The Truth About Fat-Phobia & Racism
Fact: Fat-phobia can be an act of racism and fatal for communities of color.
Let’s get into why.
Writer’s Note: Every time I use the word ‘fat’ in this blog post it’s meant in an endearing and mutually respectful way — as substituting it for other, ambiguous words feels like an erasure of the struggle.
In the early 2000s — is it too soon to call them that? — somewhere between the start of puberty and the end of middle school, I was watching reruns of America’s Next Top Model. On one particular episode, Twiggy (renowned British supermodel and panel judge) was recalling her influence on the Thin Model Revolution of the 1960s. As she talked about how she never thought she’d make it in the fashion industry and how curvier models were the more desirable norm, I remember wishing that this 2000-and-whatever-it-was was more like the 1960s — well minus the racism part, although….
Fast forward to 2009. I watched Phat Girlz, starring Monique, for the first time. While I was likely too young to be watching this movie, I was blown away by the representation for fat black girls. For those who may not have seen the movie, it’s about two fat, black women who struggle to find love and recognition in a culture where thin is regarded as the standard. They take a work trip where all the things they previously thought about themselves are combatted, they learn to love themselves, find their confidence, and start to date very good-looking, non-superficial men. This movie spoke to my hopelessly romantic teenage soul. Deriving a new sense of confidence from the fat, black girlfriends, I experienced the feelings of representation that the Body Positivity Movement would bring me later in life.
Fat-phobia and racism are inherently linked.
As a young millennial, my childhood was filled with weight loss fads and infomercials that made me think, skinny was the only thing to aspire to be. I saw my role models, like Oprah, lose and gain drastic amounts of weight in the public eye. I watched as they were scorned when they gained the weight and heralded when they lost it. I was blown away by Jennifer Hudson in Dreamgirls and not surprised when she won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress. However, it seemed as though people didn’t see her as beautiful until she finished the Jenny Craig diet and became a spokesperson for skinniness. I’ve watched the tennis heroines, Venus and Serena Williams, receive accolades upon accolades for their athletic prowess but be mocked, bulled, and refused adequate medical treatment for their “manly” statures and builds.
What’s a young, chubby, black girl supposed to think about her body when this is how society treats those that it supposedly loves?
I’ll tell you.
She’ll assume that black bodies, like hers, are ugly and disregarded by the communities around her. She’ll infer that fat black bodies are even worse. She’ll feel this truth when one of her middle school classmates starts to call her, “Big Black” instead of her name. She’ll feel like femininity, fashion, and conventional beauty are not available to her. She’ll find these feelings to be true when someone tell her that black girls shouldn’t wear pink. She’ll spend most of her teen years hiding behind sweatpants and hoodies because, “ball is life” and she’s reluctant to show off her body for fear that it’s not normal. But one day she’ll hear that Kate Upton is being regarded as one of the world’s most beautiful women AND she’s plus size! When she Googles “Kate Upton” and a slim, blonde woman with slightly large breasts looks back at her, she’ll wonder, “If this woman is plus size….then what am I?
“For ages, fat black women and fat people in general have not been allowed to call themselves feminine. Growing up, I was often teased for being feminine, and was once told that, “Makeup on a pig doesn’t make it any less of a pig”. So for me, and others who look like me, we weren’t socially allowed to express ourselves by dressing outwardly feminine.”
Sheesh…am I right?
However, in 2014, she’ll discover Ashley Graham and Danielle Brooks. Visibly plus size women that look like her in stature, build, and skin tone. She’ll then find the Body Positivity Movement, and she’ll see it as a space where she can take solace and finally feel represented.
Fact: Over 68% of women in the United States wear a size 14 or above. So…is it plus size or just regular size?
For those who may not know, the Body Positive Movement started around 2012, and was created to be a movement that “include(s) those marginalized bodies and bodies that are not culturally accepted,” (Severson, 2019). However, in its manifestation in 2020, this movement succeeds to regularly amplify the voices of “non-threatening”, marginally fat, white bodies while sidelining those other bodies that it’s supposed to include but may not be as “pleasing” to look at. It’s great see amazing influencers like Ashley Graham, Gabi Fresh, and Tabria Majors, taking off in their careers and making space for plus size women, but it’s hard not to notice that the landscape of body positive, plus size representation is becoming a space where lighter skin and an hourglass figure (that’s not too plus-sized) are definitely in the forefront. This focus effectively averts necessary attention from a fight that still needs to be fought. The fight that dismantles fat-phobia and fear of the black body (Springs, 2019), a fight that dates back to the era of slavery.
When we come across people that are fat, black, or different from us in any way, we must correct initial thoughts of fear, anxiety, hatred, or anger and replace them with humanity and kindness.
In America, fat activism began to arise in the 1960s, coincidentally at the same time as the fights for Civil and Women’s Rights. Except, it wasn’t a coincidence at all. Fat-phobia and racism are inherently linked. It was the early colonizers that coined the ideal of African people being, “gluttonous, lazy, ignorant, and unable to control their [animal-like] appetites,” (Miller, 2020). “Fatness or largeness was always a sign of wealth and health. It wasn’t until Europeans began to colonize and enslave Africans whose women were mostly large or fat, that fatness became synonymous with savagery. Suddenly, art and culture shifted the narrative that fatness= high status, to fatness=negro, which no “en-vogue” European wanted to be equated to,” (April, @fatanbougie167, 2020). This is a bias that still plagues the minds of many Americans and is evident in the way that black bodies (especially ones of larger proportion and stature) are treated in our nation. You see, as our white counterparts have succeeded to find the beginnings of fat acceptance, fat BIPOC communities are being discriminated against, used as undesirable outcome examples, and treated as less than human for their appearance.
“That’s why the mainstream body positive movement did not actually move as much as it should have. It didn’t end fatphobia because it did not center the racism at its core.”
Moreover, fat-phobia becomes a life-threatening issue when we hear about Black men being murdered because their size seems threatening or learn that doctors assume “fat” patients should be prescribed “weight loss” before properly assessing them (Spring, 2020). The latter happens most often in the Black Women community. These types of diagnoses effectively minimize the real issues that plague the health of communities of color and can be the underlying reasons for well-being concerns, such as: food deserts, environmental toxins, and air pollution.
If you know me, follow my fitspo Instagram, or read this blog regularly, you know that I’m a huge advocate for self and body love. I wanted to write this blog post to remind us that as we do the work to dismantle oppressive thinking and prejudiced action, we must also unlearn these tacit biases and accept people for who they are. When we come across people that are fat, black, or different from us in any way, we must correct initial thoughts of fear, anxiety, hatred, or anger and replace them with humanity and kindness. There’s so much work to be done in our world, let’s try to take new steps every day.
To all my curvy, plus size, fat sisters: You are beautiful and you deserve nothing less than the world.
As always thank you for the honor of your time. SUBSCRIBE down below (at the very bottom of the page) and let’s stay in touch!
Yours Truly and Truly Me,
