Ragen Chastain

Ragen Chastain

Bio

Ragen Chastain is a professional speaker, writer, and real live fat person.  She has spoken everywhere from friend's living rooms to Google Headquarters to Cal Tech and Dartmouth.  She will not stop until we live in a world where the full diversity of body sizes is respected, and fat people are able to live in fat bodies without shame, stigma, bullying, and harrasment, regardless of why they are fat, what being fat means, and if they could (or even want to) become thin. She lives in Los Angeles with her partner Julianne and their adorable rescue dogs, and is training for her first (and hopefully only!) IRONMAN triathlon. If you can't get enough of her on Ravishly, you can check out her blog www.danceswithfat.org

Ragen Chastain Articles

We need to talk about how the APA is Fat-Shaming Kids!

APA To Release Guidelines For Fat-Shaming Kids For Profit

What happens when you suggest diet behavior to a kid who’s about to grow a foot? How do you affect their growth? How to you affect their health? This is fat-shaming kids!

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Even if moving to business models that include clothes for people of all sizes might take a while, the issues with models could be solved immediately. (Image Credit: Instagram/forever21)

Forever 21 & The 'All Shapes And Sizes' Lie

So this new line by Forever 21 goes up to “3X” which they’ve defined as a size 18. Forever 21 may be better than some in terms of carrying larger sizes, and they may want to “celebrate fashion for all sizes,” but let’s be clear that they aren’t even close to creating fashion for all sizes.

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All police officers, no matter how well intentioned, live in — and are affected by — a society rife with racism and ableism.  Image: Utility_inc/Pixabay.

Yes, Being A Cop Is A Tough Job. No, That Doesn't Excuse Incompetence.

It is a very difficult and dangerous job, and it does require officers to have the ability to make good split second decisions. None of that should mean that it’s OK to be incompetent, or that we should all rush to justify, ignore, or excuse incompetence, racism, ableism, and the inappropriate use of force.

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Men, however uneducated or inexperienced, consistently feel that they know better than we do how about our bodies work.

What I Call Them: Men Tell Women About Our Bodies

Mansplaining is rampant in our culture, and nowhere is it mansplain-ier than when men explain women’s bodies to us.

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This is about way more than the freedom to dress in comfortable clothing while at school. Let’s talk about some stats that this principal should know if she’s going to talk to adolescent girls about body size. (Image Credit: YouTube/SanVic)

When A Principal Publicly Fat Shames Female Students

We could risk the mental and physical health of all the girls in the school by using fat shaming to try to control the way that they dress, or we could just let them wear some damn leggings. Seriously, how is this not a no brainer?

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Reporters should be able to dress, at the very least, in accordance with the dress codes of their actual employers.

Question For Paul Ryan: Should Female White House Reporters Have The Right To 'Bare Arms'?

Recently, Paul Ryan decided that “appropriate attire” for women will exclude sleeveless dresses and open-toed shoes, and pretty soon thereafter, several women reporters were refused entry to the Speaker’s Lobby for showing their arms.

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"A thin-obsessed world perpetuates eating disorders and fat phobia."

The Eating Disorder Community Has A Fat Phobia Problem

Suggesting that we should figure out how to apply a deadly illness to fat people is ludicrous on its face for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that THERE ARE FAT PEOPLE WITH ANOREXIA.

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Judging on appearance - even of Trump & his team - is aiding and abetting the enemy. (Image Credit: Flickr/Gage Skidmore)

Stop Body Shaming The Trump Regime

Donald Trump was recently told of a state senator who is in favor of civil asset forfeiture reform — a concept, it turns out, that is one of many t

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Instead of heading down a resolutions shame spiral that lasts until next year, let’s regroup and do this in a way that makes sense.

February And Your Resolutions Are Already History? What To Do Now.

Welcome to the resolutions flame out. It’s not so much that your resolutions crashed and burned, it’s more like they just never got off the ground in the first place. But there is hope. We can right this ride.

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image credit: Maria Kang instagram

Looks Like "No Excuses" Mom, Maria Kang, Found Some Excuses

You may remember Maria Kang from her fifteen minutes of fame a couple of years ago when she put some time and effort into looking like the cultural stereotype of beauty, had some success at that, then took a picture of herself wearing gym clothes with her three sons. Which is, of course, her prerogative and completely fine. But then she couldn't resist shaming people who made different choices (or made the same choices but had different outcomes) by adding the caption "What's Your Excuse?"

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