#Fat Representation in Media

[viscountessevie]

As a fat woman with a similar story to Penelope's (in the book) it's incredibly disheartening to see what they have done with her character and people praising it. Book Penelope was someone I could relate to as the ugly, unattractive friend that no one ever looks at twice. But even if I did some things I now regret (for example commenting one or twice on my friend's thinness even if it was out of worry, which I now know is not a cool thing to do) I was never actively a bully or used my weight to play victim. And now I can't relate to the only fat woman on a regency period romance I have seen because she is using her 'oppression' to hurt others (I do think fat people are very discriminated against but this isn't Penelope's case since she has had to face the same amount of insults as the rest of the characters (most of them coming from her herself too)) and that's not how period dramas really work. Maybe in modern times it could have worked but not in a show like the bee one.

Took me a while anon but I made it!!! Since I am on a roll talking about Pen, it motivated me to finally finish writing and post this ask :D Thank you so much for waiting and I hope you're still around on my blog to see this!

I can't quite remember when this ask got prompted but I feel like it was during my S3 speculation era so it was likely the My Fair Lady essay that prompted a lot of S3 asks. Aights then, let’s get into this: 

First off, I want to genuinely thank you for feeling safe enough to share this with me and I’m so sorry the show massacred the one character you related to. I’m sending you all my love and hugs <3 

Also it must not have been fun growing up thinking of yourself in that way but I’m here to let you know that I see you and I’m sure you’re lovely!! Glad to know that you recognised those comments to be harmful and have learnt from it. We all make mistakes. The best thing we can do is reevaluate,  apologise and move forward to do better. 

I have seen because she is using her 'oppression' to hurt others (I do think fat people are very discriminated against but this isn't Penelope's case since she has had to face the same amount of insults as the rest of the characters (most of them coming from her herself too)) and that's not how period dramas really work. 

You’re so right for this and honestly I don’t have anything to add much tbh. I think the one thing in-universe that hasn’t be horrible is that no one in the Ton really shuns Pen? Only her sisters poke fun at her, but mostly Pen is largely ignored. As my friends and I’ve mentioned here, if anything the showrunners are the ones villainising her and not giving her a proper romantic arc. Maybe it will get better in S3 but that remains to be seen at the moment. 

I hope you’re doing okay though, anon. I understand the feeling of not being seen or represented in the media you love and I know there aren’t other Regency romance shows that feature a fat woman as a main character or love interest but I thought this list of show and HR books might help ease that hurt, enjoy!

Shoutout to @jeanvanjer @hptriviachamp @sharmasandcorgis and @kateandanthonyaremyparents for all the amazing suggestions thank you guys so much for helping me with a bulk of this list!!

HR (Historical Romance) Novels: 

Callie from Nine Rules to Break When Romancing a Rake by Sarah MacLean 

Hattie from Brazen and the Beast (also by MacLean)

The Perfect Wife by Lynsay Sands

Hannah and the Highlander by Sabrina York 

Chasing Cassandra by Lisa Kleypas 

Contemporary Books:  

All of the Brown Sisters books by Talia Hibbert - Get A Life, Chloe Brown - Take A Hint, Dani Brown - Act Your Age, Eve Brown 

Princess Trap by Talia Hibbert Honestly all of Talia’s books feature plus-sized WOC leads it’s great I mainly recced The Brown Sisters because I read all three and they’re just so amazing! Dani’s love interest is a hot brown guy named Zafir and that was my fave book of the three ehehe

Anything Naima Simone has written - she writes body diversity well I’m told

Misadventures of a Curvy Girl by Sierra Simone

Glutton for Pleasure by Alisha Rai (Plus-sized Indian Girl let’s gooo) 

Spoiler Alert series by Olivia Dade (its about fanfiction ehehe) 

Electric Idol by Katee Robert (kinda more fantasy but still mythology romance)

Shows/Movies: 

Rae from My Mad Fat Diary

Annie and Fran from Shrill 

Mindy Lahiri in The Mindy Project  

Helen in The Tourist on HBO

Penelope ‘Lupe’ Alverez from One Day At A Time (my personal favourite Penelope on a show shkjdh)

Anything Michelle Buteau is in: Isn’t It Romantic, Always Be My Maybe, Someone Great 

Sookie in Gilmore Girls 

Amber RIley in Glee (this may give you brain damage but she was iconic in it) and The Wiz 

Everything Gabourey Sidibe is in - especially Precious!

