Practicing Body Neutrality

While fat phobia and fat discrimination knows no gender, it is women who are most publicly and predominantly held to the ridiculous standards of beauty that subject even those who are thin or thin-passing to scrutiny, comment, and criticism. As an audience, women are served a seemingly endless diet of commentary on other women’s bodies to the point where only the smallest few of us can honestly say we are happy with our bodies exactly as they are.

But there is danger in thin and thin-passing women claiming space in the fight for fat positivity. Columnist and author Laura Jane Williams wrote about this in an article for Red in 2018. In the article, she discusses the ways in which she in her “slightly-above-average-sized body” has “never truly known fatphobia.”

I think Williams is completely spot on with her take and the voices she chooses to amplify. When thin and thin-passing women participate in discussions about their bodies, regardless of their intent, the idea that bodies should be discussed and commented on is reinforced. I particularly love this quote Williams uses from Bethany Rutter:

Thin and thin-passing women must endure commentary about their bodies, yes, and that commentary can be hurtful; but they will never know what it is like to step outside their doors braced for the day and the onslaught of micro and macroaggressions against their bodies. They will never fear stepping onto the beach because someone might call them a beached whale and get their friends to laugh at her. They will never fear going to the gym and being secretly filmed, their unconsented-to image posted online to be served up for ridicule.

Which is why an Instagram post from Hilary Duff like this one doesn’t truly help:

This is from 2 years ago, but I came across it the other day, reposted in a Facebook group with the hashtag #bodypositivity. It’s obvious that Duff posted this picture of herself so that paparazzi and tabloids wouldn’t be able to use it against her. This is a thin actress who has perfectly normal thighs for someone with a body talking about her “flaws” and extolling women to “stop wasting precious time” wishing we were different or better. She talks about her body being “healthy,” which we have culturally decided is the same as “not fat.” And by characterizing any part of her body as having flaws, Duff only reinforces the idea that bodies HAVE flaws.

Contrast this with Jameela Jamil’s approach. Jamil is a diet survivor among many other things and she has been leading the fight against photoshopping her image in any instance, including promotional images for her show The Good Place:

What is important to me, and where I think Jamil and Williams are in line with each other, is that Jamil points out that she is not telling us that WE have to celebrate our back fat. She seems to recognize how bananas a sentiment like that is coming from “some slim actress.” I love her hashtag #letabitchlive. Yes… just let us live. All of us! Normalize fat bodies and disabled bodies and dark-skinned bodies and trans bodies and all the other kinds of bodies out there!

The way to normalize all human bodies is to stop analyzing and critiquing them and commenting negatively on them. And definitely don’t comment on other women’s bodies to anyone. Keep that poison to yourself. You don’t have to be body positive or fat positive all day every day, but practicing body neutrality with yourself and others goes a long, long way.