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Ellen Bloom Rau

Melissa AlamOctober 10, 2018

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Michael A. Giordano

Melissa AlamOctober 10, 2018

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Melissa AlamOctober 10, 2018

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the brilliant queer disability & transformative justice activist @mia.mingus posted this tweet written by queer trans non binary filipinx activist @menswearselfcare 🙏🏽💕 .
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biological essentialism is the idea that our bodies have traits inherent to its nature just based on what genitals it has. some people call this “hardwiring” and tbh it’s a silly idea. humans are super social creatures and much of our behavior is learned, not built into our DNA.
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this idea of “hardwiring” is also transphobic bc genitals don’t have gender ☺️ our brain is where our gender lives. women can have penises or vaginas or anything. men can have vaginas or penises or anything. non binary folks can have anything. intersex people exist too and they don’t easily fit into the male or female gender box. check out queer intersex activist @pidgeo_n page for more info!
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you may see many of these posts today in response to the trump administration’s recent decision to erase the existence of trans and non binary genders. the memorandum states government agencies must explicitly state that only two sexes exist, which is just factually incorrect. someone once told me that if you really deconstruct the notion of there only being two gender options, you could end up realizing that there are as many genders as there are people. and i think that’s a beautiful thing. that the way we move through the world is so unique, that it impacts the little individual ways we experience our bodies in the world. there are as many genders as there are people. and some memo isn’t going to erase us 💕
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to all the sexuality educators and therapists reading this, this is your notice to stop saying “male bodied” and “female bodied” TODAY. if you’re talking about people with uteruses, then say that. but neither bodies nor genitals have inherent gender ☺️💕

diet culture is the cloud that drizzles fatphobia onto our perfect cherubic faces 👼🏽 i also feel this graphic created by @thenakedtruth.au clearly describes diet culture as a set of thin ideals and behaviors to prevent fatness - as if that was even possible. the second image describes why diets don’t work. it includes a point about overeating and bingeing. i don’t believe overeating should necessarily be pathologized. i say this mostly bc folks who identify as binge eating are usually making up for food they hadn’t eaten yet in that day. restriction usually precedes bingeing. and so idk if that’s necessarily a bad thing 🤷🏽‍♀️☺️ hope these slides help!
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check out @fionawiller website, linked in her bio for more info on why being fat is ok, healthy, and just fine. she provides lots of readings and even podcast recordings with additional information ☺️🎈 happy reading!

thinness is not a eurocentric beauty ideal. thinness is white supremacist beauty ideal. every time we use euphemisms like caucasian or european, we coddle white fragility and therefore white supremacy.
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sometimes it’s easier to throw away a beauty ideal when we understand it’s problematic, oppressive, and actively contributing to the dehumanization of fat people. in fact, many folks in eating disorder recovery walk up to me after my workshops and ask my consent to hug me. (i love hugs. so i usually say yes!) they express that knowing their eating disorder is oppressive to themselves (& others) helps them to want to stay in recovery. this dichotomy is especially easy for rigid thinkers to grasp.
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but the weirdest pushback i get around this understanding of white supremacy involves east asian countries also valuing thinness. if you don’t live in asia or have family from there, then it might be harder to grasp that US culture is imported by other places in the world when we watch US movies or follow US pop culture. thinness is a export of “modern Western advanced developed” (sarcasm) culture and it’s actually a form of imperialism. .
in addition to that, asians can still be white supremacist. for example, using skin bleaching (fairness) creams is white supremacist. asian family systems can also have different understandings of children as property, the gendered body as a tool of the nation state, and the over importance of controlled body size as a symbol of desirability. so the answer is a bit more complicated, but thinness (at least in the white supremacist western US context in which i’m writing this post) is a white supremacist beauty ideal.
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if you’re curious about how white supremacist nazis in the US today prioritize thinness as a white supremacist beauty ideal, google this article “‘Obesity should not be tolerated’: Neo-Nazi website orders fat, badly dressed readers to get sexy.” i would also highly recommend joining @chairbreaker new patreon as they write about colonialism and fatness brilliantly in ways that feel accessible to me ☺️

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