Controversial Australian nude blogger speaks out about skinny shaming
‘You do not have to be fat to be a victim of body shaming’
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Louise Thomas
Editor
A 28-year-old blogger from the Gold Coast in Australia has spoken out about the difficulties of being shamed for her slim figure.
Jessa O’Brian published a post on her blog talking about the double standards surrounding body-shaming that has left her with a “skinny girl” complex.
She revealed that a lot of followers leave comments on her posts urging her to stop exercising and to “eat more”.
O’Brian first came to public attention when her Instagram account was suddenly deactivated because of the nude content she posted.
Her account has since been reinstated and she now has more than 69,000 followers on the platform where she posts a mix of inspirational comments alongside snaps from her travels in which the blogger is often unclothed.
“I know, some of you are probably thinking, ‘cry me a river’… and it’s because I’m skinny and look a certain way, right?,” she begins.
“Perhaps you’re thinking that this is all so easy for me to talk about because, as a skinny girl, I should feel confident?
“Or that, maybe, because I’m not fat and don’t struggle with the concept of being healthy that my input bears a little less weight on the matter of body-positivity?”
She went on to highlight further misconceptions that her followers have about her because of her naturally-slim size and suggested that some of them may be unconscious body shamers.
She added that many people wrongly believe that body shaming is exclusively synonymous with being curvy and that few are compassionate towards slim people who are criticised for their size.
“For me, body-shaming is, at its simplest, making someone feel ashamed about their body in some regard,” she explained.
“So, whether you’re skinny, fat, confident or not, body-shaming is not bias [sic].”
O’Brian’s blog post is one of three that will focus on the topic of body shaming.
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