Rethinking the Body Positive
Self-acceptance is not synonymous with empowerment
These past decades have been witness to a rapid change in our public perception of the female body. Far from the slim, athletic ideal popularised by the fitness icons of The Eighties, there has been a growing push, through commerce and the media, to celebrate, endorse, and even promote the ‘plus-sized’ figure.
‘Real’ women, we are told, are neither slim nor athletic. They are at best amorphous and unconditioned or, increasingly commonly, clinically overweight or obese. And by extension, we are to understand that those women who do eat well, exercise self-restraint, and enjoy healthy, active lifestyles are somehow less real and less valid.
This narrative is presented as an appeal to inclusiveness, self-acceptance, and empowerment, but through its rhetoric communicates more a repudiation of the healthy ideal and the promotion of an unhealthy one. More a counter-culture than a social movement, the modern ideology of the Body Positive is driven almost exclusively by a rejection of our contemporary understanding of beauty, and the celebration of normalcy.
The original notion of body positivity was arguably conceived in the latter part of the Victorian era as a natural extension of the First Wave of feminism. Shunning period ideals of the body beautiful characterised by an exaggeratedly curvaceous figure, tapered torso, flared hips, and diminutive waist, clothing reformists criticised society’s misrepresentation of the female form. In Woman’s dress, a question of the day (1894), Lelia A. Davis wrote:
Our present mode of dress is based upon a false ideal of woman’s form and ignorance of the construction of her body. Let us endeavor to change this ideal and put in its place one true to nature … In the fashion pictures which are strewn broadcast there is rarely one which shows a normally formed woman. Taper waists, often but little larger than the necks of the figures to which they belong, are an essential figure. How do the outlines compare to those of an Grecian statue?
Feminist writer Elizabeth Stuart Phelps implored women to abandon the corset in favour of more pragmatic attire, emphasising its harm to the health, the considerable limitations it imposed to function and mobility, and its role in perpetuating a patriarchy in which women were viewed as little more than ornaments. From What to wear (1873):
“A certain sense of freedom follows [removal of the corset]. The lungs partially dilate. The heart feebly feels for bounding-room. The nerve-centres are disturbed with an uncertain parody of ease. But a greater sense of discomfort grows upon you. The heavy skirts drag upon the hips. The back, perhaps for the first time in your life, begins to ache. The spine grows sore to the touch … These are not the sensations of a healthy and untrammelled organism.”
Phelps’ sentiment was well justified: the popular Victorian practice of tight-lacing restricted breathing and circulation, and caused faintness, discomfort, and digestive problems. Long-term adherence could lead to hypochromatic anaemia (historically known as chlorosis), permanent deformation of the rib cage, and atrophy of the musculature of the back and abdomen. These were harmful consequences of which physicians of the day were well aware.
When the corset eventually did fall out of favour in the early twentieth century, it was motivated primarily by the imperative for freer, more sensible attire to accommodate women’s diversifying roles. However, it was encouraged, also, by growing support for equality and concern for their wellbeing. The shift marked a positive turning point in societal attitudes towards the female body, with the near mythical ideal of the hourglass figure being replaced by a more natural and healthy one.
Just half a century later, a host of factors — post-war abundance, growing dependence on the motor car, the ubiquity of the television, the rising popularity of fast food, and a culture of consumption — were conspiring to institute a sharp rise of relative body mass in the United States. By 1960–62, rates of obesity and overweight amongst women had reached 16 per cent and 25 per cent, respectively. Overweight and obesity had already become part of a growing norm.
Now, another half-century has passed, and overweight and obesity have long since become the standard in rich, industrial English-speaking countries. In the United States, it is the second leading cause of preventable death, after tobacco smoking. Seven of every 10 people are overweight, of whom three are obese and one morbidly obese. Between 280,000 and 325,000 people, or approximately one in every thousand head of population, die every year from obesity-related illnesses. Worldwide, that figure is at least 2.8 million deaths annually! And during this pandemic, there has emerged a linear correlation between rates of overweight and obesity, and COVID-19 mortality. Not only do the factors which cause overweight and obesity lead also to illness, not only are they associated, their association is known to be causal. Contrary to the claims, there is no such thing as ‘healthy obesity’.
Of course, overweight and obesity are associated with environmental factors — poverty, marginalisation, and lower education — but these factors are not determinant. Everyone can maintain a healthy weight; some people only have greater obstacles to overcome in doing so. In countries in which people eat smaller portions, consume less total energy (fewer Calories or kilojoules), and exercise more, overweight and obesity are virtually non-existent. In Vietnam, for example, the adult obesity rate is just over two per cent, or one in 50. The persistent dogma that this condition is determined by genetics is stunningly irrational.