*Kate Pearson from This Is Us

*Willowdean in Dumplin

*I was hesitant to name the last two because while they are great reps, the early seasons of This Is Us kind of made being fat Kate’s whole personality but I will say it has improved since then and she becomes a fully flashed out person. 

I can’t speak directly to the discourse around Dumplin because I wasn’t around for it but I do know some people did enjoy it same with Kate in This Is Us hence why I kept them on the list! Feel free to ignore those two suggestions if you aren’t interested in seeing those journeys; while the other characters simply just exist as characters and are treated like everyone else which I thought was cool - that’s how I believe we should normalise fat rep: not all their stories need to be about them on a journey to accept themselves, the story already starts with acceptance! 

Anyone else has any recommendations - feel free to share via reblogs and comments, I’ll add them to the post/reblog! Thanks for reading yall and hope you enjoy the recs and better rep for you all because you deserve the best! 

#Bridgerton #Book Penelope Featherington #Fat Representation in Media #The Viscountess Approves #(My rec tag) #The Viscountess Answers

[sillyfairygarden]

90 minute leyendecker study b4 bed. heard cleo has a cat cafe this season :swoons:

#thellos art corner #zombiecleo fanart #hermitcraft #hermitblr #mcyt fanart #mcyt #ok time for a peek inside my skull: i really contemplated not posting this. not for any reasons of disliking it #im pretty conscious about how fat people are characterized/portrayed around food in media. both in fan works and canonized material #(flashbacks to hunk from voltron) i really think about ways to defy the way fat bodies are portrayed in my works. while also staying normal #i think at the end of the day i really see food as a love language. and serving people i love (even if its just coffee) brings me joy #even if theres a one-dimensional box that fat characters get put into regarding food. it makes me happy! so i'll try to do it with grace #i think representation isnt always this mentally twisting lol. but its definitely something i think about. #i hope i can positively project my feelings about food and love onto a plus size body (as a chubby girl :handheart:) and showcase that love #ok yeah yeah its 11pm. time to put meemaw in bed. if you read all this ur rad <3 also i stopped watching HC peeposad

[thisisthinprivilege]

Thin privilege is representation

Thin privilege is turning on the TV, selecting any movie or series through a streaming app, or opening a magazine and seeing at least one person with your general body type being portrayed for their human qualities and not their physical characteristics.

Thin privilege is getting to be a human with interests and a story. Thin privilege is starring in an adventure or romance or thriller as a human being with a name, interests and a backstory that do not revolve around or at least refer in some way to body size.

Thin privilege is the default, the gray icon, the naked Barbie, the first character setting on any game, the crosswalk stickman, the bathroom stall sign, the sample size, the fitness app default.

Thin privilege is representation.

#thin privilege #thin privilege in media #representation #fat discrimination #body standards #fatphobia

[fatphobiabusters]

There are too many fatphobic stereotypes to name, and of course all of them are bad, overdone tropes, but:

-Mod Worthy

#fatphobia #fat representation #media #fat stereotypes #Tumblr polls #Mod Worthy

[illgiveyouahint]

this brings me joy: mental health + My Mad Fat Diary

#my mad fat diary #mmfdedit #mental health #representation in media #mygifs #*sparksjoy #ableist language cw #eating disoder tw #self harm tw #I tried to avoid the big triggering content #so hopefully this is fine #as always please tell me if anything else needs tagging too

[heartsofhounds]

People who interpret whatever redactedverse speakers or listeners as chubby / fat / plus-sized CAN I GET AN AMEN ‼️🗣️🗣️🗣️

#fen rambles #listennnn im starving yall WHERE are all the plus sized character interpretations #especially fat FEMININE characters pls pls pls pls #*makes my angel a fat woman to piss off the fatphobes* #tbh this extends beyond redacted i just really like diverse body representations in media #like fat Jester from critical role? elite #come on folks let’s put our brains together and learn to draw larger bodies #lets get on it fellow character artists

[evanjinx]

i don't think skinny people realize how fatphobic almost every single media is

#i can count in the fingers of one hand the amounts of times i've seen good representation for plus sized people in any kind of media #and this is so fucked up yk? cause the world hates fat people and anywhere we go there's people teaching us how to hate ourselfs #its something that affected me so much through my life that i simply decided years ago that i would avoid media with fat characters cause #9 times out of 10 the character is used as comic relief and there's a fatphobic joke every 5 minutes and i just feel like shit after #watching it #sara.txt #fathpobia #cw fatphobia #tw fatphobia

