😘 Your body image is not like my body image

Hi friend,

It's time for me to raise prices on client photo sessions.

I don't like doing it, but whew, product prices have gone up. Albums that I used to order for clients at $80 (no markup – that was my cost) now cost $130 to buy.

If you already have a session booked with me, or book a session by September 15, the prices currently in effect for portrait, boudoir and small business sessions will apply. The new pricing will kick in on or soon after 9/15.

Also, Laura and I went live this week to talk about the Exhale Retreat.

Now, on to this week's letter:

Your body image is not like my body image.

Of course people in all kinds of bodies have body image issues. But there's a real difference between having body image issues because you're terrified of looking like (and being treated like) a fat person, and being that fat person.

Your thin and average-sized body image is bad because the world tells you that if you don't shape up, you'll be a fat person, with all the negative traits associated with fat people: gross, slobbish, gluttonous, immoral, lazy, liar, sad. And that if you are (or become) a fat person, you'll *deserve* to be treated like fat people are treated.

If my fat body image is bad, it's because everyone around me considers me to be all those negative things, and treats me the way fat people are treated. AND THAT I DESERVE THAT TREATMENT.

I'm right here. I don't have those negative traits, but even if I did, I would not deserve to be treated the way we treat fat people.

So here are a few things you can do to help end weight stigma this week:

👉 Stop responding to fat activists with, "But people of all sizes have body image issues!" as if it invalidates our work. It doesn't.

👉 Take a hard look at how you've thought about fat people in the past. Are we mean and "divisive?" Are we pitiable? Are we invisible? Work out those feelings in a way that doesn't demand labor from fat folks. A #HAES therapist is a good place to start.

👉 Take a hard look at how you've treated fat people in the past. How is fatphobia woven into your actions (or lack of action)? Work out a strategy for change in a way that doesn't demand labor from fat folks.

Warmly,
Lindley

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The Conversation

Here's what's being discussed this week in the world of body acceptance and fat liberation:

» New book out! Reclaiming Body Trust: A Path to Healing & Liberation

» 5 suggestions for developing helpful, Weight Inclusive Policy

» 14 Scale Smashing Stock Photos to Fuel Your Anti-Diet Dreams

» The Gym Isn’t Usually A Safe Space For Fat Women, But It’s Become My Sanctuary

» Say Cheese! How to Be in And Celebrate Photos

» Unicorn chaser: Come on Arthur you can do it

"While we have spent the last twenty-five years cleaning up the sexist residue in our vocabulary, we have been living out woman-hating methods of control via our dinner plates and our bathroom scales -- often not even knowing that this is what we are doing.

We are giving away our lives, our time, our energy, our claim to pleasure, our desire, and our power one bite at a time. Submission has taken on a new face: where once there was barred access to meaningful employment and the right to vote, sexism today has morphed into skipped meals and too many hours spent at the gym.

As Naomi Wolf famously wrote in The Beauty Myth, 'Dieting is the most potent political sedative in women's history.'" » Virgie Tovar, You Have the Right to Remain Fat