The modern interpretation of Body Positivity was not born of such noble ideals as the first. It began with the National Association to Aid Fat Americans (NAAFA), founded in 1969 by Bill Fabrey and Llewellyn (Lew) Louderback, both of whom fetishised fat women. Although its purported aims were broadly consistent with civil rights, in practice it was decidedly anti-feminist. From Fat Activism (2021):
“NAAFA was conceived as an organisation by men who have a sexual interest in fat women who were interested in developing activism that benefited them as well as the fat people to whom they were attracted… [Its] public face was one of social action, but the organisation also functioned as a meeting place for fat women and men who were sexually attracted to them.”
Nevertheless, the failings of NAAFA catalysed the creation of other genuinely progressive movements, most notably The Fat Underground. Their publication the Fat Liberation Manifesto (1973), written by members Judy Freespirit and Aldebaran, form the theoretical foundation of fat activism and Body Positivity today. Influenced heavily by Second Wave feminism, the manifesto addressed such familiar issues as respect and recognition, mistreatment by commercial and sexist interests, oppression of minority groups, and discrimination in work, education, and public health.
Where it went wrong, and where the modern narrative goes wrong, is the disconnect between ethics and science. It is praiseworthy in its demand for mutual recognition, respect, and liberty for all, consistent with feminism and broader civil rights, but underlying its objections is a patent denialism of science:
“We repudiate the mystified ‘science’ which falsely claims that we are unfit.”
That denialism, of course, lies at the core of the modern slogan Health At Every Size®, a registered trademark of the Association for Size Diversity and Health (ASDAH).
It is lost on most advocates of Body Positivity that their ‘movement’ is driven and perpetuated by the very commercial interests — those of the food, fashion, health, and pharmaceutical industries — that they claim to oppose. The epithet ‘real’ women is a commercial contrivance.
Today, the dogma of scientific denialism has become so mainstream that Cosmopolitan magazine last year featured ‘plus-sized’ (overweight and obese) models, on its cover, this time accompanied by the provocative headline “This is healthy.” The move prompted a flood of praise, criticism, and debate — the key point of contention, of course, being the promotion of an illness which represents the second leading cause of preventable death in the United States, United Kingdom, and Australia, after smoking. Whilst the magazine leans towards the politically progressive, openly advocating such feminist causes as equal pay laws, legal abortion, free contraceptives, and gun control, it would be naïve of us not to be at least sceptical of its motivations. The decision was at best misguided; at worst, it was a harmful and self-serving publicity stunt targeted towards millions of impressionable readers. It is easy to celebrate Body Positivity when seventy per cent of your prospective readership is overweight or obese. But its core business is, and has always been, the promotion and exploitation of low self-esteem.
“We fully intend to reclaim power over our bodies and our lives.”
So reads the final declaration of the Fat Liberation Manifesto. Yet the modern narrative of the Body Positive does quite the opposite through its dogma of inevitability, predestination, and victimhood.
None of us plans to burden ourselves through sickness or ill health; none of us strives to be less attractive; none of us wants to be scorned or criticised. We arrive there as a consequence of our behaviours, the choices we have made, and of our lack of understanding or resolve — our lack of power — to control our condition. And when we have the capacity to change, acceptance of our flaws is not empowering. It is indulgent and defeatist.
How often have we heard or recited the mantra some people can’t help it, and how easily do so many of us choose to believe it? But as a matter of scientific fact, we can.
This issue is not about our ideals of beauty: overweight and obesity are not a style or mode, like an impertinent tattoo or eyebrow-raising outfit, to be accepted or endured. They are not an artefact of self-expression any more than are emphysema or cirrhosis. They are a self-inflicted lifestyle illness — a choice — often a difficult choice, but a choice nonetheless. Any rational definition of empowerment, therefore, must include a recognition of the illness, personal acceptance of responsibility and, be it through diet, exercise, counselling, or some combination of those and other means, some mechanism to change.
Yes, we can be overweight or obese and still be beautiful, loveable, and worthy: our size and health are not defining. And because they are not, it is senseless and destructive to resort to the kind of denialism that defines the modern narrative of the Body Positive. We can accept that we are overweight and unhealthy, we can call a spade a spade, and still love and respect ourselves — and each other. No matter where we are in life, we are all works in progress. And it is through love and respect that we should find the strength to care for our health, and to become progressively better versions of ourselves. That is empowerment.
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