[maeofthedead]

exhausted by fatphobia in media

like...I’m just so tired

#like yes #please remind me on a constant basis that I and people like me are jokes #it's harder to list media that doesn't have fat jokes in it that ones that do #I dunno I just am feeling extra sensitive about this lately #Like maybe if I saw positive representation either as a kid (or heaven forbid now) I'd feel better about just existing #but no #gotta get those cheap shots in where you can #I hate that this is the world I live in

[irritatednick]

The Fatphobia Central to Colbert's "The Indict-Mare Before Christmas"

How is no one talking about this? I'm not being hyperbolic - I can't find anything. I don't know if it's because online leftists are no longer in Colbert's audience or if fat activists don't find this media to be important, but I have to talk about it. If you want to catch up with the state of moderate liberal politics, watch this special. And read the glowing comments. It's a mildly entertaining animation that crams in as many political references from the year as possible, but the action hinges on Trump becoming a fat monster.

With so many peppered in references to conservatives set up for ridicule like bowling pins, I feel like I'm watching FreedomToons or the Babylon Bee. The comments feel similar. "Brilliant." "Genius." "Hilarious." "A Masterpiece." Oh my goddddd. This cartoon would hardly be the first time a "children's" parable depicted greedy villains as physically grotesque -corpulent or otherwise. But like... we shouldn't do it anymore? And it's real rich seeing a fat villain opposite SANTA CLAUS. Santa is a famous example of the jolly fat man archetype. A kind of "good fatty" - what TV Tropes calls "Big Fun" - an exception to the rule that all fat people are to be maligned. Such a person is joyful or comical and exists to serve thin people. But it's a mindfuck to see Santa make a fat joke at someone else! I suppose the writers were trying to get around this by identifying the source of Santa's powers as his "belly jelly," which Elon Musk sucks out of him and transfers to Donald Trump.

But Trump doesn't just get the jelly (visibly glowing) - he becomes way fatter. And the animators did not skimp on the details!

I've complained about the overly simple "egg on two sticks" model used for fat people in cartoons, but this Trump monster comes complete with a hanging belly pouch and thighs with folds and cellulite throughout! And his breasts... ...which Santa slaps around as they're fighting. Here's some of that:

Trump belches after he absorbs Santa's jelly and in the end, eating a present meant for someone he cares about is his undoing. In this special, greed and gluttony are one, and are shown as clear vices that embody Trump's wickedness.

#fatphobia #animation #stephen colbert #cartoon #trump #media analysis #media criticism #christmas #tv #tv shows #political cartoon #liberals #fat representation

[eastasiansonwesternscreen]

List of holiday movies from capeusa

#media representation #representation in media #film #news #photos #christmas movies #a hollywood christmas #christmas at the golden dragon #big fat christmas #must love christmas #when christmas was young

[biblicalhorror]

Yknow that post that's like "when someone points out the wrong flaws in a character you hate so you're put in the unfortunate position of having to defend them" because that's me with the beloved 00s sitcom Friends

#'its so awkward without the laugh track!' first of all its not even a laugh track #its a live studio audience #google it #thats why the bloopers also have people laughing #secondly like. yeah??? #shockingly the media that was designed around a certain sound element is more awkward and clunky when that element is edited out #'its homophobic/transphobic' this argument ill give a little more grace towards #bc like yeah a lot of the ways that the characters reinforce gender roles/stereotypes on one another is by threat of homophobia #and some of the jokes about chandlers parent are offensive #but it was also literally the first ever show to have a lesbian wedding onscreen in 1996 #(roseanne did an episode on a gay wedding like a month before) #& w all the issues the show has dealing with trans people/drag it was a helluva lot better than almost anything else coming out @the time #for example chandler's trans parent is misgendered by other characters literally constantly #but when we do finally meet them theyre played by a cis woman in drag rather than a cis man in a wig #which yeah isnt perfect but is also much better than most trans representation onscreen at the time #and the character is allowed to be just as complex and sympathetic as any other parent on the show #i would even say moreso than the other parents tbh #'they put monica in a fat suit' yeah thats bad #and especially because of all the demeaning jokes monica is put through even after shes skinny #but the show again also takes the time to explore fat monicas humanity and how shes deserving of love #and explicitly states that her weight/body image issues were explicitly caused by her parents' emotional abuse/neglect #and even if she had stayed fat forever chandler would have still fallen in love with her #bc the show acknowledges that fat monica is not anywhere near deserving of the vitriol she receives from the ppl around her #which again for the time in the 90s/00s was pretty progressive #'theyre all functioning alcoholics' first of all theres an ep where theyre all shocked that the 6 of them went through 2 bottles of wine #and the reason for that is because one character finished one by themselves #secondly point out to me any mainstream sitcom from the last 30 years that doesnt have flagrant alcohol consumption #'they have like 2 black characters in the entire show and poc are treated terribly' #YES!! now we're talking #'ross sucks and ross/rachel is a romanticized depiction of emotional abuse' 10000% agree

[mivolasvivi]

.

