Episode 126: Fat Liberation, Business Building, & Style With Virgie Tovar
Episode 126: Fat Liberation, Business Building, & Style With Virgie Tovar
Virgie Tovar is an author, activist and one of the nation's leading experts and lecturers on weight-based discrimination and body image. She holds a Master's degree in Sexuality Studies with a focus on the intersections of body size, race and gender. She is a contributor for Forbes where she covers the plus-size market and how to end weight discrimination at work. She started the hashtag campaign #LoseHateNotWeight and in 2018 gave a TedX talk on the origins of the campaign. Tovar edited the anthology Hot & Heavy: Fierce Fat Girls on Life, Love and Fashion (Seal Press, November 2012) and she's the author of You Have the Right to Remain Fat (Feminist Press August 2018), which was placed on the American Library Association's Amelia Bloomer List, The Self-Love Revolution: Radical Body Positivity for Girls of Color (New Harbinger Publications 2020) and her new interactive book, The Body Positive Journal (Chronicle Books 2022). Her podcast, Rebel Eaters Club, is now in Season 3 and is Transmitter Media's first original production. In 2018 she was named one of the 50 most influential feminists by Bitch Magazine. She has received three San Francisco Arts Commission Individual Artist Commissions as well as Yale's Poynter Fellowship in Journalism. Virgie has been featured by the New York Times, Tech Insider, BBC, MTV, Al Jazeera, NPR, and Yahoo Health. She lives in San Francisco. Subscribe to her newsletter, Body Positive University, to get weekly emails.
In this conversation we talk about:
Virgie’s personal body image story- how being called ‘fat’ when she was 5 years old influenced her relationship with herself for the next 15+ years.
How the primal desire for love and safety influences diet culture.
Key pieces to consider for shifting the cultural narrative around food and body.
How celebrating food and body can be as detrimental as shaming them, and what to aim for instead.
Her body acceptance process and entry into fat activism.
Virgie’s first few years in business- how she used her curiosity and commitment to say ‘YES’ to catapult her career.
Living and working as a creative person. Some of the key pieces for building a successful business from landing a book deal to leading a TED Talk and beyond.
Her love for fashion- how style played a role through her body image journey from hiding, to rebellion, and now deep authentic expression.
The importance of trusting your body and the choices you make for yourself to live a fulfilling life.
Connect with our guest!… www.virgietovar.com
Virgie’s Newsletter! Body Positive University
Her Ted Talk
Books she’s written- add to your list to read!
Follow on Instagram @virgietovar
Ready to feel more comfortable in your skin?
TRANSCRIPTION Episode 126: Fat Liberation, Business Building, & Style With Virgie Tovar
Katelyn:
Virgie Tovar. Hi. Welcome to the show.
Virgie:
Oh, thank you for having me.
Katelyn:
Thank you for being here. I have to say before we start this conversation for everybody listening, I already mentioned this to you Virgie, but you have been a dream guest on the list of people that I would love to have a conversation with on this show, I just respect the hell out of you and everything that you're doing in the world. And I'm so inspired by you. And I just feel really grateful that you're here and I can't wait to hear your story. So thank you so much. Let's just jump in, because we have so much to talk about.
Virgie:
My body's ready.
Katelyn:
Okay, the first question that we ask everybody is your first body awareness moment. So what did that moment look like for you where you realized I'm in a body and apparently, this means something in the world that I'm living in? And how did that moment impact your relationship with your body? Or food and just yourself, in general, moving forward?
Virgie:
Well, it's interesting, right? Because like, you know, for a lot of people, their first body awareness moment is a traumatic moment, right? Like, because when we're born, we have this integration of like body and selfhood. It's all just, there is no separation. So I definitely want to share that story.
I will say that, like, in thinking about this question, I thought about, you know, I was aware, I was aware and like, kind of amazed in the dazzled by my body before I was introduced to fatphobia.
So like that my first traumatizing moment where I sort of separated myself from body was, you know, around the time that I learned fatphobia, which I'll talk about in defining in a second. But before that, you know, I have memories of being like, probably four years old, and looking down and seeing my belly that protruded out, and, you know, seeing my feet, you know, and being like, amazed by them. And this is a story that I've told so many times, but one of my earliest body memories is of jiggling. I used to love, like taking off all my clothes, and, you know, spreading out my arms and legs and jiggling. It was just so delightful, and so pleasurable. And so just delicious. It was just like, you know, it was like the chemical memory that would be the chemical imprint of that experience is still in my mind, I can still remember how good it felt. And when you're a kid, pleasure is so unadulterated. It's like this pure release of endorphins and serotonin and all of this stuff. And it's just like, I remember even my mom breastfed me until I was five. I remember breastfeeding. And like that same in ridiculous like, like, just downpour of good chemicals. Like, it's as if I can just remember those things. So I think I was aware of my body, you know, before fatphobia, but certainly, around the age of five, I was introduced the idea that, you know, something was wrong with being in a bigger body. And, you know, my family is all in bigger bodies. I was a big baby, I was a big kid.
And I, you know, didn't have any sense of anything being wrong with me until boys in my class started telling me that I was fat, you know, and I think what's interesting is like, I didn't know that word, that word wasn't familiar to me. But I knew it was a bad word because of the way that they said it. And, and I think like, in that word was encapsulated, a lot like a lot of history, a lot of feeling a lot of who I was, and like for example, I think that when those boys told me I was fat, they were teaching me about what it means to be a girl and what it means to be desirable. And what it means to be loved. And you know, like that's it. I mean, fat is just a biological reality, right? Like it's the presence of adipose tissue, right? You know, on a body and so you know, it's pretty simple but I think what is so fascinating and unfortunate is how this one word actually captures a lot. At that moment, when I was being told I was fat I was being shut down as a girl I was being shut down as a girl of color like a brown girl I was being shut down as a human being. And, and it's like, and it all is, is mixed in kind of in this like really toxic stew. And it's very difficult to sort of separate out, like, all that. I'm a believer that like in that moment when I was introduced to fat phobia, that was also the introduction to rape culture. Right? Can you explain that? Yeah. Because the whole, the whole idea was that like, you're a boy. And your problem with me being fat, is that I'm not what you've been told you're supposed to be attracted to. I'm not girlfriend material. I'm not. I'm not deserving of like sacks or romantic attention. That's what that means when a boys like a straight boy says it to a girl.
