Tess Munster is one of the most outspoken advocates of the ‘body positive’ mantra currently thanks to becoming of the top models in the world. Thanks to her size.
Tess is American born and raised and admits to being bullied terribly as a child because of her weight. It was her disabled mother who encouraged her to believe in herself and her own beauty and later she decided to pursue a career in modelling. Last year, she was named by Italian Vogue as one of the top six plus-size models in the world.
Tess now considers herself to be both model and ‘body positive’ activist, creating the popular hashtag #EffYourBeautyStandard, a body positive tag on which there are almost 400,000 photo entries of women, most not of the standard size zero. Photos come from all over the world, showing women in poses and states of beauty – their own ideals of beauty which do not necessarily correspond with the beauty industries.
She admits to working out with a trainer four times a week, she walks, swims, even hikes, doing more exercise than your average size zero, putting paid to the idea that ‘plus size must be unhealthy’. She also admits to receiving “sometimes hundreds” of negative comments and trolls on a daily basis.
She explains on the show that she understands that not everyone gets her , or understands what she’s about. However to her, it’s incredibly simple. “It’s all about loving your body regardless of your size and chasing your dreams.” And that’s an idea that we all have in common and everyone should understand without too much thought.
Check out the inspiring interview below.
