'I just knew I wanted to hike with other people who would get what it was like to feel ‘othered.’'
, a principal developed by Dr. Linda Bacon that celebrates body diversity and promotes self-care, while challenging scientific and cultural assumptions of how society views bodies.“We can just move our bodies for fun because it feels good and we can stop when it doesn’t feel good,” said Michaud-Skog. “The group hikes are all about self-care and healing and giving ourselves permission to honor our bodies needs — we don’t have that enough in our culture.
Ani Janzen, who has been the Fat Girls Hiking ambassador of the Minneapolis chapter since May 2018, said that while her group has been on the trail, they’ve been asked if they're trying to lose weight while hiking or have been told they “won't be fat much longer” because they were hiking.
“We can hike, be active, be fat and most likely, we'll be staying fat,” Janzen said. “It can be difficult hiking the trails knowing many people are assuming that we're pursuing the thin ideal, but it's a lot better in community with each other.” But the patronizing comments made at Fat Girls Hiking points to a bigger picture of how fatness is viewed in the outdoors community. Michaud-Skog said outdoor stores often don’t have hiking gear and clothing in sizes larger than an XL — and that exclusion in the industry shows that those companies don’t see people like her as a valuable market.
“I rather support small businesses or little companies that do have things that are accessible to fat bodies,” Michaud-Skog said. “To me, it is fatphobic — having lack of access to goods and services. It’s stigmatizing to fat people.”
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