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Abundant Bodies 2015 – Support Fat Community Projects

The Allied Media Conference will be happening June 19th – 21st and for the second year in a row the Abundant Bodies Media track will be part of the conference for the weekend. I’m one of the coordinators of the track for the year and we are currently fundraising to support our track, session presenters and participants. We’re not only hoping to help people out with travel expenses but to also pay presenters for the knowledge and time they will be giving throughout the weekend.

We have a TON of amazing perks including a fearless craft-a-thon with Marianne Kirby, a gift pack from Re/Dress, tarot readings, a mental health / chronic illness chat and more!

Please consider supporting and sharing our fundraiser with your networks.

The track was created and continues to be primarily ran by Women of Color, our sessions are also primarily ran by People of Color. Here is some more information about the track,

This year at the Allied Media Conference 2015 (June 18-21 in Detroit, MI) we are coming back together to continue our conversations, share skills, experiences, stories, media, knowledge and strategies to build a more beautiful, body accepting and abundant loving future!

ln this track we will gather, share and celebrate the wisdom and abundance of our bodies. Abundant / thick / fat bodies are the target of so much hate, policing and negativity, even in our organizing communities. How do we unlearn mainstream ideas of what a body should look like and (re)-learn to celebrate the diversity, resilience, wisdom and beauty of all bodies? How can we work together to deconstruct fat stigma and other forms of marginalization while building a stronger inclusive fat community? How can we challenge ourselves to decenter whiteness, capitalism, ableism, cissexism, heterosexism and classism while we explore what it means to be fat?

This track will explore these questions and create spaces to challenge the ongoing ways mainstream media shames and harms abundant bodies. Our goal in our organizing and activism is to create media and practical strategies for resistance, healing and community building. We will broaden the conversation around fat activism by centering this track on the voices of Indigenous, Black, People of Color, Dis/abled, Super-sized, Trans and Queer fat folks. Through workshops, panels and skillshares we will transform mainstream ideas around abundant bodies and create resilient communities utilizing different forms of media such as zines, theater, oral histories, poetry, social media, dance, comics, and art.

“Clark announced on June 5 that the busy Burrard Bridge will close for seven hours on June 21 for a yoga class sponsored by Lululemon and AltaGas.

The two companies are generous supporters of Clark’s Liberals, having donated a combined $36,785 over the last few years.

Now they will bask in tonnes of free publicity for a PR stunt that will not only burn taxpayers for 150 grand, but will also inconvenience drivers who cross the bridge 37,000 times every Sunday.

Lululemon just posted a quarterly profit of nearly $48 million, sending its stock soaring. AltaGas made $96 million profit last year.

Surely these wealthy corporations could come up with the 150 grand instead of sticking poor old taxpayers with the bill?

[…] Just so you know, the premier insisted on the event,” Vancouver city councillor Kerry Jang told an angry constituent, who copied me on their email exchange.

[…] But city officials were notably absent from Clark’s news conference, and staff told me Robertson will not attend the Burrard Bridge yoga class on June 21.

Calling All Abundant, Fat, Plus Sized, Succulent, and Thick Peoples From All Over!  

This year at the Allied Media Conference 2015 (June 18-21 in Detroit, MI) we are coming back together to continue our conversations, share skills, experiences, stories, media, knowledge and strategies to build a more beautiful, body accepting and abundant loving future!

ln this track we will gather, share and celebrate the wisdom and abundance of our bodies. Abundant / thick / fat bodies are the target of so much hate, policing and negativity, even in our organizing communities. How do we unlearn mainstream ideas of what a body should look like and (re)-learn to celebrate the diversity, resilience, wisdom and beauty of all bodies? How can we work together to deconstruct fat stigma and other forms of marginalization while building a stronger inclusive fat community? How can we challenge ourselves to decenter whiteness, capitalism, ableism, cissexism, heterosexism and classism while we explore what it means to be fat?

This track will explore these questions and create spaces to challenge the ongoing ways mainstream media shames and harms abundant bodies. Our goal in our organizing and activism is to create media and practical strategies for resistance, healing and community building. We will broaden the conversation around fat activism by centering this track on the voices of Indigenous, Black, People of Color, Dis/abled, Super-sized, Trans and Queer fat folks. Through workshops, panels and skillshares we will transform mainstream ideas around abundant bodies and create resilient communities utilizing different forms of media such as zines, theater, oral histories, poetry, social media, dance, comics, and art.

We are looking for sessions that speak to but are not limited by the following types of themes and proposals:

Fat Community 101

How to love your body

Ally building for thin folks and privileged fat folks

Body Autonomy and Social Media

Anti-racist fat activism for white fat activists

Skillshares/tools for surviving and thriving

Bodies, Health and Movement

Breaking down the connection between health and weight

Body movement / dance / practice for all bodies

Fat sexuality

Super-sized community members

Fatness at its intersections

Fatness and Femme identity

Fatness and masculinity

Sci-Fi Bodies as fat and queer and People of Color

Physical and mental disabilities and fatness

History of Indigenous / People of Color / Black / Trans / Dis/ability / Supersize fat activism

Tools for young fat folks

Breaking down discussions about obesity through race, class, gender and other identities

Fat Visibility

Constructing the fat body through collaborative media projects

Demystifying media around fat bodies

Cyber space/futurity and fat bodies

Challenging mainstream media

Rethinking Fat Fashion

Older fat bodies and visibility

Fat bodies and desirability

Oral history, poetry and other creative forms of resistance

Proposals are due March 2nd, 2015 at midnight. Submit YOURS by filling out the form linked here.

