What Supporting Body Liberation Means – Parts May Be Shocking
Hi Musers, today we’re going to talk about what supporting body liberation means. In the last six months or so, I’ve moved away from body positivity hashtags and towards body liberation. I decided on this for two reasons. The first is my reservations about the way the body positivity space was going. The second is because I feel body liberation more closely aligns with my personal beliefs. Part of today’s post comes courtesy of this amazing post by body.lib.robinhood on IG. Her posts are so inspiring so i recommend you check her out 🙂
My Beliefs
As I discussed in previous posts, I believe passionately in equality for all. Unfortunately, body positivity became a domain for primarily white women, and generally, their bodies were standard-size or close to it. We need a space where all sizes, shapes, colours and differently-abled bodies can be celebrated. ESPECIALLY non-white folx, superfat, infinitifat, non-binary, and folx who don’t have hourglass body shapes.
I believe we need a space to get away from the toxic beauty ideals pushed relentlessly by society as a whole, but beauty, fashion and the medical industries, I’m looking hard at you!
I also believe that a person’s body is their own, and they are free to do with it what they choose. You may think that’s obvious but wait! I’m going to drill down into what that actually means.
Pro Fat
In order for you to support body liberation, you need to support fat folx. ALL fat folx. It doesn’t matter if they choose to eat less nutritious food and never take exercise. That is their choice. Fat folx still deserve respect and equal treatment because they are still human beings. Not being laughed at, forced to not go to venues where they can’t fit the seats, or told all health problems are due to their weight. Respect for everyone. Period. Abuse of fat people needs to be as socially unacceptable as racism, homophobia or misogyny.
Pro-Abortion
This concept may be a tough one for some of you. But, the fact is if you truly support the liberation of a person’s body, then you support them having the ultimate decision over what happens to it.
That includes access to an abortion if a woman feels for whatever reason that she cannot be a mother at this time.
I’ve known plenty of pregnant women, all of whom desperately wanted their children. However, pregnancy is tough.
Vomiting, nausea, trips to the loo, backache, swollen ankles, hot flushes, trouble sleeping, the list is endless.
By month 8, the only thing these women ever said when I asked how they were was that they needed to have this baby. Being pregnant was driving them mad.
So imagine being forced to go through all this, not to mention the pain and risks of labour, when you didn’t want the child to begin with? You may not approve of abortion and would never make that choice, but you need to fight for every woman to have that option available. In this day and age, it is a basic human right.
Anti-racist
By this, I do not mean not being racist. That should be the bare minimum if you’re a decent human being. I’d like to hope none of my dear Musers would ever be so awful. You need to take it further, though.
You need to read books and blogs and watch videos to try to understand life for people of colour and all other races. I just finished Girl, Woman, Other by Bernadine Evaristo. It’s fiction but still pretty powerful. I have Fearing The Black Body by Sabrina Strings, and The Body Is Not An Apology by Sonya Renee Taylor on my amazon wish list for Christmas.
You need to understand the privilege you have you may not even be aware of. I admit I’m privileged. I’m not rich, or powerful, or the ideal beauty standard.
However, I am white, cisgender, straight, married, and living in one of the wealthiest countries in the world. I have access to clean water, state benefits if I need them, free healthcare, I have enough money to live on, and I feel safe!
Do you have any idea what that list would mean to others in this world? In Afghanistan right now? In some parts of the US? In Israel?
Going back to my original point, it’s not enough to not be racist yourself. You need to educate yourself and fight as an ally of victims of racism. I’d love to give POC a space to discuss their experiences here on this blog. I don’t want to speak for people. I want to provide them with a safe space to speak for themselves. I still have a long way to go and lots of work to do, but I’m trying.
Support All Genders
I’m not just talking about male and female. You may not understand non-binary or gender fluid or transgender, but you need to support the choices of individuals who feel this way. Learn and use the correct pronouns and respect their choices.
Support All Sexual Choices
This covers a lot, actually. What supporting body liberation means is accepting everything a person decides to do with their body. So again, you may not like it, but what supporting body liberation means is defending a person’s absolute right to do what they want to with their own body.
This means supporting heterosexuality, homosexuality, asexuality, pansexuality and so on. If you feel the need to drag religion into it and feel like you have to speak out against it, then you aren’t fully embracing body liberation. It’s not a half-in, half-out thing. Either you support body liberation, or you don’t.
You also need to accept a woman’s right to sleep with whomever she chooses, and you should fight to end the culture of slut-shaming that still exists in our society. The double-standard of the stud/slut paradox makes my blood boil. There should be no difference! So if you see even a hint of it, or find yourself thinking it yourself, then challenge it. Nothing will ever change until we all do it.
We also need to fight against victim-blaming in rape and sexual assault cases. The other day, I saw a fabulous t-shirt on social media that said, “My Clothing Is Not My Consent”. Damned right!! A woman should be able to walk down the street in a g-string with a tassel on each nipple and not be attacked. Men need to be taught from the time they are children that no means no.
There are no “amber lights”, no “mixed messages”; it should be as simple as whether she said yes or no. If she says no, at any point, the man needs to stop. And we need to kill stone dead this philosophy of “boys will be boys” or talking about “hormones”. If a man can’t control his urge to attack a woman, he shouldn’t be walking free. It’s that simple.
Body Art
This is a smaller issue, but one worth mentioning. I’ll say it again, what supporting body liberation means supporting a person’s freedom to do as they wish with their body.
You may not like tattoos, piercings, eye dying, scarification or any of the other wild and wonderful things people choose to do. You still need to support their right to do it, though, and not make negative comments or assumptions about the person’s character or personality.
More and more people choose to express themselves this way, and we need to stop seeing it as a bad thing.
What Supporting Body Liberation Means
You support the right for a person to do whatever they wish with their body and, if necessary, fight to preserve that right for them. You don’t have to like what they do. You don’t have to do it yourself. You just need to fight against governmental or societal attempts to stop them.
Over to you! How do you feel about what I believe supporting body liberation means? Do you think I’ve missed anything or got it wrong? Let me know in the comments!
