Fat Bubble: Fat In Film

Welcome back to the Fat Bubble, where every week I pop into your inbox (and thank you for that privilege!), and share fat fellowship with you. The Fat Bubble is a powerful antidote to the anti-fat hate that exists all around us; in a culture that cannot yet be trusted to treat fat people with dignity, respect and delight, creating a fat bubble is a subversive and protective experience! 

And it’s my pleasure to help sustain that Fat Bubble within each person who might engage with my work – whether that’s here in the newsletter, or in therapeutic sessions, or professional consultations, or in the Fat Villages (peers and pros). Feeling that I might be a contributor to what helps make those bubbles good and robust – not delicate washing-up-liquid bubbles, but big Zorb ball bubbles! - is a joy to me. And, of course, helps sustain my own joyfully fat existence!  

This week I’ve been thinking of the other folks in my orbit who compile fat resources for us all to delight in, and the one I want to highlight today is Fat In Film, an Instagram account that shines a spotlight on fat representation on film and on TV. It’s a collaborative effort – folks are encouraged to use the link in the Fat In Film bio, to contribute to the Google doc of suggestions. They then get shared by the account’s host. 

Establishing our history of presence on the screen is such a vital archive for fat culture, and I’m always so grateful for the folks that see these gaps in our collective history, and step into the wake. It is both a truth and a stereotype that fat characters are often sidelined on film, and giving ourselves the opportunity to gather together as many examples as possible is a powerful expression of community. It’s one of my hopes for this newsletter – that it is a resource to draw together the scant examples we have of fat representation, and turn them into abundance. Because fat excellence is all around us: it’s just our mainstream culture that wants to carve it up into insignificance. Collations and archives – by fat people, of fat people, for fat people, are a radical act of visibility – we've always been here and we aren’t going anywhere.

Do go and have a scroll through the page, and I’m sure you’ll find a couple of new actors to be interested in, or inspo for a show or film you might want to seek out. And yes, I have made my own suggestion of characters I’d love to see come up on the account one day, so if you ever see King George and Pote from Queen Of The South come up as a post, you’ll know my wish came true!! (And always feel free to engage me in QOTS chat btw, because I’m a big big fan!).

Until next week, friends, wishing you safety and joy.

Vicky