What is Body Shaming?

Most of us face body shaming nowadays without even realizing it. Body shaming can be done by your parents, relatives, siblings, cousins, colleagues, flatmates, friends, etc. You don't even realize how badly it affects your mental health leading to severe trauma and low self-confidence in 70% of the cases. Awareness programs need to be increased by a huge number to stop such people from body shaming you. 

According to one of the research, body shaming victims mostly are fat. Although, other cases are not lagging too. But in contrast to this, before the 1800 era, being fat was seen as a status symbol. Fat people were considered rich from the aristocratic royal families. But in the middle of the nineteen century, people started considering being slim as the new status symbol of attractiveness. 

In this article today, you are going to learn about the basics of basic shaming. 

What is Body Shaming?

Body shaming simply means speaking negatively about somebody's body or yourself. Any person's body shames you by commenting or judging you based on how you look, walk, age, color, hair, size, eating habits, choices, etc. Nowadays, people have this norm that a person looks attractive when they are slim and fit. People who are constantly bullied about their weight and how ugly they look get even worse. Body shaming leads to ill effects on your mental health as well as physical health. It might leave you feeling neglected, unattractive, and feeling negative about your body. Body shaming causes stress, anxiety, depression and in the worst-case scenarios, you hit to suicidal attempts. 

You need to go into the depth of the body-shaming subject to understand how bad it can be to somebody. We have seen multiple cases, where a person leaves a suicide note stating how he lost all his strength to bear an Ill body-shaming comment and had to choose a path of death. To be honest, we all are God's beautiful creations. How can you misjudge something based on their looks? We all are beautiful in whatever way we are. So, disrespecting yourself or others' body I.e, body shaming would be disrespecting God which is not something you would like to do. Understand these basic things, live and let others live in peace. Instead of letting each other down, try to uplift each other and boost each other's confidence to do well in life, and then see how beautifully your life changes for the betterment of all. 

Types of Body Shaming

Body shaming can happen to you in various types. All the types are demonstrated below - 

Age: People who have sick minds are habitual of body shaming others based on their ages respectively. If you are above 30, then start to call you aunty, uncle, etc. If you are too small, they dominate you by saying that you are too small to speak in front of others. 

Weight: Getting body shaming because of being overweight is very common. People can pass on comments to you for either having excess weight or for being too skinny. 

Body Hair & texture: Everybody has a different texture of their body. Most people are body shamed for their body color, texture like freckles, and having excess hairs. 

Hair: You can also face body shaming for your hair. Most of the people who have either healthy or thin hair are bullied with words like bald etc. Having too much volume and fluffiness can also lead to negative comments upon you from others. 

Clothing: You might get body shamed for your personal dress choices. People body shame you by passing comments on your clothing preferences and style. For example, girls who wear ripped jeans are the talk of the town in the low incomes towns.  

Eating: If you eat too much, you are body shamed. If you eat too little, again you are body shamed. So, what you eat and the quantity you eat also leads to body shaming. 

Impact of Body Shaming

Body Shaming leads to severe side effects on the person facing it. Let us learn what all are its impacts -

It leads to feeling ugly and unwanted every time 

It causes low self-esteem and curtails the confidence 

It leads to sadness and depression 

It also leads to body dysmorphic disorder

You are prone to getting sudden panic attacks and higher anxiety 

It affects your socializing with people

Your office productivity decreases with body shaming

You find it difficult to present your views and ideas in front of others

Your eating schedule gets badly disturbed

It can also lead to psychological distress

You have suicidal tendencies 

Key Takeaways 

Body shaming, for me, is nothing but sin. It showcases your ill mentality and negativity dwelling inside you. I highly recommend stopping such practices by taking mandatory steps. Whether you are body shamed or if you see others getting body shamed, you need to speak up for the right thing. Explain to them how the worst effect it can have on the minds of people when they even think about suicide. Let's join our hands together and match toward stopping it from the roots. We all are beautiful in our ways & need no acceptance or liking from others to leave peacefully. 

Always remember that your mental health is in your hands so don't put it in others' laps. Others will say whatever they want to, but you need to be smart enough to understand what should you let affect you and whatnot. If you feel triggered and unpleasant, in a case where you feel that everything is going out of hand, then I would suggest you talk to a counselor or a close trustworthy friend who can understand your emotions. He or she will guide you better to stay positive on your journey, which in turn will boost your morale to work with full enthusiasm in life without letting negative body comments affect you.