noahsingh's review

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4.5


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bashsbooks's review against another edition

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funny informative inspiring slow-paced

4.0

Happy Fat is a great introduction to fatphobia as a concept, and how to fight against it individually and systemically. It assumes that the reader has little to no interaction with or understanding of other kinds of social struggles, so it's good for folks that are newer to all sorts of movements and the idea of intersectionality altogether. It helped me evaluate my relationship to my body, and more importantly, it opened my eyes to struggles that fat people faced that I'd never considered before - like being unable to wipe in a small bathroom stall or being injured by too-small airplane seats. Also, Hagen is a comedian, and this book is injected with her great sense of humor. 

That said, I do have a few small gripes with this book. It's full of words that describe complex and nuanced things, but it doesn't have much room for many explanations (although Hagen does her best to provide definitions for many of them). This creates kind of a confusing buzzword effect, especially if you're not familiar with a lot of this language (thankfully, I knew most of these words beforehand). Jumping off of this, Hagen makes a lot of references to those with experiences she doesn't personally have - for example, being a person of color or being transgender. I appreciate the interviews with fat people who have these characteristics, but as a transgender person myself, there are moments where it feels like her understanding of gender has not fully surpassed that of the average liberal white woman. That is disappointing. (She has a joke where she uses the word "non-men" and talks about putting all the men in jail so the "non-men" can have fun. I'm not a fan of this new binary.) 

Overall, this is a very educational book, and I am glad I read it. It was good start for educating me about fat liberation, and I can't wait to get into some of the other media Hagen recommends. I'm also going to check out some of her comedy.

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kylieqrada's review against another edition

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funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted medium-paced

4.5

4.5 ⭐️s. I have no idea why I put off reading this for so long - it was a DELIGHT. I love Sofie and have followed them on IG for a long time. I even have a signed picture of them and their dog on my fridge. This book, while at times repeating alot of information I already knew, was a good reminder for me in many ways. It was also freaking hilarious and had me outright laughing at multiple points. 

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alys055's review against another edition

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challenging emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

5.0

If I could make everyone read one book, it would be this one. If your considering it, ot's definitely worth the read.

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