The internet has changed things in so many ways.
What sticks out, however, is stories. Normal people like you and I can share our pain and happiness with billions of people across the world.
While not everyone may have the same struggles, just having one more person going through the same thing as you makes a huge difference, it makes it more bearable.
Here’s a great story of a body confidence coach who shared her story with the world.
Meet Michelle
Michelle Elman calls herself a body confidence coach. She helps people deal with their body issues and learn to love themselves. She’s done a lot.
She has a podcast, a YouTube channel, and has even written a well-received memoir.
However, what she is most proud of is a recent campaign to give plus-size Asian women better representation in the world of fashion.
Her focus
It all started with an Instagram post she made. She was strongly expressing her disappointment with the plus-size community in the United Kingdom for excluding Asian women while still claiming to be pro-diversity.
In her post, she challenged anyone to visit any of the biggest plus size brands on Instagram and try to find a single Asian woman. She also points out how mainstream plus-size brands always leave out Asian women in the marketing campaigns, their websites, or even their sponsored posts. Her frustrations didn’t end there.
How it started
As an activist for plus size women, she would always notice that she was the only Asian woman invited to events. She argues that, in London, you won’t find a single plus size event that features Asian women.
Why? According to Michelle, it all happens because Asian women tend to be stereotyped as being petite. However, it doesn’t stop there. Michelle goes on to acknowledge that she felt forced to use the term “Asian” women even though it wrongly generalizes an entire continent made of very different cultures.
Liked
Man people liked the post and shared their own stories in the comment section regarding similar struggles they had endured.
Linda Blacker, a photographer who had worked with Michelle previously, reached out. She wanted to see if Michelle would be interested in helping create a campaign to show that plus-size Asian women deserve to be a part of mainstream media.
They found six more Asian women to model for the campaign, and it looked good, really good. Of course, it was shared.
On Instagram, the pictures got more than 23,000 likes while on Twitter, they had more than 5,300 likes and more than 1,900 retweets.
It didn’t just stop there. Publications like the Huffington Post, Stylist, and Glamour Magazine picked up her story. Even Good Morning America featured her campaign.
Please SHARE this with your friends and family.
Introspection
For Michelle, however, all the attention her campaign got reminded her of something else. In a separate post, she admits that her journey as an activist started out of anger and frustration.
She felt like the only way she could help Asian plus size women was to convince fashion brands to change.
She has since had a change of perspective. She feels that it would be more effective to use the tools and platforms she already has to remind many like her that they matter.
