Lizzo says she is accepting that she is a body icon more and more every day.
In a conversation with People she said:
“I think I have a really hot body! I’m a body icon, and I’m embracing that more and more every day,” says Lizzo,
“It may not be one person’s ideal body type just like, say, Kim Kardashian might not be someone’s ideal, but she’s a body icon and has created a modern-day beauty standard,” she tells PEOPLE.
“And what I’m doing is stepping into my confidence and my power to create my own beauty standard. And one day that will just be the standard.”
“I deserve the spotlight,” Lizzo tells PEOPLE. “I deserve the attention. I’m talented, I’m young, I’m hot. You know? And I’ve worked hard.”
“I grew up in a family that was very proud of our Blackness,” she says.
Her parents told her the truth about the Black experience in America. “I don’t think my dad wanted to tell us about the gruesome murders that happen to Black people all the time,” she says.
“But Black parents have this responsibility to let their children know what can happen.
They taught me at a very young age how America treats Black people. How it treats Black women. And I saw very quickly how we treat fat people.”
Lizzo admits becoming aware of it all made her “cynical” at first, but as she found success, she decided to flip the script.
“I was like, ‘OK, what can I do with this? How can I make the best of this? I wasn’t supposed to survive. I wasn’t supposed to make it this far.
I wasn’t supposed to be a millionaire. I wasn’t supposed to be a sex symbol.
I wasn’t supposed to be on the cover of PEOPLE, but I am. So how can I make this worthwhile? How can I make this not just a flash in the pan?’ ”
As Lizzo’s music took off—she’s earned three Grammys, two Soul Train Awards and millions of fans—her body became a topic of conversation. “Okay, we all know I’m fat,” she says with a sigh.
“I know I’m fat. It doesn’t bother me. I like being fat, and I’m beautiful and I’m healthy.
So can we move on?”
Lizzo lists the stereotypes women like her face: “The funny, fat friend. I played that trope in high school. Or the friend who is gonna beat your ass ’cause she’s big.
Or it’s the big girl who’s insecure ’cause she’s big.” She pauses. “I don’t think I’m the only kind of fat girl there is.
I want us to be freed from that box we’ve been put in.”
