There is no good way to body shame someone. There is no good way to tell someone or passively suggest that their body type is not the norm or is not what it should be. Some people say that the act of pointing out someone’s flaws is what makes someone more likely to ‘correct’ them, in other words it gives them motivation. This is sometimes true, but there are right and wrong ways to do these things, and from what I have observed, most people get it wrong.
There are many types of body shaming that I have observed. Firstly, there are people that say people need to “dress for their body type.” For example, some stupid people think some girls should not wear bikinis because of their bodies. These people are wrong. Commanding that someone should dress one way or the other does not motivate them to change their eating or exercise habits if that is infact the issue. Clothes are just clothes, nothing more. Let people wear them how they please. This is just one of the many ways that body shaming gets people to hide their bodies behind clothing, which no one should feel like they have to do.
Telling someone that they should look a certain way is not right either. Thigh gaps, flat stomachs and toned arm muscles for women. Abs, arm muscles and toned legs for men. These are just a few of the expectations that people are pressured to achieve. Of course, this generally means you are a healthy person, and it is good to be healthy, but everyone is different. My kind of healthy is different from the next person. Some people struggle to lose weight, and some people just naturally don’t need to look that way to be perfectly healthy. Additionally, weight is just a number that no singular person can compare to someone else’s.
Someone once told me that I shouldn’t worry about the number on the scale, but on how I actually feel. If I felt healthy, then that is what mattered. If I didn’t, then I can change how I eat or exercise to feel more healthy. My weight has no bearing on what someone else should weigh, because everyone is different. So can we please stop comparing one another?
A size two versus a size six or twelve is not comparable.
Don’t tell someone they are wrong for not working out. Don’t tell someone they are wrong for eating certain things. Stop comparing yourself to others to make them feel down.
Women or men, they all see it in the media. The images of what is expected of us is enough already, we don’t need people telling us to our face that we are not ‘acceptable.’
We are all acceptable. And there is no mold we need to fit.
People just need to remind us that we are beautiful, we just need to be healthy. Health is the goal in exercising and eating right, not fitting this image of ‘perfection.’
