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?

More than lip service to an unlikely situation, I needed accountability from my family. Small things that required less bravado, but more work. Just before Christmas, I experienced the moment that made our breakup crystallize.

I came to realize that even though I was certainly a bona fide member, that some fat people were far more acutely marginalized than me.

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

The other night, I was eating capellini with asparagus and shrimp with a new friend/Babecamp Jamaica alum.

I understand the connections between the violence that leads to police shootings and the violence that leads people to starve themselves. I know with complete certainty that diet culture is a manifestation of the state’s expectation of assimilation and of social control, both of which are manifestations of institutional violence.

Would you date a fat fetishist? It always feels complicated to answer this question, but I promise an honest one by the end of part two.

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

I am currently in Los Angeles trying to forget that the election happened.

We forego doctor visits because we know with near-total certitude that we are going to be told to lose weight. That we don’t need care — we just need to “cut back.”