Here is a video about body image from the founder (Annie) of the website Stop Hating Your Body on Tumblr. Stop Hating Your Body is updated daily with many great and sometime moving testimonies of real men and women who have battled with their body image. On the website, Annie states the reason for starting it:
I started Stop Hating Your Body on Oct 12, 2010 after taking a photo in my underwear with the words “START A REVOLUTION! STOP HATING YOUR BODY!”
I wanted to create a space where people could express themselves about body image, where all sorts of different body types, age groups, ethnicity, beliefs, can unite over one thing: the desire to be happy, the desire to love themselves completely.
I have a low tolerance for bullying or cruelty, if I catch it, depending on what was said I might give someone a warning or I might just immediately block them from the site. Of course I can’t see all that goes on, so I also rely on people to report any harassment and I will do the same.
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| Stop Hating Your Body Website (http://stophatingyourbody.tumblr.com/) |
I understand that people have concerns about physical health in accordance to weight, but that does not justify criticizing, bullying, or shaming people for their bodies. If you are truly concerned that one is living an unhealthy lifestyle and it is showing, then show kindness, not judgment. I bring this up because there is constant scrutiny based on health, but I am here to say that one’s health or health lifestyle does not EVER justify bullying. I bring this up, because YES, some bodies you will see on this blog WILL be unhealthy, but that doesn’t give you the right to put them down. We are here to SUPPORT each other.
I cannot emphasize enough that this is NOT a health blog, this is a self-esteem blog, I am not a doctor, I am not equipped to answer questions about health, but hopefully I can be of some help in finding clarity about your body-image. So though, as a person, as Annie, I would hope that you are healthy and that you live a long and happy life, you are no less of a human being if you are unhealthy, whether it’s because of lifestyle choices or matters out of your control, you deserve respect, you deserve positive self-esteem.
Also understand that this is a space for EVERYONE, no matter what size, color, age, we’ve all suffered with body image issues, most of us anyway, and we are here to support each other; not to compare our bodies, not to see how many notes your post gets, not to judge each other. We are here to listen, to learn, to understand, that we all have our own battles and we are all human and deserve some respect.
This is a place of encouragement, a place to talk about body image, a place for feeling beautiful. No matter what you look like, what color, what gender, what size or however many “flaws”, healthy, not healthy, working on it, we are all human, we all deserve to be happy, we all deserve to love ourselves. With this blog you will see all kinds of REAL bodies, REAL people, REAL stories.
Please support this website by visiting it and telling others about it.
Stop Hating Your Body
