Body positivity, a movement toward self-love and acceptance for people of all shapes and sizes, has seen rapidly growing support in the past few years thanks to social media and "body-posi" influencers. This social movement aims to invoke confidence in people of every body type and celebrate the resilient vessels that our bodies truly are. Stretch marks, moles, hairy legs, wrinkles, scars, broad shoulders, small chests, belly rolls, and everything else that society considers to be "flaws" are nothing but marks of unique beauty and individuality in the body-posi community.
As it should be, right?
Wrong.
Though the body positivity movement has been met with widespread support, many people believe it to be be ignorant of health concerns such as obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, and more. Placing conditions on your support for body positivity — saying it's great *unless* you're unhealthy — negates the very idea of what body positivity is actually about.
Body positivity places value on all human beings regardless of how they look. This includes accepting those who may not be in good health, because contrary to what opponents of body positivity may think, a person's health does not define their value, worthiness of respect, or right to self-love.
Of course, we shouldn't celebrate or encourage unhealthy lifestyles, and that's not what body positivity does. The movement instead gives validation to people of every body type at every stage of health because no one should be made to believe that their physical health somehow determines their worth as a human being. Saying that body positivity is only good if you're maintaining a healthy lifestyle is incredibly ableist as it ignores the physical, mental, genetic, and socioeconomic barriers that many people have to climb over in order to be "healthy." It denies people with limited ability and access to physical wellness the validation and respect their bodies rightfully deserve.
Someone who is middle class, living on an organic diet and curvy should be no more or less valued than someone who works two minimum-wage jobs, eats fast-food most nights, and is overweight. Body positivity is not just for the people privileged enough to actively live a "healthy" lifestyle. It's for everyone. Male bodies, trans and nonbinary bodies, black bodies, brown bodies, disabled bodies, overweight bodies, bodies recovering from eating disorders, bodies built on organic food, bodies built on fast-food...everybody. Every body.
Body positivity does not discriminate and neither should you.
If your support comes with conditions, it's not support.
Health does not control whether or not someone is worthy of respect.
Everyone has the right to feel secure in their own body regardless of how healthy they are.
Health looks and feels different on everyone because everyone has different needs in order to function and be happy.
Some people find health and happiness through physical wellness, others find it through mental wellness.
No matter what our individual perceptions of health are, everyone deserves equal validation and respect.
Self-hate gets us nowhere. Convincing people who don't live the healthiest lifestyles that they aren't allowed to be body positive unless they start eating healthier and going to the gym is an incredibly twisted way of thinking. Pressuring someone to look or act a certain way because of your own internalized prejudice isn't motivation - it's destructive. What good is physical health if it comes at the cost of mental health? There's nothing more damaging to a person's well-being than self-hate, and that's why we need body positivity. It is the first step in learning to love, accept, and respect yourself rather than punishing yourself for not fulfilling society's expectations of what it means to be"healthy."
Everyone has their own battles that they fight every day from behind closed doors: people scraping money together for dinner every night, people who binge-eat from stress, people whose depression makes it impossible to get out of bed, people with chronic pain who can't handle more than twenty minutes of activity. Regardless of the circumstance, it is never your place to judge someone for trying to practice self-love. Stop placing your own ableist, classist, and ignorant guidelines on a movement that simply wants to ensure that everybody and every body is valued and respected.
