Food Psych #142: Breaking Free from Fatphobia & Gender Norms with Caleb Luna
Writer and fat activist Caleb Luna joins us to talk about how gender identity intersects with fatness, how to tolerate the desire for weight loss, navigating food choices as a form of self-care rather than deprivation and restriction, why representation matters, the effect of internalized fatphobia within the family, breaking out of the gender binary, and so much more! Plus, Christy answers a listener question about navigating thin privilege while living in a smaller body.
Caleb Luna is a writer, activist, teacher, performer, fat babe and Ph.D. student at the University of California, Berkeley, where their current project focuses on the relationship between bodies and discourse. They have also explored the intersections of fatness, desire, white supremacy and colonialism from a queer of color lens. You can find more of their writing on Black Girl Dangerous, Everyday Feminism and The Body Is Not An Apology. Find them on Twitter at @tummyfuq.
Grab Christy's free guide, 7 simple strategies for finding peace and freedom with food, to start your intuitive eating journey.
We Discuss:
Caleb’s relationship with food growing up, including learning to associate food with comfort and experiencing anxiety around their body size
Caleb’s experience visiting a nutritionist at a young age, and learning to equate body size with health
The effect of internalized fatphobia within the family and the intergenerational transition of fatphobia
Caleb’s relationship with their father, and how his addiction shaped Caleb’s childhood and understanding of coping skills
Media representations that expose thin privilege and weight bias
The evolution of and history of the Food Psych Podcast
Caleb’s discovery of fat acceptance and fat activism, and how it helped them to strip away the shame around their eating habits
The stress of eating in public as a person in a large body, the judgment around hunger, and making peace with our basic needs
The cultural desire to erase fat bodies
Caleb’s experience dissociating from their body as a form of safety
Navigating food choices as a form of self-care rather than deprivation and restriction
The value of community in the recovery process, and the importance of seeing people in fat bodies enjoying their lives
Why representation matters, especially for non-white, non-cisgender fat folks
Caleb’s romantic and sexual experience, and discovering that their body was attractive and desirable, rather than something to “settle” for
Fat discrimination in the queer community
How higher education enabled Caleb to feel affirmed and validated in their identity
The healing work of therapy, fostering non-judgmental self-awareness, developing skills to change the way we interact with others, and embracing self-compassion
How Caleb’s gender identity intersects with their fatness, and breaking out of the gender binary
Smaller fat bodies vs larger fat bodies, understanding thin privilege as a spectrum, and different intersections with fatness that compound oppression and marginalization
Caleb’s advice on how to tolerate the desire for weight loss, and the ways in which the desire for weight loss is a response to trauma
Scrutinizing who benefits from white, cisgender, colonized beauty standards
How our values can guide us towards self-care
Caleb’s PhD project, including how categorizing individuals contributes to disconnection between all humans
Resources Mentioned
Some of the links below are affiliate links. Affiliates or not, we only recommend products and services that align with our values.
FAT!SO? by Marilyn Wann
“The Gender Nonconformity of My Fatness” by Caleb Luna
“Super Fat Erasure: 4 Ways Smaller Fat Bodies Crowd the Conversation” by Caleb Luna
Submit your questions for a chance to have them answered on the podcast!
Join my online course, Intuitive Eating Fundamentals, which includes monthly listener Q&A podcasts and access to my private Facebook support group.
Listener Question of the Week
What exactly is “thin privilege?” How do we participate in the fat liberation movement if we’re in smaller bodies? What are the real-life consequences of weight stigma?
(Resources Mentioned: Sarah Harry’s Food Psych Podcast episode and Lisa DuBreuil’s Food Psych Podcast episode)