This week's Insight explores the body positivity movement and whether there should be a more nuanced approach to it. Watch 'Body Positivity' on Tuesday 11 April from 8:30pm on .
Be happy in your own skin. Love your body. You're imperfect, and you're beautiful.
Social media feeds are filled with messages celebrating self-love and body acceptance. On TikTok, videos with the #bodypositivity hashtag have had more than 36 billion views, while on Instagram, the #LoveYourself hashtag has been used over 108 million times.
The body positivity movement has done a lot for promoting the visibility of diverse body shapes, sizes, and abilities, as well as challenging conventional, and often unattainable, beauty standards. This year's and campaigns for Australians to improve their relationship with their bodies.
Sara says as a bilateral amputee, the body positivity movement is not something she can support wholeheartedly.
Sara Shams has tibial hemimelia, which, in her case, means she was born without shinbones in both legs.
As a bilateral amputee, the 33-year-old disability advocate says the body positivity movement is not something she can support wholeheartedly.
Sara believes it's unrealistic to expect people to always be positive about their bodies regardless of the way they look or feel.
"As a person with disability, I don't love my body all the time and my body fails me sometimes," Sara told Insight.
"So, saying 'always love your body the way it is' can definitely have a notion of toxic positivity, which I think is quite detrimental to how I see myself."
She says the movement can make her feel guilty that she doesn't love her body 24 hours a day.
“A lot of body positive influencers are often small-to-medium-sized white women, and there's a huge lack of representation of marginalised groups."Sara Shams
"I think it's unnatural to say, 'love your body all the time the way it is'. If I don't, does it mean there's something wrong with me?," she added.
Sara also says the movement is not truly inclusive.
"A lot of body positive influencers are often small-to-medium-sized white women, and there's a huge lack of representation of marginalised groups," Sara said.
In 2020, a US study revealed that out of almost 250 body-positivity Instagram posts, 67 per cent featured white women. Men and women of ethnically diverse backgrounds were highly underrepresented.
Body image researcher Zali Yager says body positivity has its roots in the fat acceptance movement of the 1960s led by fat-identifying Black, Indigenous, and other people of colour.
The concept is about feeling good about the skin and body you’re in.
"It's accepting and appreciating … it's often thought of as #loveyourbody," Zali said. "The problem is the space moves so quickly, it’s really hard to keep up."
Could 'body neutrality' have more impact than body positivity?
As someone living in a larger body, Andrew Wilson sees the benefits of the body positivity movement — especially in addressing weight stigma.
Andrew, who is also part of the Weight Issues Network, believes weight stigma affects people living with obesity in multiple ways, including contributing to poor mental health, discouraging people from accessing help and healthcare, and isolating them.
He says the body positivity movement can help destigmatise excessive weight and in turn, allow people with obesity to live better lives.
However, he's also concerned the movement may encourage people to simply accept the comorbidities that can come with being severely overweight.
Andrew says he's concerned the body positivity movement may encourage people to simply accept their comorbidities.
"There are potential pitfalls with body positivity because if you get too caught up in being big for the sake of it and over-romanticise it, it's not as great as you think," Andrew said.
"I'm just worried that people just think 'this is all great, loving myself being big' because you can be bigger and be very happy. I think if you can be happy in yourself; you've got a good mindset but there’s probably a bit of pain in there as well."
In a shift away from body positivity, some are turning to alternative outlooks, such as body neutrality and body acceptance where the emphasis is not on how you look.
"Body neutrality is about thinking and worrying less about appearance," Zali said. "It's shifting away from thinking of the way you look as being central to your worth and your identity."
For Sara, body neutrality is the concept she resonates with the most.
"For me accepting, embracing my disability and what my body and my legs can do for me, and what I can achieve with my assistive technology is really what I have come to realise and embrace," Sara said.
I think it's unnatural to say, 'love your body all the time the way it is'.Sara Shams
"It's not just about the way I look, but it's also the way I feel, and it's okay to be who I am, and okay to be different and do things differently."
Hear more from Sara, Andrew, and others about their views on unconditional self-love and body acceptance on .