Katelyn:
Can you explain that?
Virgie:
Yeah. Because the whole, the whole idea was that like, you're a boy. And your problem with me being fat, is that I'm not what you've been told you're supposed to be attracted to. I'm not girlfriend material. I'm not deserving of like sacks or romantic attention. That's what that means when a boys like a straight boy says it to a girl. So, you know, rape culture is all about, I mean, there's so much to be said, I'm not a rape culture expert, by any means. But like, you know, essentially this idea that, like, men and boys are gatekeepers of safety through romantic desire, like, right like of is rape culture, right? And so for me, I'm like, when I was told I was that, like, they were essentially saying, like, they were sexualizing me even though they were also children, right? They were like, enacting a cultural sexualization ritual, which, you know, right now, I'm understanding you as a potential sexual partner or potential like, person, I want to let you know, romantically like it's, I mean, it's like, it's a little bit complicated, but like I was being sexualized in that moment by those boys. Because the problem would be that was that I was not desirable to them. Do you know what I mean?
Katelyn:
I do. And it it's also just so wild. How early this starts, for girls and boys, you know, how deeply ingrained it is? And just the generational trauma that's attached to that as well, too.
Virgie:
Yeah, totally.
Katelyn:
So this was in middle school, right, that you were getting this, this feedback from this group of boys?
Virgie:
That started when I was five.
Katelyn:
Oh, wow.
Virgie:
Yeah, It started when I was really like, preschool, kindergarten, and it just continued. Yeah.
Katelyn:
So how did you make sense of that? Because I also think it's so valuable, what you shared about your environment that you grew up, and your family, which is essentially, you know, that's the unit of safety, that's where we got so many of our needs met as children and where we learned so much about identity and belief systems and everything. And then the other side of that is this highly impressionable adolescent part where we hear it from our peers, and we learn it from our peers. And so I would imagine the dissonance for you was probably pretty high when you were being exposed to a family of neutrality- it sounds like there wasn't a lot of body or food, talk in your family that was demonized? And then being exposed to that. And your peer circle as a five year old, and then from there as well, too. So how did you sit with that?
Virgie:
I mean, it was really, really, it was really confusing. There was a lot of cognitive dissonance. I remember being really confused. At that time, because I couldn't understand what was happening to me like. It was like the beginning of a hazing process. And some, like, socialization is a hazing process. To be fair. It was the beginning of a hazing process. And when you've never been hazed, it is extremely disorienting you feel gaslit, you feel, you know, I mean, I think what's interesting is like, the confusion very quickly gave way to guilt, shame, and the sense that I had failed. And I think it was that sense of failure. And that sense of taking on the blame was connected to survival. I think that was like, I don't think that I explicitly understood that. But I think when you think about, like, now I know about childhood psychology. And when you're that age, you know, children will happily take on the blame for something rather than accept that their world is unstable, the world is wrong or unfair. And so that is how this becomes an entrenched problem, right it’s because it's so fundamentally intimate and so fundamentally happening at an age when children are, are willing to take on blame. And so, you know, that was what happened to me. And I think, also, to be fair, this is something that I'm still excavating.
Katelyn:
Absolutely.
Virgie:
I mean, my family did not demonize my body or food, but I grew up in an extremely emotionally volatile home. And so my mother was, you know, for recent reasons, I know some reasons I'll never know. She was not consistently emotionally available to me and will just leave for long stretches of time without announcing that she was leaving, which is very, very, very, very unsettling for a child. And so I think, you know, I think of it almost is like two important bookends of the story. Which is like, Yes, I was introduced to fatphobia outside of my home by boys my age in school. On the one hand, I had already begun to disassociate from, like, I knew that my mother was not available to like, love me in the way that a caretaker was supposed to. And I figured that out really early on. I'm five years old, I'm a kid. So I'm surrounded by television and Disney that's telling me that like, you know, you move from your parents love to your husband's love. And that's those are your two greatest loves. So I'm a child. And again, I'm doing the calculation subconsciously, cuz I'm a kid. But I'm like, I don't have access to familial love. So I think that what these boys were threatening that I wouldn't have any love was what really made it so much easier to be a victim to fatphobia, you know.
Katelyn:
And I keep coming back to what you mentioned about survival. And I think about that so much too Virgie, just as human beings, but specifically as women functioning in this culture, and from a body image perspective, as well. What we will do to meet that need of feeling like we are surviving, even if we're not naming it that in the moment, but especially at such a formative age where, of course, you know, your brain is at the peak of formation, and you're trying to get your needs met your basic needs and your fundamental emotional needs met as well, too. And then just the disorder around how those needs are being met, especially from the perspective of feeling like you were meant to get a partner by way of these Disney images that were being shown. And I mean, I can relate to that as well, too, but then not having that positive feedback from the boys in your life at that point as well, too. So I imagine it was probably pretty terrifying, especially as a kid.
Virgie:
Yeah, I mean, acceptance and love are certain they, you know, their life, in a kid's mind, I don't even know if it's like psychological or if it's something bigger and deeper. But like, to a child, like, not having access to love is the same as dying. So you know, it's like, it's really important to understand that like, acceptance, you know, fundamentally is that, you know, it really is the difference between life and death to a child. And so it was at that point that I'm introduced to fatphobia, and all of a sudden I felt like, you know, it's okay. I mean, I've sort of accepted on some level, that I'm not going to have maternal love, and I'm not going to have this, like, you know, love for my family that I really want. And but now I've got all my eggs in the in the husband basket.
Katelyn:
So how did you navigate this? From from this point forward? What, what was your relationship with your body like, and food, just through middle school and high school? And then after high school as well?
