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Are Our New Year’s Resolutions About Weight Loss Inherently Fatphobic?
On TikTok, Body Positivity and Weight Loss
No.
No, they’re not. If all you wanted was an answer to the question in the title, there it is.
I recently bit the bullet and joined TikTok. You learn two things after signing up for TikTok. First, the app’s algorithm is a psychic demon. It is exceptional at analyzing your tastes and curating a feed filled with precisely the content you enjoy.
Second, the short-form video platform rewards absurdity and controversy. For this reason, especially in the social commentary space, people make grandiose, polemic statements to go viral, often without qualifying them.
Imagine I say, “Orange juice production is rooted in patriarchal fundamentalism, and drinking it every morning with your cereal makes you a raging misogynist.” Just an example; I ran out of OJ this morning.
Your natural response might be, “Explain.”
Now imagine if, instead of explaining, defending or qualifying my position, I doubled down on my accusations of citrus fruit-related misogyny and told you, “Google it.”
This made-up scenario reflects much of the TikTok body positive/fat acceptance movement.
