Fatphobia is unconsciously ingrained in our brains from an early age when we start getting warnings from our moms to not eat too much junk food or unsolicited comments from random family members that feel entitled to make us feel uncomfortable in our own bodies. Fatphobia also comes in the form of marketing, when in one jean design you could be a size 6, but in another model from the same brand, you might have to move up to a size 10. We are taught to seek out our most thin selves from an early age, but where did this fear of gaining weight come from?
The history of fatphobia has its roots in slavery and therefore rotates around the features of black people, especially black women. In the early 1900s white health experts coined terms to describe black people with terms such as ‘lazy’ or ‘mammy’, and many advertisements went on to depict Black women as ‘mammies’. Over the centuries, in many white Americans’ eyes, and in other communities as well including the African American one, fatness was associated with laziness, which in turn is associated with black people in general. It became kind of a crime to be fat or else you would be compared to a black person.
Black women decided to take it upon themselves to prove that there is nothing wrong with being black and that having features historically associated with black women is nothing to be ashamed of. Notable activists such as Margaret K. Bass and Johnie Tillmon spoke out against the discrimination in the media against black women, setting an official start to the fat liberation movement- directly challenging the strict beauty standards of the time.
Many movements have come out of the fat liberation movement, such as the body positivity movement and the natural hair moment in the early 2000s. Despite being the pioneers of these movements, many black and POC women continue to be excluded from these through the mechanisms of colorism and racism. The body positivity moment has been taken over by people who in some way still fit into the beauty standard, displacing those marginalized bodies that fought to make themselves accepted for decades. In many ways, it's no longer about separating fatness from black features but rather embracing other ‘unconventional’ features and existing in your body as it is, not seeking out to change it through diets or exercise.
Briana Dominici, the author of this article, says “When we make body positivity about all bodies, those who are marginalized will continue to stay that way. The movement needs to remember who lit the flame of its radical roots.” It is important to recognize that fatphobia is a product of racism, and acknowledge and honor this in our day-to-day.
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