I love Lizzo. I want good things for Lizzo. Weirdly, I think she’ll probably get all of those good things. She seems to have a good head on her shoulders and she seems to really understand the conversations around her and her body. Lizzo is a plus-sized woman, and Glamour has devoted several articles to “the f-word” – meaning “fat.” Lizzo doesn’t call herself the f-word. But she does talk about what it’s like to live in her body. She’s also tried of being praised for being “confident,” or for existing without apology while not being a size 2. Some highlights from this Glamour piece:
On bravery and confidence: “When people look at my body and be like, ‘Oh my God, she’s so brave,’ it’s like, ‘No I’m not.’ I’m just fine. I’m just me. I’m just sexy. If you saw Anne Hathaway in a bikini on a billboard, you wouldn’t call her brave. I just think there’s a double standard when it comes to women.”
It’s not a miracle for a plus-size woman to have confidence. “I don’t like it when people think it’s hard for me to see myself as beautiful. I don’t like it when people are shocked that I’m doing it.”
Becoming the face of Absolut Vodka’s new Juice line: “The creative had the big girls in it. It was juicy, like me, and fun, like me. For someone like me to get a campaign with Absolut and to be wearing a bikini and to be jumping around and dancing and having fun—Absolut saw me on Instagram, saw how I like to dress, saw how I liked to party with my girls, and they came up with that creative.”
The media/internet has been instrumental in changing the narrative around beauty: “Back in the day, all you really had were the modeling agencies. I think that’s why it made everything so limited for what was considered beautiful. It was controlled from this one space. But now we have the Internet. So if you want to see somebody who’s beautiful who looks like you, go on the Internet and just type something in. Type in ‘blue hair.’ Type in ‘thick thighs.’ Type in ‘back fat.’ You’ll find yourself reflected. That’s what I did to help find the beauty in myself.”
Make space for plus-sized women in society: “Let’s just make space for these women. Make space for me. Make space for this generation of artists who are really fearless in self-love. They’re out here. They want to be free. I think allowing that space to be made is really what’s going to shift the narrative in the future. Let’s stop talking about it and make more space for people who are about it.”
What strikes me about Lizzo is that she’s been a big deal in the mainstream now for, what? A year, maybe a little bit longer. And in that time, she’s just… existed and done her thing and been an artist on her own terms, without apology, and she’s struck the right note every time. Even in the prevalence of Cancel Culture, she hasn’t done anything to piss people off. That’s rare. Anyway, I just love her and I love the way she talks about these issues. Lizzo for president! Lizzo 2020!
Photos courtesy of WENN.
yea after basically doxxing an anonymous food service worker when LIZZO was the one who messed up, didn’t answer her phone & wasn’t there, she can get gone. That woman is STILL feeling the negative effects of it to this day & is STILL getting harassed.
her ‘body positivity’ doesn’t make her any less an entitled a**hole
That’s not what “doxxing” is.
hence ‘basically’
she put her picture up, her first name & intials, the screenshot has her car model etc, and it was enough for cruel fans of hers to pile on & harass her.
it’s pretty amazing the cherry-picking that goes on here when it comes to ppls idols. Entitled famous WoC messing up the life of a civilian WoC just trying to make a living….but sure, Lizzo apologized, so its all good right? smh.
@Marisse so basically what you’re saying is that apologies don’t matter or count. That we are all just the sum of the bad or dumb things we’ve done in our lives. So why even try to make amends or apologize, right? It’s either perfection or nothing at all. Got it. I hope you are applying that high standard to yourself and people in your life and not just celebs.
She publicly apologized on Twitter for that. She admitted she was wrong. This is the problem with cancel culture. People make mistakes and people demand they apologize and do the right things and even they do it’s still not enough.
There are more important things to cancel people over than one bad day on Twitter that they took responsibility for.
Well said Valiantly Varnished.
ms single malt
Thank you! Couldn’t have said it better
Marisse- I couldn’t agree more. I was a Lizzo fan, loved her vibe and confidence, I thought she was a role model. But damn, turning this girl’s life upside down, jeopardizing her income, making her feel UNSAFE, it’s unacceptable. She showed her face. I’m still pissed about this even right now thinking about it. She half ass apologized and it wasn’t nearly enough. It wasn’t real. She doesn’t get it.
I just think it’s odd that people like Lizzo and Beth Ditto are described as ‘brave’ – as if by simply being out and about in the world as a larger woman should be a badge of honour. Can’t we just simply say they are talented and leave it at that?
I ditto Lizzo’s comment about disliking when people call confident oversized people “brave.” Its almost like a backhanded compliment. Plus its a complete misuse and overuse of the word “brave” IMO. Luv Lizzo.
Yeah, I think our word choice really matters when we talk about plus-sized women. It’s pretty patronizing to call Lizzo (or other plus-size ladies) “brave” for doing things like wearing short skirts.
I’ve begun following plus size women on social media and it changes the ads I see too and it’s made a huge difference in my perception of beauty and allowing myself to feel good as I am. Not covering myself up out of shame, wearing dresses and skirts above the knee with my big legs showing because I feel so much better like that than wearing leggings underneath. When I was younger and much smaller I felt this same way so it’s not about size IMO it’s about not feeling like you have the right to exist as you are. I went to Greece this summer and wore two swimsuits I found online that I felt amazing in that yes showed my legs. I didn’t put a t-shirt on over my suit like my mother said to do growing up because ‘you’ll feel better’. The show shrill also helped me a lot. I can’t explain how amazing it felt to swim because I wanted to when I wanted to, not lying to myself saying no I don’t want to when really I just didn’t feel good in a swimsuit.
Yup! I follow a bunch of plus-sized models on Instagram (plus just a bunch of other beautiful plus-sized women) and it’s really helped how I see my own body.
I love Lizzo. I find it funny that Absolute hired her to do their campaign with the song “Juice” while she quotes drinking GreyGoose Vodka in the song…lol