“It has literally been a lifesaver”: the role of “knowing kinship” in supporting fat women to navigate medical fatphobia

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article focuses on the development of online fat kinship in the Health at Every Size (HAES) movement. Drawing upon 15 fat women’s experiences of their HAES community membership, we explore the ways that fat kinship develops around fatphobic experiences, and how it can facilitate the mitigation of fat oppression. Building upon the notion of the “knowing community,” we suggest that sharing experiences of, and developing tactics against, medical fatphobia transforms “knowing communities” into “knowing kinships.,” characterized by mutual support and affective relationships. We argue that sharing experiences on egalitarian social networking platforms builds a supportive, safe, and affective kinship network of “knowing” members. Through this online-based kinship network, fat women not only share stories of medical fatphobia but also collaboratively develop tactics of “everyday resistance” against it, including the identification of fat positive healthcare practitioners and the honing of communication strategies to optimize healthcare interactions. These tactics, we suggest, are developed to convey a high degree of “cultural health capital” which undermines assumptions of fat patients as apathetic leaving less space for fatphobic treatment. Although we focus on kinship development in the HAES landscape, we conclude with some reflections on the application of our “knowing kinship” framework to other fat populations.