Virgie:
Yeah, I mean, it's you know, restriction, like I started to restrict food really early on, I think, probably by first or second grade, I was restricting food, because I know, by the, by the age of nine, I was already engaging in like, starvation behavior. I mean, it was the it was the summer between fourth and fifth grades that I decided that I was going to really try and like transform my body and have like a summer transformation story or whatever, like I've seen in movies. And so you know, at that point, I was obviously already restricting food. And that was a summer that I think I really started to. I mean, I don't know really, I want to say in parentheses, right? You know, our culture doesn't have a great way of deciphering between what it considers like normal dieting and disordered eating, right. Like to me, dieting is disordered eating, there is no like, like, if there's a false continue. There's a full spectrum that our culture tells us exists. And I'm like, no. There's no like difference between, I restrict, I just, I think like it's a slippery slope. So it's hard for me to even talk, I guess I'm saying is like, it's hard for me to talk about what was going on at that time, because I'm like, Was that what the culture thinks of his dieting? Or did I actually have anorexia? Was that like the anorexia period, I don't know. I mean, I'm still excavating that stuff myself and trying to assign it you know, labels. Do you know what I mean?
Katelyn:
I definitely do. I think this is so common. Unfortunately, I can definitely relate from my own perspective as well. But there's so much overlap and so many shades of grey with these labels and names and the diagnosis of, of what they are from, like an intellectual perspective, and then just a cultural perspective as well, too. But yeah, I think dieting to disordered eating to a full blown eating disorder and the severity around eating disorders, it is a pretty wide spectrum. And I think that they can often be confused with each other, unfortunately. And I think it's important to to be able to take time and label them in a way that is honest and truthful. And that feels good for each individual. So I mean, I think it's really healthy, that you're taking time to go through that and being able to make sense of that. I'm certainly doing the same too and my own unpacking of my relationship with myself and whatnot. So when did you get to a place that felt less intense? What was the lightbulb moment for you where you realize that something needed to change? Or was there something you were introduced to? What was kind of the turning point for you, or just the entry point into exiting, we'll use the word diet culture, just to kind of generalize things right now.
Virgie:
Yeah, before I answer that, I kind of want to go back and sort of finish like, you know, I think that if I were as an adult, looking back at my fourth grade self, I would have, I would say, Oh, I was exhibiting anorexic and Orthorexic behaviors. You know, my doctor at the time was just like, whatever you're doing, keep it up, no questions asked. Right. And I think even my parents, my family saw this as positive because they are surrounded by a culture that's telling them that, you know, losing weight is positive, by any means necessary. I think the turning point, you know. I mean, I continued to exhibit, I think this is the thing about, you know, restricting food, which I know you're aware of, but I always think it's important to articulate is like, the reason that one and four people who diet like go on to have eating disorders is because food restriction. Like, I mean, essentially, you have to it's a moving target, right? Like, you have to do more extreme behavior to get the same results over time, because your body is seeing dieting and restriction as a threat. So your body is actively acclimating against dieting and food restriction. Anyway, so I was I was very much on that treadmill very much on that, that slippery slope or whatever you want to call it. And then I think, you know, for me, a big turning point really came when I started dating someone fat positive, and it was just completely coincidental. I had no idea that I didn't know what fat positivity was, we didn't really even use that language. He just, you know, he just treated me the way that- like, I was normal, which was like I was anybody else. Like, I've been a desirable human being to him. But not like, some kind of, you know, monster, which is my fault.
Katelyn:
Where was this for you and your story? What age range are you in part of your adolescence?
Virgie:
Yeah, I mean, I was in my early 20s. I mean, to be fair, even before him, like the fact that once I became sexually active at 17, or 18, the fact that anybody wanted to have sex with me was like, counter to everything I had been told from the age of five. So even though it wasn't like magical or spectacular, or anything like that, the fact that sex was available to me was completely counter to everything I had been told about how the world works and who I was in that world. And so it was really just like there.
Katelyn:
Yeah, because this honestly just goes to show how powerful the human brain is, and especially from a child perspective, how impressionable it is at such an early age because we're talking about the beliefs that were formed in your mind at five years old, and how that impacted your relationship with yourself and others at 17/18 years old. And I want to just shine some light on that because I think that this is so valuable. And we're talking about this from a body image perspective, right? This could be applied to so many things, but especially from our bodies standpoint, how we talk about our bodies and the environment that we create with the people around us who are impressionable. From a body image perspective, I think that t is truly where the shift needs to occur in our culture, if we really want to make a radical change moving forward so that we don't keep perpetuating this and really just having conversations about what, what people are saying about your bodies at school or not saying or what you know, what you're thinking about your body at an early age and whatnot. So I don't know if you have any thoughts about that. But it's definitely something I think about often, and I think it's just a really valuable example that you're sharing in your story.
Virgie:
Yeah, I mean, I think like, honestly, it would take, in my opinion, relatively so little to move the needle. I mean, I remember having this realization a few years ago like, I grew up having people- and this is still existing, right?- In our culture today, right now. I mean, I still have people who are saying, like, just be thin, just don't eat, just exercise obsessively. Like whatever they're saying, right? Essentially these perfect strangers are making a completely enormous demands of fat people and fat women in particular. And I'm just like, I find it so fascinating that you're fine with asking me to literally dedicate my life, like if you're a naturally larger bodied person, in order like to, like, first of all, like, the possibility of ever being a thin person, no matter how extreme and self harming the behavior is, is very, very, very, very infinitesimally small, right? But, let's look at that population of infinitesimally small population, you're looking at someone who's living with an eating disorder, period. It sounds like the idea that someone feels entitled to demand that someone have an eating disorder in order for them to feel comfortable, is gobsmacking. And I also find it fascinating that they could stop being bigots in an instant, instant results guaranteed, you know? And to me, it's like, it's just kind of the way that the culture works right now, is that the person who has power, the person who's in the normative body, or who has the normative view, is supposed to be able to demand whatever they want, no matter how absurd. And in fact, in this issue, certainly anti scientific it may be, but there's no demand that they adjust their behavior, or their ideology. And so for me, I always want to remind people that it's like, you know, when we're talking about demanding that a naturally larger bodied person dedicate their life to becoming something they were never designed to be, is absolutely an appropriate what is appropriate, and in fact, expedient and pragmatic, is to ask the Bigot to accommodate their behavior to be more pro human.
