CONSUME AND SHARE MEDIA THAT ACCURATELY DEPICT WOMEN IN A RANGE OF SIZES
DIVERSE IMAGES OF women are starting to appear more frequently, as we’ve seen with Erica Schenk’s cover of Women’s Running and the “This Girl Can” campaign. Other examples include the July 2015 cover of ESPN The Magazine, featuring plus-size Olympian Amanda Bingson in the nude. In 2016, for the first time in the magazine’s history, Sports Illustrated featured a plus-size model, Ashley Graham, on its cover, and the iconic brand Nike included diversity in their Brahaus Collection advertising by featuring plus-size model Paloma Elsesser. When you see images and stories like these, share the hell out of them on your social networks. Start conversations about size diversity in sports. Get to know the game-changers who are out there leading the way—it can change the way you think about your own body and athleticism. But in order to do that, you need to know where to find them. With that in mind, here are seven places to find body-positive and size-friendly media:
1.My Name Is Jessamyn
Jessamyn Stanley is a yoga teacher, body-positive advocate, and writer from Durham, North Carolina. Stanley has gathered a significant following documenting her yoga journey on Tumblr and Instagram.
2.Body Positive Athletes
According to their website, “Body Positive Athletes is a community of people who believe that the term ‘athletic’ defines a lifestyle and not a body shape or size. We represent people from all walks of life—coaches, athletes, trainers, and people who simply enjoy pursuing a healthy lifestyle. We have a common goal of celebrating the function of the body and the diversity of physiques in sport.”
bodypositiveathletes.wordpress.com
3.FabUplus Magazine
FabUplus Magazine is the long-awaited voice of the plus-size community. As North America’s first body-positive health, fitness, and lifestyle magazine with weight neutral content dedicated to women with curves, FabUplus is breaking traditional media rules by showcasing women of size and encouraging women to be confident.
4.“This Girl Can” Campaign
“This Girl Can” is a national campaign developed by Sport England alongside a wide range of partnership organizations. It’s a celebration of active women throughout England who are doing their thing no matter how well they do it, how they look, or even how red their faces get.
5.The Militant Baker
The Militant Baker is a popular blog authored by Jes Baker. Baker covers a mixture of subjects ranging from the delightful to the very uncomfortable. Her topics include the hazardous journey of body acceptance, how to take boudoir photos, and general empowerment. Baker’s wit and humor can also be found in her book, Things No One Will Tell Fat Girls.
6.Adios Barbie
Since the dawn of the web (or at least since 1998), feminist site adiosbarbie.com has been on a mission to broaden the discussion of body image to include race, gender, sexual orientation, dis/ability, age, and size.
7.About-Face
About-Face is an educational website whose vision is for women and girls to lead full lives, unconstrained by preoccupations with appearance and body image. It also aims for gender-balanced and gender-neutral media representation. The website offers tools and workshops to create change for women and girls.
BE THE MEDIA!
IN THE SOCIAL media era, we all have a platform to share our views. Jes Baker became a well-known body-positive advocate when she rebutted Abercrombie & Fitch’s CEO, Mike Jeffries, who had publicly stated that his company only makes clothes for smaller women (as he called them, “cool kids”); they intentionally do not sell larger sizes. Baker, a plus-size woman, took striking photos of herself posing with a conventionally hot male model and used them to create the “Attractive & Fat” campaign, which played on the branding and typography used in Abercrombie & Fitch’s advertising. This campaign landed Baker on the Today show, and her story was covered by most international media outlets. Baker is proof that if no one is doing it for you, you can definitely make a statement on your own terms.
FIND SUPPORTIVE HEALTH AND FITNESS ENVIRONMENTS
FINDING YOUR FIT in fitness is an important component of your continued success. Look for gyms, leaders, and trainers who support body-positive training, and who are not hyper-focused on weight loss. In my own experience, the people who believed in my goals without casting judgment or asking me to change my body became essential to my journey. These types of people and environments are usually behind the doors of gyms that represent you and me. Look for gyms that embody who you are in their marketing. Ask yourself these questions: Does their website show a range of sizes, ages, and ethnicities? Are they giving you the unspoken invitation to join the gym in their marketing by demonstrating that their services are for you? Gyms that do represent you have carefully thought this through and have emphasized inclusiveness in their messaging. This communicates a lot before you’ve even walked in the door. This gym is ready for you.
PARTICIPATE IN ATHLETICS IN YOUR COMMUNITY
I KNOW HOW hard it is, at first, to show up for the race or the dance class. But when you do, you represent size diversity and send an important message to the others present. Many people have never seen people with larger bodies kicking ass in athletics. Your appearance tells a new story that is revolutionary. You will feel empowered, and others will be encouraged.
Recently I spoke to a large group of plus-size women on the topic of athleticism at every size. When I brought up the subject of participation and how representing size diversity can influence others to join in, a woman proudly put her hand up and told me that a while ago she very reluctantly started dance classes. She was doing the type of dance that you see on Dancing with the Stars and was getting quite good at it. That soon progressed into local competitions; all the while she was having a ball doing it (no pun intended). She said someone would often approach her after the competition and tell her how much she had inspired them to get active. Seeing is believing in yourself, and until we see bigger bodies in fitness media and advertising, it really is up to you and me to spread the word and be the change.
CREATE A SPACE OF NO NEGATIVE BODY TALK
WOMEN OFTEN DEFLECT compliments by saying something negative about themselves. I have been guilty of this too. Someone might say, “Your hair looks great today,” and often my reaction would be something like, “Really? I haven’t washed it or styled it in two days.” Turning a positive comment into something negative was habitual for me until I became more self-aware.
The pursuit of perfection is so ingrained in us that we say things about ourselves that we would never say to another woman. When people compliment you, accept the compliment with a smile. When negative thoughts enter your mind, push them out with something positive. With love and kindness, call others out on their own negative self-talk. An example might be when a friend says “I look terrible today,” to respond by saying, “No you don’t. We can’t always look amazing and we are