Fat & Fierce: The (Other) F Word Celebrates Diverse, Fat Voices

Reclamation of the word “fat” is hardly new, yet it can often feel lately that pop culture is breaking into new territory with a newfound, proud presence. With each new hashtag or TV series like Shrill, fat acceptance — a social movement changing anti-fat bias in our attitudes and cultural dialogue — reaches a wider audience and cements its message in new, bolder ways on its path to more a mainstream embrace. The (Other) F Word: A Celebration of the Fat & Fierce is the newest addition to the campaign of dignity, love, and respect for diverse bodies coming from Amulet Books this September. And as its title suggests, it continues to take the “f” word from its former place of insult, akin to embarrassment or even vulgarity, to a place of acceptance, pride, and celebration of our bodies. The result is an anthology that welcomes its newcomers to the movement, full of message directed towards teens and young adults: messages of commiseration and validation, offering to the altar of shared experience, words of motivation to those in the process of learning to love their bodies for the first time. As a thin man reading this book I found myself feeling as an outsider eavesdropping in support, cheering quietly with each story, each reclamation of power, but quietly, in hushed cheers, as not to draw attention to myself. As stories unfolded I became a guest in my own imagination, fully aware of what I felt, perhaps falsely, was an awkward sight: me on the downtown A train reading a…