I think it's mostly a good thing.

I don't really subscribe to the idea that promoting body positivity among overweight people will mean they're less likely to lose weight. Bc -
1. A good mental state is one of the most important aspects of losing weight. Feeling shit about yourself often drives overeating, or even makes you "give up" on losing weight.
2. There's still social pressures to lose weight, regardless of the body positivity movement. Skinny / normal weight people are treated more favourably when socialising, during job interviews, by strangers, etc - it's mostly unconscious on the part of the other person but it is a measurable effect. I can tell you from my own experience that strangers treated me better when I was underweight.
3. There's still health pressure to lose weight, and the body positivity movement is not advocated against this. Medical associations, government health advertising , individual GP consultations - we're always getting messages about how bad obesity is, as we should.

There are some extremists out there that try and argue "being overweight isn't bad for you" but they're in the minority.

Generally I think that it is a good thing as well. Everyone should be comfy in their own skin.But I do think that it can be bad, like if a person is encouraging a person to gain weight because big is beautiful. On the other hand you have pro-anorexia sites where extreme weight loss is glorified.

Everyone should feel good about themselves. But if a person wants to lose or gain weight I think that enabling comments like, 'but fat/skinniness' is beautiful could enable them or keep them from self-improvement. If that makes sense. Like I think that we should let people with weight gain or loss goals know that they should put in the effort to achieve those goals, but in the meantime they are still beautiful and loved as they are. I hope that that makes sense.


That said I agree with you on how body positivity doesn't =/= enabling. As you said, a good mental state can help with weight goals both gain and loss. And there's a lot of pressure to be skinny that can lead to damaging that confidence. To lecture and make larger people feel like shit is just as bad as enabling.

^ That's also true.