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No, body positivity isn’t ‘ignoring health concerns’
Just a casual PSA
by Gail Vivar
There are a lot of really absurd things I’ve read on the internet and brushed off with a casual side eye.
But when an article like The Odyssey’s “Body Positivity is Great And All But Not When It’s Ignoring Health Concerns” is doing rounds on my timeline, I can’t help but feel it needs harping on.
As someone who is not a size 2, and who has experienced eating disorders regardless, I have a few choice words.
Firstly, people who are worried about what other people are doing with their bodies need to mind their own business, but that’s besides the point.
Our weight does not affect or concern you. The body positive movement is not a movement to “trash our health.” Young women like myself should not feel guilt for the size we are. We’re not encouraging anyone to “gain weight.” Rather, we’re encouraging people to learn to accept the bodies they’ve been handed, they’ve worked for or they’ve found themselves in.
Whether people are nurturing their bodies to maintaining their current weight, or searching to be comfortable through working out is none of your concern. It’s a movement for us to experience by ourselves.
The author writes, “It seems self-love talk is going to peoples heads” and “Normalizing obesity.” But the only problem we see is you policing other women. This is the same self-love that’ll empower girls to stand up to people like you one day.
According to The National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders, at least 30 million people of all ages and genders suffer from an eating disorder in the U.S.
To say that the body positive movement is “promoting obesity” is to ignore the fact that obesity is not the result of individual decision making or a lack of self-control.
There are a lot of people who are not privileged enough to eat the healthy foods you do, there are a lot of people who work too many minimum wage hours to find the time to work out, and there are a lot of people who were born into bodies they’d maybe rather not have been born into.
Don’t you dare shame us for learning to live with that. People don’t choose to be overweight, but we can choose to view our bodies in a positive light. Sorry you can’t.