowering and less man bashing and man blaming, then I will be believe your spiel. Until then, I'm not even renting it.

Cheechos

But white men are a no? They're frankly the most maligned minority group out there. Every other group throws a pride rally, and it's a cause for celebration.

A group of white guys try to celebrate being white and they're called a hate group.

Kindly stuff your rhetoric. When I see more empowering and less man bashing and man blaming, then I will be believe your spiel. Until then, I'm not even renting it.

Are you joking right now? I feel like you're joking.

newmanel

I am so excited that this thread exists. On a site like this with so much internalized shame, it is extraordinarily brave to talk about radical acceptance. I'm a feminist and fat positive, but I fight every day with self-loathing, self-criticism, and judgment. This is why feminism and fat positivity are so relevant to people on MFP. I'm very skeptical of my desire to lose weight and look a certain way if it makes me hate myself.

Also, huge lulz at the MRA above.

newmanel

I'm glad feminism has given you the entitlement to take it so utterly for granted!

Love,
A Man-Hating Harpy

MoreBean13

Choosing to accept obesity for yourself is like playing russian-roulette with your health, except all the chambers are loaded except one. There are the occasional genetically-blessed people that can live long healthy lives with no obesity-related complications, but they are rare and it is a HUGE risk to assume you're going to win that genetic lottery.

Cheechos

No, I am not joking. Unlike you and the OP, I don't just buy the rhetoric spouted at me and actually think about it. If the OP had thought about her question, she would know it was the stupidiest idea ever. Empowering doesn't mean enabling harmful behaviors. It's called COMMON SENSE. Something the entire world is in short supply of.

This kind of blindness is the reason I am fed up with the feminist movement as it is. They are either man hating harpies who think bullying and demeaning men makes them 'empowered' or witless wonders like the OP who can't think logically for themselves because it might go against the rhetoric they take as gospel but clearly haven't ever thought about.

I am a strong woman. I don't need a political movement to empower me. Like I said, not even renting it. But I am sure your fembots friends thought that was ever so witty. Too bad it wasn't.

"Unlike you and the OP"

Yeah, do me a favor and don't speak for me. You don't know anything about me other than the few lines of text you've read so far.

Also, if you seriously believe that white males are "the most maligned minority out there" then maybe you're internalizing more idiotic rhetoric than you think.

bethannien

But white men are a no? They're frankly the most maligned minority group out there. Every other group throws a pride rally, and it's a cause for celebration.

A group of white guys try to celebrate being white and they're called a hate group.

Kindly stuff your rhetoric. When I see more empowering and less man bashing and man blaming, then I will be believe your spiel. Until then, I'm not even renting it.

Are you joking right now? I feel like you're joking.

No, I am not joking. Unlike you and the OP, I don't just buy the rhetoric spouted at me and actually think about it. If the OP had thought about her question, she would know it was the stupidiest idea ever. Empowering doesn't mean enabling harmful behaviors. It's called COMMON SENSE. Something the entire world is in short supply of.

This kind of blindness is the reason I am fed up with the feminist movement as it is. They are either man hating harpies who think bullying and demeaning men makes them 'empowered' or witless wonders like the OP who can't think logically for themselves because it might go against the rhetoric they take as gospel but clearly haven't ever thought about.

I am a strong woman. I don't need a political movement to empower me. Like I said, not even renting it. But I am sure your fembots friends thought that was ever so witty. Too bad it wasn't.

:noway:

bethannien

I'm big time anti fat shaming. A persons weight is like the tiniest part of who they are.

BUT I also think we have a responsibility to our bodies and to our life which is already so short to care for ourselves to the best of our ability. Love yourself, love your family and friends as they are. But becoming complacent about your health in a misplaced attempt at protest does no one any favors.

ashleyisgreat

No, I am not joking. Unlike you and the OP, I don't just buy the rhetoric spouted at me and actually think about it. If the OP had thought about her question, she would know it was the stupidiest idea ever. Empowering doesn't mean enabling harmful behaviors. It's called COMMON SENSE. Something the entire world is in short supply of.

This kind of blindness is the reason I am fed up with the feminist movement as it is. They are either man hating harpies who think bullying and demeaning men makes them 'empowered' or witless wonders like the OP who can't think logically for themselves because it might go against the rhetoric they take as gospel but clearly haven't ever thought about.

I am a strong woman. I don't need a political movement to empower me. Like I said, not even renting it. But I am sure your fembots friends thought that was ever so witty. Too bad it wasn't.

"Unlike you and the OP"

Yeah, do me a favor and don't speak for me. You don't know anything about me other than the few lines of text you've read so far.

Also, if you seriously believe that white males are "the most maligned minority out there" then maybe you're internalizing more idiotic rhetoric than you think.

My thoughts exactly. The recent surge of hostility toward the feminist movement (which, by the way, is not a single thing; feminism is manifested in countless different ideologies and in countless variations and degrees) is strongly rooted in the desire to maintain the power structures that we currently have. The rhetoric of anti-feminists is no more unthinking, uncritical, and illogical than the extreme feminists that laele75 mistakenly assumes are representative of all feminists.

To the OP: do what you need to do for YOU. If you're doing this because of some kind of internalized fear of being fat and deemed unattractive by society, then you're going to run into problems and this won't be a true lifestyle change. However, if you're doing this because you want to be healthier and maintain a more active lifestyle, then this has nothing to do with societal pressures or gender roles. Don't worry about that. It's just about being healthier.

lndsylck

I am so excited that this thread exists. On a site like this with so much internalized shame, it is extraordinarily brave to talk about radical acceptance. I'm a feminist and fat positive, but I fight every day with self-loathing, self-criticism, and judgment. This is why feminism and fat positivity are so relevant to people on MFP. I'm very skeptical of my desire to lose weight and look a certain way if it makes me hate myself.

Thanks, that's exactly why I originally posted in the first place -- to see if anyone else out there was feeling like I was