If you’ve been scrolling lately, you may have noticed the shift in how we talk about bodies. Once again, thinness is being elevated as the gold standard of health, and in that shift, body positivity is being misrepresented. Some people are going as far as renouncing the movement altogether, framing it as something that encouraged neglect rather than nuance.
As a plus-size registered dietitian who has been advocating for inclusive nutrition and body respect, I see something very different. What I see is not evidence that body positivity failed, but evidence that we have misunderstood it. And that misunderstanding is dangerous.
Body Positivity Did Not Begin on Social Media
Body positivity did not originate online with perfectly curated selfies or pastel-colored affirmations. Its roots trace back to the 1960s fat liberation movement, which was a civil rights effort led by activists who demanded equitable treatment for people in larger bodies.
Organizations like the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance (NAAFA), founded in 1969, advocated for anti-discrimination protections, fair employment practices, and equitable healthcare access. The movement challenged systemic bias and insisted that people in larger bodies deserved dignity, safety, and medical care without shame and humiliation.
It was not, and has never been, about denying health concerns or rejecting personal responsibility. It was about rejecting the idea that someone’s humanity, intelligence, morality, or access to care should be conditional on their weight. Over time, social media reduced that message to something much smaller than it was meant to be.
When Civil Rights Became Aesthetic Branding
In the age of algorithms and viral moments, complex movements are often reduced to catchy, bite-sized slogans. This sadly resulted in body positivity became a hashtag, a trend, and a marketing aesthetic. Some creators and brands viewed this new “trend” as an opportunity to monetize empowerment…to sell products, build platforms, and attach themselves to the language of self-love without necessarily engaging in the deeper advocacy work that birthed the movement.
The nuance, which includes the policy advocacy, the healthcare reform, and the anti-discrimination work, was overshadowed by surface-level messaging. What began as a demand for structural change became a performance of self-love curated for engagement. And once the message was watered down, it became easier for critics to redefine it on their own terms. If body positivity is only framed as “love your body no matter what,” it becomes easier to argue that it dismisses health concerns. But that framing completely ignores its foundation. Body positivity was never anti-health. It was anti-shame, and that is a significant difference.
Health Versus Weight Stigma
When someone says they want to “focus on their health,” that is their personal right. Health is dynamic, goals evolve, and bodies are allowed to change. As a dietitian, I support anyone who wants to improve their overall health, but pursuing health is not synonymous with perpetuating weight stigma.
Weight stigma occurs when body size is treated as a moral failing or a visual diagnosis. It shows up in doctors’ offices when patients’ symptoms are dismissed with, “Just lose weight.” It appears in hiring decisions, in classroom teasing, and in media portrayals that equate thinness with virtue and integrity.
Research consistently shows that weight stigma itself is harmful. It increases stress, raises cortisol levels, discourages medical visits, and can contribute to disordered eating patterns. Body positivity challenges stigma. It does not reject health. In fact, removing stigma has been associated with producing sustainable health outcomes. When people feel safe in their bodies, they are more likely to engage in joyful movement, nourish themselves consistently, and seek preventative care. Fear, shame, and humiliation has been shown to shut down those pathways.
Why This Conversation Affects Black Women the Most
For Black women, this hits even harder. Black women already face disproportionate healthcare disparities, from maternal mortality rates to higher prevalence of hypertension and diabetes. Research shows that Black women’s pain is more likely to be dismissed and our symptoms are more likely to be minimized in healthcare settings. We are often required to advocate harder just to be taken seriously. When weight bias intersects with racial bias, the impact doesn’t just add up, it multiplies.
So, when public narratives claim that body positivity “encourages neglect,” that messaging doesn’t land neutrally. It reinforces harmful stereotypes about larger Black women, implying that we are irresponsible, lazy, or indifferent to our health. That narrative is not just inaccurate, it’s dangerous. Once certain bodies are viewed as careless, it becomes easier to dismiss their symptoms, overlook their concerns, and offer less thorough care. And that’s how stigma quietly turns into substandard treatment.
You Don’t Have to Choose Between Health and Humanity
The public conversations about body positivity suggest you must pick a side: body positivity or health, and that is simply not true. We can pursue metabolic health while rejecting body shame. We can set personal goals without stigmatizing others. Health is multifaceted and includes a variety of contributing factors. It includes lab values and medical assessments, but also mental well-being, food access, stress, sleep, and social support. When we reduce health to weight alone, we erase its complexity and miss the bigger picture.
It’s also important to separate personal choice from public messaging. If someone chooses to change their eating or activity habits, that’s autonomy, and body positivity has always centered autonomy. Body positivity did not tell anyone to ignore medical advice and reject health. It told society to stop withholding compassion and treat all bodies with dignity and respect. Period.
So Where Do We Go From Here?
We start by teaching that advocating for equitable healthcare does not cancel out managing chronic conditions, and challenging weight stigma is not the same as dismissing evidence-based nutrition. We can hold space for both.
For Black women especially, this means rejecting the idea that we must shrink, physically or metaphorically, to deserve care. It means demanding inclusive research, addressing implicit bias in healthcare, and expanding our definition of health beyond aesthetics. When body positivity centers dignity, it strengthens health outcomes rather than undermining them. And when we dismantle misinformation about body positivity it helps to ensure that the next generation understands that advocating for body dignity does not mean abandoning health. It means pursuing health from a place of respect rather than punishment.
Body positivity was never about ignoring health. It was about insisting that our bodies should never determine whether we are treated with humanity. And that is a movement worth defending, not renouncing.