That is the problem I'm talking about - that the visibility of white, cis, ablebodied women is seen as something harmful to the movement as a whole. So are they supposed to hide just because there is that many of them? Or just because they're not fat enough to take space in the body positivity topics? I myself see more and more influencers who promote especially fat acceptance and have huge following and engagement. If you take time to follow different types of people that's what you're gonna see in your feed. The problem is that many of the self proclaimed body positivity influencers are gatekeeping or promote aggressive behaviours to people who are different or "not fat enough" and shame them calling them "thins" and directly telling them to duck off or promoting borderline thin shaming.
And no, the fact that the current movement is maybe focused on black obese women does not mean black women started the body positivity movement as a whole. Everyone should have a right to participate. If you see someone thinner than you showing their body as harmful then you are the problem.
Not to mention the fact that body positivity or fat acceptance is very often going into harmful area of claiming that obesity is okay and is not a reason for health issues. The amount of obese people grows every day and it's not something positive. The fact that some people can't find clothing their size in general clothes is the social issue not the issue of discrimination.
Listen, I don't want this to go too far OT (this is supposed to be about Jade after all) but you either did not understand my post or are intentionally misconstruing what I said.
I literally said *anyone* can participate. On an individual level, there is nothing wrong with that. On a larger scale however, this trend of the movement being flooded by smaller, cis, white, ablebodied women should be viewed critically because it takes visibility away from those who suffer from systemic (!) discrimination because of their bodies. And your justification is really "there just are more white, thin people" (spoiler: no there aren't)? Also, not everything you see online is based on your feed. If the movement is flooded with white thin bodies, that is what's going to be on people's for you and explore pages and in their yt recommendations. I want to point out once again that the issue people have with Jade's post isn't that she is posting her body and what it looks like (nobody is asking her to "hide"!), the issue is that she's contorting her body to look bigger than it naturally looks and then saying "lets normalise this".
Also not sure if by "thinner than you" you meant me personally or just a general you but my body is fairly similar to Jades, although i carry my weight a bit differently, I would say we're a similar size overall.
I agree, body shaming isn't the right way to go and it is an issue that goes both ways but once again, the body positivity movement is mainly (supposed to be) about systemic issues. But also, being called "thins" is slightly different from something like "lazy pig", don't you think? Body shaming (from what I've seen) is oftentimes more aggressive when it is directed at plus-size people (but obviously both aren't acceptable). I think gatekeeping definitely is the wrong way to go (even though i rarely see plus-sized creators gatekeeping) but once again, marginalized bodies are also (even moreso) affected by gatekeeping and aggressive behaviour. The body positivity community is one of the only spaces where they aren't (in theory). Excluding anyone from the body positivitiy community is wrong but we need to have a certain understanding of why and how communities come to be and that certain people are more severely affected by certain issues.
I will also always be wary of someone who claims body positivity "is going too far" and claims it as harmful. Yes, there are health issues connected to obesity, but people deserve respect regardless of their health status. It is also a fairly reductive argument because health and bodysize are both very complex issues that require intersectional understanding to judge its implications. A health condition could very well be the reason for someone's weight (or not, either way, it's none of your business). Also, that whole "obesity promoter" strawman makes no sense, I've not met anyone who wanted to be overweight because of the body positivity movement, but I do know several people who have developed EDs partly because of the fatphobia they have faced. People who are concerned about "health" often don't seem to care about those. I am not saying that's you but I am saying that people who immediately bring "health" into the discussion are often only trying to thinly veil their fatphobia.
Feel free to explain to me how social issues are different from discrimination? Sure, clothing is not the most significant aspect of it and it's definitely not like... super severe discrimination (for lack of a better term; obviously there are things that are much much worse in this world) but it is a symptom (!) of the overall discrimination of larger/marginalized bodies. A group of people is being treated differently purely for their body size or ability. That's discrimination in my book. Jade can walk into a store and find clothing that fits her and is accessible to her (both physically and financially) and have plenty of (fashionable) options. A lot of people cannot (especially those dependent on adaptive clothing).
All of that being said, I personally think there are a lot of valid criticism of the body positivity movement and I personally subscribe to body neutrality rather than body positivity but this is not the place for that discussion.
Exactly my kind of humour: Crying because thin-privileged, conveniently beautiful Jade is criticized for how she participates in the body positivity / fat acceptance movement and how this "gate-keeping" is "skinny-shaming" and at the same time putting an upper limit on the movement and how it portrays these bodies (aka not as harmful, detestable timebombs).
Until I can be a fat person without being a health risk for myself and society in general first and foremost I refuse to even engage in discussion about "skinny shaming".
Exactly! Only just saw this but you're right, it seems very hypocritical to say "let's not exclude people, skinny people get shamed for their bodies too!", then turn around and basically shame fat people for their bodies
) woman doesn't feel 100% confident and wants to participate. It's super fucked up - and it's not just about Jade (whom I super dislike so it's not meant to white knight) but in general. If we want to be so proper, I'd say body positivity should be about birth deformations, people after accidents or illnesses not about race.
