Virgie Tovar

Virgie Tovar

Bio

Virgie Tovar, MA is an author, activist and one of the nation's leading experts and lecturers on fat discrimination and body image. She is the editor of Hot & Heavy: Fierce Fat Girls on Life, Love and Fashion (Seal Press, November 2012) and the mind behind #LoseHateNotWeight. She holds a Master's degree in Human Sexuality with a focus on the intersections of body size, race and gender. After teaching "Female Sexuality" at the University of California at Berkeley, where she completed a Bachelor's degree in Political Science in 2005, she went onto host "The Virgie Show" (CBS Radio) in San Francisco. She is certified as a sex educator and was voted Best Sex Writer by the Bay Area Guardian in 2008 for her first book. Virgie has been featured by the New York Times, MTV, Al Jazeera, the San Francisco Chronicle, NPR, Huffington Post, Bust Magazine, Jezebel, 7x7 Magazine, XOJane, and SF Weekly as well as on Women’s Entertainment Television and The Ricki Lake Show. Her most recent speaking engagements have included University of Washington, Earlham College, Hollins University, University of California at Berkeley, University of California at Davis, California College of the Arts, Sonoma State University, and Humboldt State University. She lives in San Francisco and offers workshops and lectures nationwide. Find her online at www.virgietovar.com. And on instagram. 

Virgie Tovar Articles

My parents wanted our family to be in high-threat mode because it kept us closer.

Take The Cake: Breaking Up With My Family, Part 1

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.

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I will admit that nude hot springs are often the domain of thin white people. Kori and I are both melanin-blessed 250+ pound femmes. Image: author.

Two Fat Babes At The Naked Hot Springs

It all started with a text from my roomie, Kori: "I am manifesting lying out, and getting some sun on my cooch."

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image credit: Virgie Tovar via Instagram

Take The Cake: Where Do You Feel Safe In Your Fat Body? 

There are a lot of places where fat people don’t feel safe because of fatphobia. What does it feel like to feel safe in your fat body?

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Take The Cake: Fat Girl In Jamaica

Every inch of skin that can experience a breeze is urgently needed in Jamaica. This makes choosing the tank top and short shorts so much easier. It takes the thinking out of wearing very little clothes for me, and being scantily clad is still an exercise in vulnerability.

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Image: Instagram

Take The Cake: Being Fat In San Francisco

This week I have been thinking a lot about home, and how home shapes the way we feel about our bodies.

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Cake Related Fatphobic Incident — or CRFI for short

Take The Cake: No, I Won't Cut You A Smaller Slice Of Cake

A cake related fatphobic incident is that moment when it's time to eat cake, and an otherwise joyous experience gets ruined by a moralizing impulse.

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image credit: Virgie Tovar via Instagram

Take The Cake: (Re)Discovering My Love Of Food After Dieting

Hi, my name is Virgie and I’m a fat girl who loves food. During my years of restricting I thought about food more than I thought about most things.

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Take The Cake: Secret Relationships With Fat Women

When we both moved to San Francisco in our 20s, she moved to a wealthy neighborhood and I moved into a neighborhood where old men had phone sex on the pay phone at the laundromat. Our friendship threatened her world in a way that it didn’t mine. The people I knew had neither wealth to protect nor any desire to play at that game, and so their lives were inspired by a freedom I adored. The kind of freedom that allows you to talk about shitting and fucking over dinner.

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image credit Virgie Tovar

Take The Cake: On International Women’s Day I Celebrate The 31% Stock Plummet of WW

I can think of few things more worthy of celebrating on International Women’s Day than the slow and very public decline of a company that has capit

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Take The Cake: More Fat Face Representation Please

The other day I was having coffee and ice cream with my friend. We were talking about who we follow online.

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