If you have any questions regarding your proposal or this track, please contact us via on the Abundant Bodies Discussion Page on AMP Talk or at [email protected].

**Abundant Bodies and the Allied Media Conference is committed to creating a space that allows for access to all community members regardless of economics. We will be fundraising in the near future to make sure we can support all of the session coordinators who need it in order to give as many voices in fat community the platform they deserve.

I’ve seen a lot of people either ask why Canadians should be talking about police brutality and racism when “it doesn’t happen here” or try to talk like Canada is so above this shit so here are a few examples

The Saskatoon Freezing Deaths or "Starlight Tours" where native people have been picked up by police, dropped outside of the city and abandoned, often resulting in a person freezing to death, have been documented from 1976 - 2003 but I wouldn’t be surprised if it happened a lot more often and has just gone unreported. Neil Stonechild, a Cree teenager, was found frozen to death in a field in 1990 and had last been seen cuffed in a police cruiser. Rodney Naistus and Lawrence Wegner, both native men, were found frozen to death in the same place in 2000, and the same place where Darrel Night, another native man, was left by police, although he survived and the cops were put in prison for 8 months. Two Worlds Colliding is a film about him.

John Joseph (J. J.) Harper, from the Wasagamack Indian Band in Manitoba, was killed by a cop in Winnipeg in 1988 who insisted that the gun went off accidentally, and was later exonerated.

Robert Dziekanski, a polish man immigrating to live with his mother in BC, was tasered to death in the Vancouver Airport by three cops in 2007. Eyewitnesses, including another traveller that took a video of the entire incident (which later went viral), led to the realization that the police had lied about the circumstances surrounding his death.

Dudley George an Ojibwe man murdered in 1995 by an Ontario Provincial Police officer while he was protesting for sacred burial land on which a military camp was built under the war measures act in WWII to be given back to the Stony Point First Nation in theIpperwash Crisis 

Frank Paul, a Mi’kmaq man from British Columbia, was arrested for public drunkenness and left in an alley by two cops, where he died of hypothermia in 1998

Crystal Taman, a mother of three in winnipeg, was killed in 2005 when an allegedly drunk, off duty cop rearended her vehicle.

Anthony Griffin, a black nineteen-year-old, was killed by a cop in Montreal in 1987, which led to discussions of the widespread racism and racial profiling that happens in Quebec and among Montreal police. At the time of his death, his killer had already had to pay fines after allegations of racism stemming from other incidents

Eric Osawe, a 26-year-old from Nigeria with two children, was shot in the back by a cop during an apartment raid in 2010 in Toronto. The police officer responsible for his death was charged with murder, but later exonerated

Duane Christian, a 15 year old black child, was killed in 2006 while driving a stolen minivan. He was shot at five times.

Junior Alexander Manon, an 18 year old black teenager, died in police custody in 2010 due to injuries caused by police in apprehending him and tackling him to the ground. Eyewitnesses, including one that was trained in first aid, said that one police officer had held his arms while another slapped his face, and that it was apparent he needed CPR which they did not perform.

Reyal Jensen Jardine-Douglas, a 25 year old African man with a history of mental illness, was shot and killed by police in 2010, after his family had called to have him taken to the hospital. this article names some other people shot by police under similar circumstances

Matthew Dumas, an Aboriginal 18-year-old, was shot and killed by police in Winnipeg in 2005 for carrying a screwdriver.

Phuong Na (Tony) Du, a 51 year old in Vancouver, was killed py police on November 22nd, 2014, for brandishing a piece of lumber.

You wanna pretend Australia is exempt? 

You wanna fucking forget your own terrible history to make yourself feel superior to the states? 

Don’t get too comfortable with your view of Australian cops as good people…

What has happened in Australia is fucking sickening

From 1990 until the Palm Island death in custody of Cameron Doomadgee or Mulrunji in September of 2004, 147 Indigenous people died in police custody in Australia.

Mulrunji was singing “Who Let The Dogs Out” and walking, then he was arrested, beaten by a police officer, and died in his cell.

John Peter Pat, a 16 year old Indigenous boy, was kicked in the head by a cop in a bar fight and died in his cell.

Thomas Hickey, a 17 year old Indigenous boy, died in 2004 after being impaled on a fence while riding his bike. Police officers say he got scared when he saw the cop car and sped up then fell, but eyewitness and the families attest that the police car was pursuing and then clipped him, which caused his accident. 

Ms Dhu, a 22 year old Indigenous woman, died in police custody while being held for unpaid parking fines. She was taken to the hospital twice, but did not see a doctor, and police ignored her cries over a series of days as she begged to be taken to the hospital. Her cause of death could not be determined

Edward James Murray, a 22 year old Indigenous man and avid rugby player, was found hanged in a cell only an hour after being picked up by police. It is unknown whether he committed suicide or whether someone killed him, but the circumstances were suspicious.

From 1990 til now, 340 Indigenous People have died in Custody

An Indigenous woman died in a mandatory alcohol rehab center in the Northern Territory this year. If a person is picked up 3 times for drunkenness in NT, they are forced to go into a treatment program.

Kwementyaye Briscoe, 27, died in 2012 after being dragged into a cell by an officer, suffering a head wound, and failing to be checked for two hours.

12 Year Old Dymond Milburn was severely beaten by 3 plainclothes police officers because they thought she was a prostitute. Even though they beat her with a flashlight and caused injuries to her head, spine, throat and ear, the cops charged her with assault.