Virgie Tovar

What horrible thing is going to happen this year? Is my aunt going to touch me or someone else inappropriately or make sexual innuendo? What terrible thing is my mother going to say to my aunt about her internet boyfriend who steals chicken from my grandparents’ garage freezer in the middle of the night?

A lot of people don’t know this, but fat activism has been around in the United States since the 1960s. Yes, it’s true!

Earlier this month I flew into JFK for the Glamour Women of the Year Awards (WOTY, for short) and took selfies with Gabourey Sidibe!

Fat liberation and fat people’s full humanity and our right to a life free from discrimination — not our health status.

Fatphobia morphs into a conversation about looks because fatphobia targets women. The bigotry is masked through this gendered decoy.

How does a weight loss company sell weight loss products to people who don’t want to be fat but also don’t want to say they don’t want to be fat or identify as being on a diet? This question lives at the heart of what I’m going to call “BoPo-washing.” BoPo-washing is the new paradigm of companies using weight-neutral or body positive language in order to peddle products.

What I’ve noticed, as a fat feminist, is that self-identifying as a feminist or an activist bears a different social cost depending on your body size.

My boundaries around how people can talk to me about my body are very clear. I’d like to share with you four body boundary tips for a better holiday.

Bodies of all sizes do amazing stuff all the time. Don't let fatphobia hijack your body's right to exist in all its vast complexity.

Fat people are not obligated to be disproportionate emotional laborers. They get to be angry, frustrated, and even difficult, just like everyone else.