Size Diversity Task Force |

Hi everybody! I’m so excited to present the very first episode of my new web show “Right Now! With Jeanette DePatie AKA The Fat Chick”. Hope you like it. If you’ve got some specific topics you’d like me to cover in the show, I’d love to hear them. And if you are willing to be interviewed for the show (via my super handy skype cam) I’d love to have you on! Just comment below or send an email to jeanette@thefatchick.com.

I also feel it necessary to talk about a few of the other incredibly awesome things we’ve got going on! First of all, on the Fit Fatties Forum, we’re still going strong with our Fit Fatties Across America project. In less than 2 weeks we’ve gone from New York City to Topeka, Kansas! Can you believe it? Don’t forget to enter your minutes or miles HERE by noon on Fit Fatties Fridays. Then check back after 5PM to see just how far we all have gone.

Next, I wanted to let you know that I will be presenting a teleseminar next week Tuesday evening at 5PM PST (8 PM EST). I’ll be talking about setting safe, reasonable and fun New Years resolutions for fitness. Click HERE to register. There are limited slots and we’ve got a whole lot of people already registered. So go on over there and register right away!

Finally, I wanted to remind you that Paper Mâché in a Big, Big Way is still going strong. We’d love for you to “liberate” diet books from thrift stores and resale shops (so no more money goes to the diet industry) and send them to us so we can use them to make the world’s largest paper Mâché sculpture. Or if you’d prefer, you can donate money and we will liberate the books for you! I know. There’s just so much awesome here, it can hardly be contained!

So hop to it my little Chicklettes. Let’s get going, right NOW!

Love,
The Fat Chick

This last weekend I participated in an activism event at Huntington Beach called Take Back the Beach. The event was a coming together of a number of size acceptance groups including the newly formed Size Diversity Task Force. The event was full of fun for people of all shapes and sizes including a Hot Flash Mob for Menopause Awareness Month (video coming soon), a Flesh Mob (pictured above and led by national dance champion Ragen Chastain), a weenie roast, body surfing, sand, s’mores and well, more. The weather was perfect, and I think we all had a wonderful time.

The event was fun and wonderful and powerful. I have to admit however, that the event didn’t match the picture in my mind for a “stereotypical activism event”. We didn’t march. We didn’t chant or shout. We didn’t camp out in tents or form human chains. We simply put on our swimsuits and sunglasses, grabbed our “Know Fat Chicks” towels, slathered on sunscreen and relaxed.

But in a quiet and gentle way, activism happened. People saw how much fun we were having and asked what we were up to. Some people came by to say that they loved our energy. Some little kids adopted us for a while and asked questions and spent time with us. We danced in our swimsuits on the sand and on the boardwalk. We smiled. We laughed. And we didn’t apologize.

Sure, there were stares. For the most part, we met those stares with smiles and openness. And by just getting together and relaxing and sharing our joy and baring some skin we made the beach a brighter and warmer place.

And it made me think of how we are activists when we are fully and deeply ourselves. Feeling comfortable in our skins and sharing our joy is an act of quiet and peaceful rebellion that ripples out and radiates like a big round stone dropped in a quiet pond. Being open and inviting to those who stare at us is a shot across the bow for those who would categorize and stigmatize. And just being there created a precedent for others who have been too afraid to feel the sun on their skin.

So my dear Chicklettes, I’d like to invite you to be an activist. Whether it’s joining the new task force or putting on a swimsuit and dancing at the beach or marching with a sign or simply returning a stare with a smile, I invite you to reach out. Stretch. Shine. The world is better with you in it. So fully inhabit the planet with all of your awesomeness!

Love,

The Fat Chick