Katelyn:
Hmm. Let's just say that someone is listening to this and feeling a little cold out right now. How would they start changing the narrative? Or the you know, I know this applies to a lot of different people in a lot of different walks of life, whether it's your profession or just your relationship, whatnot. But what's an easy entry point for somebody to just start getting really curious of where they might be inserting some of their bias on other people and changing the language to a more accepting or human standpoint, like you're suggesting?
Virgie:
Yeah, I mean, to begin with, I don't even think it necessarily needs to start with like to me it's like, just stop saying bigoted things. For me. It's like, you know, you can stop doing harm instantly through linguistic changes. So stop demonizing bodies and stop demonizing food in fact. I mean, I challenge the people I work with to stop talking about food and bodies positive and negative for a month and see what their life looks like. I guarantee you that it will look really different. Yeah, so just like you don't even have to try it don't even do like think don't be like Oh, but positive isn't? Just stop.
Katelyn;
Oh my god, I love you. So I do want to come back to your story. And I want to hear more about this as well, too, because I am a huge believer in body neutrality, more than anything, because I think that feeling- the need to talk about our bodies, whether in a positive way, or what we're eating in a positive way, is not equally problematic, but does pose a lot of problems. Like why why do we feel the need to moralize or demonize? Why is it so black and white? Why can't we just exist? I mean, there's so much to unpack there and a whole culture and, you know, social systemt that is kind of like, encouraging that. But do you know what I mean? Like, it's just it's maddening to me, that we're talking so much about it to begin with. And here I am with the podcasts on it.
Virgie:
Like, I mean, it's like in a, in a dream world, we're having like responsible, critical conversations about it. But for the average person who doesn't want to spend like hours and hours and hours reading, like, you know, reading literature and thinking critically about this, I mean, I understand, right, like, not everybody, that's not that's not for everybody, you can just stop doing harm by like muting that conversation. And then I think like, the second part of it, which is like the heart shift, I really do believe that, you know, fatphobia, and I just wrote a piece about this, like looking looking at fatphobia, through the lens of attachment theory, essentially, like we all have the wound of being told that, you know, either you're fat, you don't deserve love, or you can if, if at any time you stop monitoring how you eat and how you move, you will become a person who does not experience love. That is absolutely a traumatizing lesson that we all learn, you know, children understand fatphobia, whether they're fat or not, right, they understand the stakes of social denial, whether they're fat or not. And so I think like, you know, understanding that you don't just have a sort of an internalized sense of bigotry, you actually are working through a wound that manifests as bigotry, right? Whenever we experience trauma, especially as children, we hold on to belief systems that we learned at that time. And to me, that's what stigma is, stigma is the is, you know, the residual effects of being introduced to horrible anti humanitarian views that our society is based upon, and which is a trauma, you know, and so, I mean, to me, it's like understanding that, we need to accept that that's what's happening. We need to grieve for those lessons that we learned, we need to make amends to those we have harmed, right, these are just the processes of, you know, these are the human processes of like, whenever we have perhaps unknowingly harmed other person, right, like these are kind of the building blocks of of repair, you know?
Katelyn:
Hmm, I definitely I appreciate you saying that. I think, you know, the intersection of trauma through all of this, and we've talked about trauma a lot on the show, but for anybody who's not familiar, you know, the stance that we take on the show, and this is evidence-based as well, too, is that we all have some form of trauma or have gone through trauma, there's big T and little T trauma, so minor events, major events, but I think that this is so important to really talk about if we are kind of dissecting what needs to change and also self-compassion, individually and compassion that we hold for other people. Especially in really tough moments. I you know, I think for me, Virgie, and I have talked about this a little bit before as well, too. But especially during the pandemic, when cancel culture was really amping up. I was very uncomfortable, and I still am sometimes, with holding conversations with people who were in a different position than I was, whether it was body size, or race or ethnicity, gender, whatnot, because I felt like I was just gonna fuck up all the time. And I was really scared and my heart was so pure and just wanting to hear and wanting to understand and wanting to know more and do better. But I was just paralyzed with this fear of I'm just gonna fuck it up. I'm gonna fuck it up and cause more harm and whatnot. I've really done a lot of work in getting through that but it's still comes up. So for anybody who might be in that position, who is feeling that urge to do better and learn more and, you know, communicate differently. But having that fear creep up on the sidelines, what would you say to them? What's the most effective way that somebody can perhaps, begin working through that?
Virgie:
Well, I mean, you know, I don't have like a perfect or fantastic answer for that. But I mean, I think social media sometimes creates a sense that we have to be almost minute to minute plugged in and giving updates in real time and do processing in real time. And actually, for most people, that is a solitary process, you know, like, it might be pulling back from some of these outlets, and sort of going through, like I was saying earlier, like going through my own wreckage, going through my own history, kind of, and how that could be, that doesn't have to be a process as publicly documented, that can be a very quiet, internal process that happens, you know, with you. And I think there are moments right, like I think about, there are moments where I think certain voices maybe need to be a little bit louder than others, because they've been silenced in the past. And I understand that the inclination, I think, for all of us is to sort of say, like, but how do I do this better? You know, and, and sometimes that isn't the question that needs to be the first question or like, the question that surfaces when someone is largely perhaps expressing, like, that they're feel really angry and really frustrated. They may not necessarily want to be offering, actionable advice in that moment. And it can be really frustrating, because it's like, obviously, I think when someone when we hear about an injustice, and maybe we didn't know it existed, you know, a lot of us have the instinct of like, how do we make this better? And I totally understand that instinct. And sometimes again, like that, that how do we do this better, might be something that you are having a conversation with, like, your closest friends, or maybe not on social media, right? Like y'all are sort of making those, those processes are about like something that's a little bit more intimate. And I think, for me, it just as a rule for me, whenever I have a strong feeling about something happening on the internet, I do not act on any event for 24 hours. And so I think, like for some of us, right, like, I think there is that reflexive, like, an how do I do? Right? And I think what's important is not to immediately jump to necessarily action, but to sort of sit with like, this feeling, not trying to get rid of this feeling as quickly as possible. But to just sit with it, and sit with the discomfort. And I mean, again, I don't have the perfect solution. But like those are my thoughts.
