Body Positivity Is in the Midst of Change

<span data-mce-type="bookmark" style="display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;" class="mce_SELRES_start"></span>For better or worse – and maybe a bit of both – body positivity is in the midst of change. People are ascribing it to the availability and uptake of GLP-1s for treating obesity. In a video essay for the New York Times, Gabriella Lascano explains the journey she has taken to become a former body positivity influencer:

“I used to be a body positivity influencer, preaching a simple message: Love yourself at any size. Then, I risked it all, saying ‘I don’t care how trendy or cute or fun it seems to be fat. You got to really think about your health. Love yourself at any size, but don’t forget that your heart has to beat, babes.’”

A Turning Point

The turning point came when her friend, a body positivity influencer, died at the age of 37. She had been confined to bed for two years because of heart failure. Unable to leave her house. Then another died at 28. So Lascano came out and said it:

“Health is real … It’s not fatphobic to care about your health.”

She received a massive backlash. People came at her “seething with anger.” Ironically, acceptance and tolerance for diversity of thought has never been a feature of the fat acceptance movement.

Backtracking on Body Image and Stigma?

Not all of the resistance comes in the form of anger on social media. In Nature last week, Fady Shanouda, a scholar of critical disabilities at Carleton University in Canada, made a more academic argument. Fatness is always equated with health, he says:

“So this just now amplifies it, because the question people will get asked is, ‘Why aren’t you just on Ozempic?’, which denies the state of being fat as an allowable state of being.

“We’ve built a world, and especially medicine has built a world, where fat people are not allowed, and these are the conditions under which people are taking Ozempic.”

He has a point. But the real point is not whether obesity is a real medical condition that merits treatment. It is and it does. We’ve been stuck on that debate for way too long.

The real point is that linking medical needs to moral character is a mistake. This is true whether the judgment falls on someone living in a larger body, someone seeking care for a chronic disease, or someone providing that care. Moral judgments about health and body image help no one.

Click here for Lascano’s video essay, and here for the spotlight article in Nature. For further perspective, click here and here.

Seated Woman (Olga), painting by Pablo Picasso / WikiArt

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2 Responses to “Body Positivity Is in the Midst of Change”

February 17, 2026 at 9:38 am, Trisha said:

Re: separating moral character from body size & medical needs, well said! People with larger bodies can’t seem to win. They’re brutally criticized for their size everywhere they turn (whether they claim to have body positivity or not). They’re criticized for being overweight but also for losing weight (by both people with larger bodies and those who think they “took the easy way out” by using helpful medications). I have to believe people who devote energy to criticizing others on their weight are not happy with themselves in one way or another. Re: the backlash this woman received by her body positivity community… they seemed to feel betrayed by her. They also liked her better when she was saying “you and I are perfect just the way we are.” But she should be allowed to change her mind! Ironic indeed that the body positivity community didn’t accept that (while asking for acceptance by the masses at the same time). We can accept, love, and support people in a large bodies while at the same time acknowledging their bodies would benefit from reduction in size (if causing complications such as diabetes, sleep apnea, physical and social challenges, etc.). They are not mutually exclusive.

February 18, 2026 at 10:56 am, Geeta Sikand said:

As a practicing dietitian for several decades, I always seek my patients’ permission to talk about their weight. Dietitians are uniquely skilled and trained to counsel patients who live in a larger body with empathy. Robust evidence shows positive clinical outcomes when dietitians provide counseling for patients with overweight or with obesity.

Moral judgments about health and body image help no one. In fact, we might create the very problem we want to fix. Overweight people already know they weigh more than they should. They don’t need others to tell them. Its like intruding into their space.

Agree… linking medical needs to moral character is a mistake. This is true whether the judgment falls on someone living in a larger body, someone seeking care for a chronic disease, or someone providing that care.

February 17, 2026 at 9:38 am, Trisha said:

Re: separating moral character from body size & medical needs, well said! People with larger bodies can’t seem to win. They’re brutally criticized for their size everywhere they turn (whether they claim to have body positivity or not). They’re criticized for being overweight but also for losing weight (by both people with larger bodies and those who think they “took the easy way out” by using helpful medications). I have to believe people who devote energy to criticizing others on their weight are not happy with themselves in one way or another. Re: the backlash this woman received by her body positivity community… they seemed to feel betrayed by her. They also liked her better when she was saying “you and I are perfect just the way we are.” But she should be allowed to change her mind! Ironic indeed that the body positivity community didn’t accept that (while asking for acceptance by the masses at the same time). We can accept, love, and support people in a large bodies while at the same time acknowledging their bodies would benefit from reduction in size (if causing complications such as diabetes, sleep apnea, physical and social challenges, etc.). They are not mutually exclusive.
February 18, 2026 at 10:56 am, Geeta Sikand said:

As a practicing dietitian for several decades, I always seek my patients’ permission to talk about their weight. Dietitians are uniquely skilled and trained to counsel patients who live in a larger body with empathy. Robust evidence shows positive clinical outcomes when dietitians provide counseling for patients with overweight or with obesity.

Moral judgments about health and body image help no one. In fact, we might create the very problem we want to fix. Overweight people already know they weigh more than they should. They don’t need others to tell them. Its like intruding into their space.

Agree… linking medical needs to moral character is a mistake. This is true whether the judgment falls on someone living in a larger body, someone seeking care for a chronic disease, or someone providing that care.