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Fit is a Feminist Issue, Link Round Up #45

This is where we share stuff we can’t share on our Facebook page for fear of being kicked out!

Usually the posts are about body image, sometimes there’s nudity and links about sex but we’re all adults here.

This is why women get inked: Feminism, tattoos and the new politics of body art

Before women are ever exposed to the world of alternative body modification, they have been overexposed to the beauty culture through their personal interactions as well as the media. They have developed an identity based upon their gender performance, sexuality, race, nationality, age, and ability. With the addition of becoming heavily tattooed, their embodiment identities intersect with these other factors. While White women may be given more space to experiment with their body modification, women of color, lesbians, disabled people, and other already-marked bodies will be interpreted more harshly, as multiply “deviant.” People of color’s bodies are often criminalized and discriminated against; with the addition of heavy tattooing, these pressures can become magnified. Lesbians and bisexual women may face additional stigma if their tattooing reinforces a butch appearance, but less so for a feminine one.

I Fuck Fat People

I remember the first time I became consciously aware of my fat attraction. I was sixteen, sitting on the couch with my high school boyfriend watching Ruben Studdard sing “Ain’t Too Proud to Beg” on American Idol. My boyfriend was skinny and white, with dyed blue-black hair, and I loved him, as much as an emotionally-embryonic teenager can love someone. I loved him, and I loved fucking him, but watching this 400-pound man on the TV stirred something in me. I wanted his body next to mine. I gave my boyfriend a hand-job, and imagined what Ruben’s heavy embrace would feel like, something like a down comforter mixed with a hot bath.

“It’s not a fetish,” I sometimes find myself explaining. I don’t exclusively fuck fat people, just like I don’t exclusively fuck black people. Out of the—one, two, give me a minute—nine people I’ve slept with or dated this year, three have been fat. Last year I dated two men who you might classify as “obese” and who I classify as “some of the best sex I’ve ever had.” The fact that I even have to qualify my attraction to them outside of fetishization is fucked up and depressing, but that’s the world we live in. Most people are so conditioned to view fat bodies as undesirable that those of us who desire them are automatically labeled deviants.

To Every Woman Who Has Ever Felt ‘Disgusting’ 

Sometimes I get overwhelmed by how many incredible women surround me in every area of my life: my family, my best friends, my coworkers, friends of my close friends, the list goes on for miles. And it’s only intensified by the fact that I’m involved in the comedy community in Chicago, where there are talented, inspiring, smart, admirable women everywhere I look.

But lately, more so than usual, too many women I know, and plenty that I don’t, have been struggling with their own self-worth – particularly, how they feel about the outside of their body.

And it hurts to hear that, so badly. I think it hurts any woman in existence to hear another woman say that – even one she doesn’t know.

Tess Holliday’s Journey

My relationship with my body is a journey, not a destination. I appreciate & honor what’s it’s done for me, & the life it brought into the world. I couldn’t give a 🙊 if you find me attractive or if my body offends you.

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