Katelyn:
I love those thoughts. I love the the ideas behind that I and I think that there's something there for so many people. And one thing that I've really started to kind of equate in my mind when, you know, intense things are happening in the world or we feel like we need to react or make a change or whatnot is, what's my role in this orchestra? You know, what instrument am I playing, because I feel like we all have a gift that we can be contributing. And some of the gifts are really loud, and some are really quiet and more behind the scenes. But every single person, whether you're, you know, handing out the the flyers in the beginning, or making sure the musicians have water or whatnot, or you're playing the trumpet, or you're conducting it, like everybody plays a vital role. So what's your role in really making this symphony work? So just a little visualization that I have in my brain when I kind of sit with that, but I appreciate you saying all that. Let's come back to your body image story, because I read your book. And I love it.I want the people to know. And we'll talk about your book in a bit. But what comes next from this experience of feeling desired by somebody else, and just also kind of untangling your body from your worth or somebody else giving you the permission to start doing that. What was the turning point for you from that point forward?
Virgie:
Yeah, I mean, I think like that relationship was really formative. And I think what's amazing is like it wasn't just, you know, I mean, I think the lessons I got from that really not only that there's nothing wrong with you like me. But that I'm in fact, like sexy and vital and interesting and hot and like the whole package, right, which is, I mean, like, I'd never got that messaging. And you know, from there actually ended up in you know, we were still together when I when I started graduate school, and he had just finished graduate school. So he had a lot of tools about how to navigate it that I ultimately ended up beating, but I wanted to graduate school. I was not sure I was going to study fatness, but it was one of the potential topics, I was really interested in how weight discrimination affected women's lives and sexuality, etc. And I ended up researching, and they're deciding to do my thesis on how weight discrimination impacts gender for women of color. Um, and you know, at that time, like, I remember I had an advisor, I was switching topics. I just like after a few events happen. I was like, I wanted to I want to research fatness. And my advisor at the time, I did not know, this was a fatphobe. Um, and I when I when I told her I was like, I don't want to do the topic that we had discussed when I first came into grad school I want to study fatness, she said, everything about fat has already been written. It's career suicide. And I and my partner, the fat positive one I mentioned. He was coincidentally he was outside the office of that one during that meeting, and he overheard everything she said. And when I came out, he like, jumped up and said, you know, you're not gonna let her fatphobia affect what you do, like, you're going to find a different advisor who's going to support you. And it was yeah, it was like, I got like, I mean, I think that's so powerful is like, when your partner, your partner should be your ally. And like, when your partner is like, everything goes right, unfortunately, like, especially I know, for a lot of straight people like hard work. And I think like, you know, like, you know, that moment of him being the person like, who needed to say the things that I needed to hear like, he was an ally, and you know, and a partner, all in one. And so that that was really impactful. But I think from there, everything sort of took off. Like I was introduced to fat activism, and fat liberation politics, which are all about, you know, ending wage discrimination and not only wage discrimination, culturally, like there's a there's a wage gap between plus size and straight size women. There's obviously less fashion accessibility, certainly at that time, more so that now. And, you know, like Paul says, women experience a lot of medical discriminations, not just ending wage discrimination from a cultural structural perspective, that ending bigotry, like the idea that there's something wrong with being fat. And that and understanding that fat people are like special and unique and just right and perfect. And that community really changed my life, like in a really, really big way. And I just kind of from there on, I just, I just so deeply resonated, and leading up to that I had been an anti racist activist, and then I had become a feminist. And then you know, that activism kind of was a little bit of like a synthesis of it, just it just mapped onto the activism and the politics I was already committed to. And I think it just, it drove it all the way home for me. And so, you know, like, I think that what fat activism offered was like, not just not just like, you know, your life matters, no matter what size you are, they've said, you know, you get to be as fabulous as you want to be and your fatness may, in fact, like be a key to that fabulousness in a unique way. And I think that like that was just so it was just like it was just like, I felt like I found the fountain of youth or whatever. Like I'm going I know in front of you. It's kind of an ageist thing, and I'm not into that but like I felt like I had found like the mother lode like I was like, oh my god, I sense that it wasn't just the mother lode for me that it was the mother lode for the culture. Um, you know, so like that that really I just, I feel like if any, you know, like some people have like a religious ecstatic experience and like that was that was my
Katelyn:
I love that. I mean in really hearing you describe all of that it, it feels like the love and the safety that you've been craving your whole life. But the beautiful part about this that I'm really hearing is, you not only found a group of people, a community and environment that you are exposing yourself to on a regular basis that was giving you that love, but also encouraging you to do that for yourself first and foremost. I mean, how powerful. And I think you're spot on, I think that this could be found in, in so many different communities and, and whatnot, I mean, but it just goes to show the power of belonging and connection. And also, in this case, just that radical sovereignty that I think is so important for really doing the work and having a relationship with yourself with each of ourselves individually. That is, it's so sacred.
Virgie:
Yeah, I mean, 100%.
Katelyn:
So from here, how did you start this incredible business? Like, what do you even call yourself because you have a book, you have a podcast, you're speaker, you're an educator, you're somewhat of an influencer online. How did you even begin to create this career for yourself?
Virgie:
Honestly, it was just saying yes to everything. I'm such a fan of saying yes I love saying yes, it's like I have this like one of my qualities as a person is I'm like, very curious. So I'm all always I mean, yes. It's like, yes, it's such a curiosity driven practice, like saying yes is so much about like, I don't even know what's gonna happen. I'm gonna do it. Because I think like I said, kind of earlier, it started with, by the time I was finishing grad school, I was already getting booked to speak at universities. And it all just felt kind of like weirdly mysterious like a how do you know what I'm doing? Like, even just fat activism, like and being introduced to fat activism, I got like a cryptic email that was like, heard you were doing fat studies want to meet up and I'm just like, heard from WHO? Like, I think that the world was at that time, fat activism was really small. So it makes sense of the word would get out, you know, but I'm, like, all of the beginning of it felt extremely mysterious to me. Like, I'm like, How did you know that I was doing my thesis on this. How did you get my email address? Like these kinds of things were like, a little bit confusing to me.
