Women’s perception of their bodies

Dubai

A social media campaign, which originated in the US in 2012, hopes to change the way young women perceive their bodies.

Gulf News spoke to Virgie Tovar, the founder of the #LoseHateNotWeight campaign.

As a former sufferer of self-esteem issues herself, Tovar said: “The #LoseHateNotWeight campaign is about understanding that we don’t need to change our bodies; we need to change how we think of our bodies.”

In today’s world of unrealistic beauty standards, she talked about women’s common misconception of weight loss as the solution to every problem. She said: “You don’t need to be thin to be loved, be seen or be happy.”

She talked about the relevance of her campaign to young women’s lives today, due to the many external pressures on them to be thin.

Tovar said: “Women still believe that their greatest accomplishment in life is to be a size zero. We have the chance to be inventors, writers, artists, scholars, entrepreneurs or activists. Why, then, are we so focused on a goal that is attached to no actual achievement in terms of career security, financial stability, professional recognition or political change?“

With respect to social media, Tovar cited instagram as the most powerful platform for her campaign, because of its visual focus.

She said: “People spend more time online now and are increasingly looking for messages that empower them rather than those that make them feel bad about themselves.”

Young women in the UAE can get involved in the campaign by uploading an image of the things that inspire them to feel good about their bodies. They can then post the image with the hashtag #LoseHateNotWeight and spread the word, or visit virgietovar.com/lose-hate-not-weight.html.

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The writer is an intern with the Readers Desk at Gulf News.