A Bikini Body

WARNING. THIS BLOG POST CONTAINS PICTURES IN WHICH, WHILE STILL NOT NAKED, I SHOW A LOT OF SKIN. IF YOU DO NOT WISH TO SEE THIS, DO NOT CLICK.

This is my bikini body.

I rather like it.

And I don't care what you think.

Body shaming comes in all shapes and sizes (no pun intended). Subtle, obvious, from people who love you and truly wish the best for you, and from people who’d rather see you dead than alive. From media, from culture, body shaming exists nearly everywhere. Hell, in some societies being fat is seen as desirable, which mainly just means that the body shaming is aimed primarily at the skinny women, which is not any better than it being aimed at the fat ones. Body shame is something that almost every American woman deals with, has dealt with and/or will deal with in her lifetime.

Some people who see a fat woman who seems not to mind showing off her body make the ignorant assumption that she doesn’t realize she’s fat. So here’s a newsflash, my friends. Almost every single woman above the age of 6 is acutely aware of how her body fits in to the societal ideal. Yes, that woman knows that she is fat. She has likely been aware of her fat since she was a small child. She has been told she’s too fat by almost everyone she knows, most likely including her family and friends and boyfriends or girlfriends. Or she’s been denied her fat by people who don’t want to think of her as “one of those fat people”, who genuinely like her as a fat person and don’t want her to feel bad about how fat she is, because only bad people are fat. Only people with no self control, without money or the sense to get surgery are fat.

That woman is extremely aware of her fat. She has just decided, after years of being shamed, after years of dieting and exercising herself until she wants to commit suicide because of how many times she’s failed to stop being fat, that she doesn’t care what you think anymore. She is fat. This is a fact of her existence. It means nothing more than her height, her favorite color, or how many boyfriends/girlfriends she’s had.

This is my bikini body. I want to show it off. Because I have yet to find an actual bikini in my size, I’ve decided to knit myself one (not for actual swimming, more for other fun summer things). I don’t give a flying fuck what you think. I don’t think every fat woman needs to show off her body. I don’t want to force anyone to show off their fat. That’s not the point of size acceptance. There’s no mandate that says anyone above a certain size has to wear a muumuu, and there’s likewise no mandate that anyone below a certain size has to show off their body, regardless of what popular opinion would have you believe.

These pictures are of me wearing a solid black bra and a sarong. I only didn’t show off my underwear because it’s kinda ratty and I didn’t want to get another pair just for a couple pictures. I am not ashamed of my thighs or booty, which are indeed quite large. That sarong is folded so it only goes down to about mid-thigh on me, but I could only get so much in the picture so you can’t really tell. They’re just practice for whenever I can find a suitable yarn and actually knit myself up a real bikini. And I will do it. Because I have a bikini body, and I’m going to fucking show it off.

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