Katelyn:
Around what year was this, do you remember?
Virgie:
Yeah, this was like 2010. Okay. Um, so you know, if you can imagine at that time, right, like, there, the body positivity movement did not exist, there was no like, body positive, like, very few people knew about fat activism. At that time, or like that positivity or anything like that, like body neutrality, body acceptance, all of that was like, a very underground queer led movement. And so, you know, like, so yeah, right out the gate. I was like I had, you know, I proposed I wanted to do an anthology focused on the people I had met in the fat activism world who were fat and refusing to diet and having like, beautiful, amazing lives. So I pitched it to a women's press in Berkeley, California. And they were like, Yeah, we're going to do this. And so right out of grad school, it was like, I was working on a book, I was lecturing at universities already. And I got it was like, by invitation. I don't exactly know how they found out about the work that I was doing. But it was good.
Katelyn:
Yeah. And I have a technical question, because I love hearing stories like this. And whenever I'm hearing somebody share the story on a podcast or something I always want to hear kind of like the bootstrapping business pieces of it, too. So getting out of college, you're starting your career. Are you are you charging for these speaking events? Are you like, how are you financially supporting yourself? Or like, what's the trajectory with just kind of like some of the nuts and bolts, like technical pieces of starting your career?
Virgie:
Yeah, I mean, so like, for example, you know, like the book when I proposed it, they're like, here's the advance and they were pretty clear. They're like, you're not getting more than this. So it was like, it was enough money for me like little undergraduate me, it was a little less than $10,000. This is me coming out of grad school. So like, that's a lot of money to me. So I'm like, okay, I can do that. I can like I mean, I paid the contributors. So like, a good portion of that ended up being paid out to the people who contributed to the book, but whatever was left over I was like, Okay, this is like two or three months of living expenses for me at this point. And then like, in general at the universities, they would typically offer an honorarium. And it was like budgeted and things like that. So even at that time, like I didn't even know how to ask for money and they would just offer like, you know, this is our honorarium.
Katelyn:
Well, that's why I ask because I don't think a lot of people know how to ask for money coming out of school, I mean, it's not really something that we're taught. So that's where I was curious and it sounds like it was kind of just taught to you by way of how your career was kind of intuitively being handled at the time, divinely guided?
Virgie:
Well, yeah. And I think like, you know, as you know, the longer you are in the space, like, you know, you can potentially charge more. But like, at that time, the standard honorarium was usually around $250 to $500 for like a brand new speaker. I mean, certainly, I think if I had an agent or a little more savvy, I probably could have asked for more. But at that time, I was like, Wow, I'm getting paid like, $500 to talk for one hour at a university. That's really cool. I may have taken on one or two clients. But that wasn't until probably a year after that. But at that time, it was like, I think I still had loan money from college. And then I had the advance and I had some honorarium. And then maybe I was doing some other like, maybe little freelancing stuff on the side. I'm living in San Francisco, and I live still live here now.
Katelyn:
And this is pre social media and all the things. So when where does the TED Talk fall into this? Is that something that you knew you wanted to aspire to? What was your vision for how your career was going to be built out? Is that something that you even knew you wanted?
Virgie:
Yeah, I mean,it felt a little bit like things were happening to me not that I wasn't making them happen. And that was a little bit like, I would like to have a little bit more control. So the TED talk. I mean, for me, it's like TED talk was just obviously like, you know, I mean, there's a lot of prestige attached to that, like I was approached to do the TED talk. I didn't like, apply. I don't even know if there's an application process. It felt like this is exactly what I'm supposed to be doing with my life. And I just feel like that there is like, there's a lot of weird, magical, strange, mysterious, inexplicable things that are part of it. And I've just talked to a fair number of women who have some very similar story, you know, or it's just like, this is just exactly I don't know how to explain it. Like, I don't know how to explain it, because like, some of the stuff just feels like how did this just sort of appear? Yeah, but I will say like I've also had, there's also been a lot of stuff where it's just hard work and frustration and annoyance, and like all that stuff. And I'd love to talk about that, too.
Katelyn:
Yeah, what what are some of the biggest things that stand out when you think about that?
Virgie:
Yeah, I mean, I'm thinking about like, I remember. So the TED talk was like 2018, which was when the book came out, You Have the Right to Remain Fat. And even that book, like it was just, you know, I knew I wanted to, I mean, honestly, I had been proposing some version of You Have the Righ even before grad school, like as I remember, like, you know, before grad school, I was like, I submitted a proposal for a book to the same publisher who ultimately did the anthology. And they were like, you're a good writer. We have no idea how to access this market. like who are these people who are going to read it. We don't know who they are. So they were like, get back to us when it if you get get back to us, essentially. Yeah, and then I waited like two years to propose another project that was connected. So anyway, I've been trying to get you have this published since probably like 2008. And then it didn't come into the world till until 2018. And it was like, by the skin of its teeth, right? No other publisher wanted this. It was a friend Michelle T was an amazing author who was like, Hey, I'm working with a publisher, they're asking you to scout talent, like would you like to write something? They don't have a huge budget, and I was like, Okay, I'll do it and I definitely it was like a lot less money than I wanted. And they were not budging at all and then negotiate normally in publishing negotiations, there's like, a little bit of back and like, they'll consider some stuff. But like they were like, Nope, no, absolutely not. No. It was very frustrating. And I talked to a mentor who's been in the publishing business for like, 20 years. And she was like, Is anyone else knocking at your door that take this? And I mean, it's one of those hard conversations where you like, you don't want to accept that that's the answer. And I think I certainly could have sat on it and waited and like, tried to sell it at another point. But at that time, it felt really urgent, I really wanted to do it. And so and the book did really well. So I'm just like, really, but like, you know, that that like that process of trying to get it published for 10 years, yeah. And then not even getting paid what you feel you're owed for it is like sometimes the hard reality of like being in publishing, and I kind of want to share that, before that a few years before that, I remember being at my boyfriend's apartment, different partner than the person I was with in grad school. I was like laying on the sofa, and I was like I am I need somebody to help me, I need someone, I need someone to, like, guide me through and coach me through starting my own business. I just feel like I'm like, sort of like I'm making money here and there with speaking engagements, and sometimes like articles, but I don't feel like I have the tools that I need to be a business owner, which is what I felt like I wanted, you know, and so, and to be frank, I want to tell you that story of like, But to be frank, I want to say also, that it was because of fatphobia, that I even considered becoming an entrepreneur, I just wanted to be like a normal person who worked in downtown San Francisco at an office and like, went to drinks after and got a certain salary. Like I just wanted to be part of the same cultural story that like, pretty much all women are sold on some level.