#thinking about how sometimes even just very surface level representation helps #growing up as a fat child skinny was the default in all media and I felt like an outsider to society and unable to fully participate in it #unless I was skinny #like seeing even more neutral depictions of fat ppl in things like csrtoons would’ve been so beneficial

[mitsquinyax]

Interested in;

Horror? The creepy things thay surround the Appalachian Mountains, or even West Virginia? Cryptids? Crimes? Camcorder and vhs stuff? Lgbtq/POC/disability/different body type rep? Lovable, goofy, and diverse characters? Perhaps some funny, or unsettling plot twists?

Well have I got the thing for you folks;

Muscaria Hills!

Just a w.i.p horror media involving a small town in West Virginia in 1986 that may or may not have to do with mushrooms, psychological horror, creatures beyond human comprehension, eye imagery, and a bit of the gay.

We’re also memeable around here.

But yeah, take the slightly crappy early art stuff because I have nothing else, just characters and ideas that I have yet to fully flesh out/draw/edit just yet. I will make something introducing the cast when I have the things!!

Help, Ideas are easy, and work is

Hard.

Also, see MH’s other creator;

@rosemaryizhere :)

#spooky #scary #maybe skeletons #creatures #cryptids #creepy #w.i.p #horror media #appalachian horror #vhs horror? #there will be eye imagery #people will simp for the monsters somehow #and I’m afraid #disability representation #poc representation #fat representation #lgbt representation

[clamorybus]

its insane how my small town of <10,000 is more diverse than the majority of hollywood productions that are set in major cities

#im exaggerating obvs its not like i ran the stats or whatever #but in SO many movies and tv shows #even if there's people of color they're all skinny and abled #like growing up i've known and seen so many fat people. people with cleft lips. people with prosthetic limbs #people with burns. people in wheelchairs. people of all faiths and speaking all languages #like i could go on #and ive been to <15 cities and towns in my life and maybe two of them had populations over 1 million (boston and nyc) #i am not making a bad joke when i say that i see more disabled people in the outlet mall on a wednesday #than ive ever seen on tv or film #like that's legitimately fucked! #such large parts of the earth's population are just left out of media entirely #when they're such large parts of our lives and our world but they're just ignored #its just insane when you think about it #mickey.txt #(like obviously structural change and aid is ultimately more important than representation #but its still messed up how many people are left out of even the background or crowd shots #its really gross to put it mildly)

[honeymaki]

Thinking back to before the pandemic; I used to dress goth - I was gothic and witchy, I wore black and lace and velvet and dresses chains and collars and loved practising magic, wearing vintage dresses and big heavy shoes, embracing this raw part of me; I forgot how good it felt to express myself and feel truly comfortable. Now coming to learn or relearn parts of my raw self, I think I revisit this era and see how I express it now.

#that means fishnets eyeliner black dresses and tights and shirts #i felt good wearing that stuff engaging in that media and with people #the representation is better too I see so many beautiful gothic fat women and I see me #I’m not clean or fit the aesthetic or style or bubble I’m trying to be atm #I’m also not trying to be individual or hyper individual #I’m just going back to my roots and that’s witchcraft black clothes and a bubble of me #🌱.chats

[spider-sideblog]

My favourite thing about diversity is listening to the opinions of others

My partner (Guatemalan, chubby) has such different opinions about some films. We saw in theaters last night a showing of "Fortune Favors Lady Nikuko" and though I found the representation to be a bit problematic and definitely could have been better, I got to watch as they were almost sobbing at it. They found a good representation, they found a fat person who was allowed to be more than just the comedic relief. They found someone who didn't hate their body and did what they could to be a good mom.

I can sit and complain about the representation in Encanto being performative at best and problematic at worst but they love it. They love being able to see Latinx representation, even if they're not from the same countries. I would go so far as to say it is their favourite film and one that will live with them forever.

This is why representation is important. You cannot see true joy until you find someone in their early 20s finally find some sort of representation. Even if it's not the best and we have such a long way to go, I am so happy it exists. I am so happy that my partner gets to see themselves in films as something other than the joke. I am so happy that my partner is happy

#actually autistic #representation in media #hispanic representation #fat representation