Facebook removes 'feeling fat' emoticon for ‘normalizing body shaming’

Washington: A group called ‘Endangered Bodies’ along with many activists launched a campaign to persuade Facebook to remove the ‘feeling fat’ emoticon option from the list of its status options saying that it ‘normalizes body shaming’.

According to the Washington Post, the activists said that ‘fat’ is not a feeling adding that the status option can be especially harmful to people with eating disorders. A number of activists partnered with Endangered Bodies to post Change.org petitions, asking Facebook to remove ‘fat’ from its list of preloaded feelings.

The petition, which was signed by more than 16,000 people, was launched by a 24-year-old student at Ohio University in Athens who struggled with eating disorders while growing up. Facebook has a list of emoticons which users can choose from to let their friends know how they are feeling. Some of the options include excited, happy, sad, annoyed, maybe sick. Each feeling comes with its own emoticon.