Katelyn:
How interesting is that? That's the pattern of wanting to belong again. I’m glad that you shared that. Because I, especially for creatives, and entrepreneurs, and I think everybody is a creative, but people who really have that artistic calling, or that entrepreneurial spirit, that is the shame piece that often is so tough to get past feeling like well, will people accept me? If I start this own thing? Will they judge me? Will they have all these opinions? will I will I lose my friends by not being able to go to happy hour after work together or whatnot? I think it's just that deep desire to belong and feel accepted and loved.
Virgie:
Yeah, I mean, 100%, and I just could not manage to access that world because by virtue of like, I think being a fat woman of color, like I just like, you know, I would have great first and second interviews. But whenever the boss would interview me, like, he was always a straight man, for what I could tell a straight white man, like, it was just clear from the start that I just did not have the kind of body that he wanted around him. And I felt like I just had that experience again, and again and again. And finally, I was like, Okay, this is clearly not going to work out. And I feel like, in some ways, entrepreneurship felt like the path that felt more accessible simply because I just couldn't manage to break through the kind of gatekeeping that I felt was happening in downtown San Francisco in the financial district. So I think that's important to contextualize, you know. But anyway, back to the sofa, and my boyfriend's house, a few years after grad school, I'm really frustrated. And I ended up calling my friend Isabel Foxen Duke who, you know, started this program called Stop Fighting Food. And we had been friends already, by that point for like, several years. And I was like, I need help girl. And so she just, she was like, we're not getting off the phone until you have a business plan.
Katelyn:
She's amazing. Thank you for sharing her name, if everybody's taking notes, take a note to check her out.
Virgie:
So so she so she literally just sat on the phone with me for like, hours, and was just like, okay, like, what do you want? What's your dream goal? She's like, what's the product you would create if no one was looking, like your dream product? You know, what would it be? And then she gave me basic sales advice. She was like, Alright, you have to sell. You have to have a product, and you have to put a price on it. And that price x whatever is your desired salary, you just gotta meet that number. And so she broke it down in this way. I mean, obviously, sales when you get into the brass tacks it's a lot more complicated, but the philosophy itself is actually quite simple. Like what's your desired salary? How many units of your product you need to sell? You've got a game plan, right? Um, and so I think laid out in that way, that was sort of the beginning of like, really starting to feel like I could harness the power of what I was creating, versus just allowing others to sort of determine how much they were going to pay me and when I was going to work. And I mean, to be fair, even now I've been doing this work for about 12 years, and I feel like I've been an entrepreneur for maybe 10 years or a little bit less, something like that. Even now, there's business that I can't predict, even now there's business where it's like, you know, I can't control it, I can't pitch somebody this, like they're coming to me or they're not coming to me. So there is still that mystery even this far in. But I do feel like, I know how to create a budget, I know how to keep my books, I know how to do all of these things that an entrepreneur kind of needs. And like networking, which always struck me as like, so weird, and disingenuous, or whatever, and I don't really call it that. But like, it's become really intuitive. And like there's just kind of these, I think a lot of it is just years and years and years of like being confused, asking questions when I felt like I could. Taking advantage of educational opportunities when they were when they when I could afford that. And then also straight up having a day job. I had a day job until 2018. And I was like paying most of my bills through the salary. I was getting through that.
Katelyn:
Where were you working?
Virgie:
I was working at a an arts nonprofit like a queer literary arts nonprofit called Radar Productions in San Francisco. That was started by Michelle T, the author I mentioned earlier. And she was like, Do you want to be the Managing Director of my nonprofit, you'll learn everything you need to learn to run a business. That was like her pitch. She was like, I know you're an artist, but like, Hey, you could learn all the business side of running something if you helped me run my own side.
Katelyn:
So valuable.
Virgie:
Yeah, so like, anyway, that it's kind of like a lot of coincidental luck stuff to be completely fair, and a lot of frustration and moments and like, and obviously other women looking out for me and helping me and stepping up in moments where I was like, I don't know what I'm doing. So it's like a lot of different elements kind of went into it.
Katelyn:
I love it. Where does style come in for you with all of this? Because I think anybody who has been in your energy before, whether it's online, or whether your books or whatnot, I mean, you're so self expressed, and you have just a very distinct style. And it's obvious, you're highly creative. And it's obvious that fashion is important to you. And this is something that you play with a lot. And so was this always a part of your your self expression, design and style and that element of creativity? Or is that something that you found through your body acceptance journey? Where does this fit in?
