Let's take a moment to talk about Body Positivity, shall we?
I keep seeing all these things about body positivity, but it's always associated with being chubby or overweight. Stay with me here, I'm all about body positivity, I really am... Everything I can find says that it's mostly to address unrealistic beauty standards. That's great, but that mostly means that those that are skinny are shamed for being skinny because that's "unrealistic".
So, what happens to being body positive then? How can I, as a skinny person, be body positive when I'm shamed for being skinny? There's all these posts about being chubby and cute or fat and cute, and all of that, and I'm all for it. Body positivity is amazing and great. I'm on board fully. I read about it and it says it includes all body types, but then the more I look, it talks more about not focusing on losing weight, or weighing too much, or being over weight, or not being as skinny as society makes you think you need to be... etc, etc, etc. If I say anything about how I'm skinny and cute, or I'm happy with being skinny, I'm shamed because I'm projecting an unrealistic beauty standard. It's not okay to be skinny anymore, or rather, it's not okay to be okay with being skinny.
I'm not sporty, I'm not fit, I don't go to the gym, I don't work out. I'm just... skinny. Naturally this way. And that makes it worse. If I say that I don't work at it, that I'm just naturally skinny, I get "don't rub it in" or "don't you ever eat" or "you should really eat more" or "you're too skinny, you're just skin and bones". If I'm cold, I get "you got no meat on your bones, you need to eat more so you have something to keep you warm!"
Body shaming is body shaming, whether you're saying someone weighs too much or too little. Doesn't matter. If you can post on social media that you're chubby and cute, I should be able to post that I'm skinny and cute, but I can't. I'm far too uncomfortable to do that. I know I will have people upset about it if I do. It's not okay to do that. It's not acceptable because it's not okay to be skinny anymore. Rather, like I said, it's not okay to be okay with being skinny anymore. Especially naturally skinny. Going to the gym to get skinny and working towards it is one thing because you had a goal and you worked towards it to reach it, but just being this way is something completely different. Somehow this is far worse, like I'm some sort of affront to all woman kind for the way my body is naturally and that if I mention it at all I'm bragging and trying to shove it in the faces of everyone that's either not skinny, or those that have to work hard to be skinny.
So I say nothing and I'm just happy for those that are happy with themselves, just wishing I could be outwardly happy with myself as well.
