{The Body Liberation Guide} ✊ Inherently radical and political

Hi friend,

Project Heal asked me to weigh in (pun intended) for Weight Stigma Awareness Week on a topic I’d been meaning to revisit: body positivity versus body liberation. What’s the difference, and why does it matter?

Here’s a short excerpt:

After centuries of racism-driven weight stigma, 75 years of diet culture telling us that thinness is beautiful and sexy, and decades of commercials telling us that thinness is easy to attain, it’s no wonder it’s so easy to ascribe moral value and worth to thin bodies and a lack of those things to fat bodies.

When we as a society systemically deny certain bodies equal worth, access and value, that’s oppression, and that’s why body liberation is vital to a just and fair world.

Systems are by their nature big, sweeping, and intimidating. It can feel easier to work on our individual body image — and that’s also worth doing! But we can’t ignore the systems at work if we want to create a world where people don’t feel bad about our bodies in the first place. Body liberation is inherently a radical and political movement, and that can be uncomfortable when you first encounter it.