Virgie:
Well, I mean, I come from an intergenerational fashionable family. I do think that it is one of those things that like can be inherited. Like I'm like one of my favorite pictures of all time is actually my grandfather, in his 20s he had like gold teeth even then, like, I mean, it was like, what's the I don't even know how but I mean, I think he was like a trendsetter on the gold teeth thing. But he had like gold, like there's a picture of him where he's like walking down. He's like, in somewhere in Mexico, where my family's from, with a friend and he's just like smiling ear to ear. He's got gold teeth, and he's got like, head to toe white suit with a bolo tie. Well, this is probably from like, 1950. So he looks like a rich wizard. A rich desert Mexican wizard, but also a badass. And it's, I'm just like, Yeah, I feel like that thing is like what I have just in my blood. Like who like who puts on a white ass suit? And like the desert, right? Like, that's a real bold move. Like, I love tiny purses because of like, what they don't do like, I was shopping for a scarf and Gucci. And you know, I was having a great conversation with the salesperson. And he was like, I’d love to show you like some other things. And I was like, Sure, let's do it. And he brought out this thing and it was like a tiny, tiny, tiny sack or bag. It was probably three inches long and one inch high. And I was like, what does that do? And he was like What it doesn't do is what matters. My grandfather wearing a white suit in the deserts of Mexico was like the exact same kind of statement, but that that tiny bag of Gucci was. And I think like, you know, certainly, I mean, I think about my, I think my grandfather is probably my most formative model. I really think like I, you know, he was the person I became. And he was always like, you know, he was he always had like, 50 hustles going and he was always worried about like, his hair having pomade like it just, you know, so I think like, there's a lot of that like that kind of, I think like also a line that goes through it. Is the cheekiness like that the same thing of like, you know, that white suit in the desert. I think that that same desire to kind of like, you know, be like a little fuck you all the time. Like, I think that that's in me too. And I think certainly, going back to the history of it, like I grew up in a family that was always interested in like, my grandmother and mother are seamstresses, like they're very talented seamstresses who like made their own clothing as plus sized women. I wore the clothes that they made for us when the when the children's clothing industry wasn't making clothing for fat children, my grandmother and mother were making like identical, you know, slightly smaller versions. Like they're making identical versions of like, outfits for like my grandmother, my mother and me, like little Russian nesting dolls wearing like denim, cheetah print, robbers, or whatever. Um, so I think there's like, there's so many pictures of me as a kid where my mother like, fully like, loves fanatically dressing me like, I'll have like, you know, like, I had like, a little outfit for like, like, my, like, what was her name? Like Jane Fonda Oh, my gosh, like workout gear outfit, and fit with a sweat band. And like my little leotard, and then and then I've introduced to fatphobia, and I'm encouraged to hide my body and told my body is disgusting. And I'm basically wearing like, black and dark blue and brown for maybe, almost 20 years. And then, you know, I'm introduced to fat activism, and all of a sudden, I'm like, oh, that fuck you energy is back. You know, I think like, I think, you know, I really was like, I'm not gonna just wear, you know, revealing clothes, I'm gonna wear like, the tightest clothes, I'm gonna wear the shortest clothes, I'm gonna wear like the brightest clothes. And it was very much kind of a performance, it was like about kind of not only performing gender, like, over articulating my femininity, it was kind of aggressive. It was a little bit like, you know, oh, you know, you want me to be like this ideal woman? Well, I'm gonna serve you, the cloud version of like, what you're trying to make me become. And I mean, I've always been a what not always, like, for a long time, ever since I was an adult, have been in queer community. And I think like that playing with gender was always part of being in that community, too. So it was like a good company, and learning from the people around me, like sort of how to play with these things, and how to turn you know, gender to do a performance and how to make it and how to throw something back in the culture space in order to create discomfort. And so I think like, for a long time, my fashion inspiration was that was really almost like the performance. And I think, you know, now it's still there's, there's still a sense that, you know, be having a fashion like caring about fashion and a plus sized body. Still, it probably always will feel political, to me, but I think at this point, it's less about the kind of trolling, that's not the primary reason. I think that now it's a little bit more like, what like, what is genuinely, you know, what do I like, right now? What excites me? And I think also, it's like, there's a little bit of a fashion is kind of a language, I love how my fashion sense invites other people to engage with me. So yeah, that's kind of like the the style and fashion piece.
Katelyn:
I love that. I think, you know, there are so many incredible takeaways from everything that you shared in this conversation. And I think that what I'm taking away and I, I hope so many people in this community will, too, is the inspiration to be curious, to learn about yourself to learn about where you came from, to learn about what you want, what you don't want, who you are, how you want to express yourself, even if it's from a rebellious standpoint, getting to that place of deep authenticity, like the inspiration that you demonstrate for that is, is so fierce. I'm so grateful that you have brought your energy to our space today and for just the work that you're doing in the world in general, but honestly, the person that you are so unapologetic. I couldn't be couldn't be more grateful. I also want to talk to you for like three more hours. So this is really sad, but you’ll have to come back on. Yeah, thank you so much. Any last words before you go? And of course, where can everybody find you and hang out with you? I've read pretty much and listen to everything that you've done. So I can vouch anything that you put out is amazing.
Virgie:
Oh, thank you. Yeah, I'm going to have a new book out. It's called the Body Positive Journal. It's an interactive journal. It's really cute. They're stickers. It's really beautiful. And it sort of walks you through like about 30 of the most important tools that I've used to really help people recuperate their relationship to their body and to food. And my website is Virgietovar.com. And I'm on Instagram a lot @VirgieTovar. I post articles. I am a contributor for forbes.com for Forbes women. So I do a lot of articles focused on ending weight discrimination at work and the plus size market. So you can find that through the Forbes website and I post about that on my Instagram and my bunnies and my partner and my clothes and my adventures and occasionally like to rant. So I welcome you to follow me there and I have a free newsletter called Body Positive University you can find it through my Instagram or through Virgietovar.com. I think like final words are just, you know, I feel like talking to you has made me really think about especially what you said about rebellion. Like I think there's such a huge piece of intuition and all of this just like, what would it look like we live in a culture where we're taught, you know, fatphobia is one of the ways that we're taught not to trust our bodies. But regardless of your body size. Like we live in a culture where you've been taught that trusting your body leads to danger, it leads to death, it leads to illness, and what would it look like to sort of refuse that and say, like, actually, if I trust my body, amazing things will happen. If I trust my appetite and my desire? Like, is it possible that incredible things could happen? And I think the answer is yes. And just allowing yourself the space to experience that however it manifests. Maybe that's like incredible rage. Maybe it's like incredible joy. Maybe it's like you know, eating all the delicious things you've been denying yourself. Maybe it could be sexual, it could be visual art, right? It could be anything, and just really giving yourself permission to like, trust that it's the right way to do it. Right. So those are my parting thoughts.
Katelyn:
Love. So powerful. Thank you so much. We'll link everything in the show notes to keep it easy for everybody. But again, I just adore you and I appreciate everything that you shared in this conversation and it was so fun. I just love talking to you.
Virgie:
Same Thank you.
