Australian of the Year a win for body acceptance, but there’s still work to be done

Brumfitt, 45, went viral in 2014 when she shared a side-by-side of her bikini-clad body during a bodybuilding competition, and after, slightly heavier but visibly happier. Since then, Brumfitt has become an advocate for body acceptance, founding The Body Image Movement and producing two documentaries, Embrace and Embrace Kids.

While Hélène-Horton welcomes Brumfitt’s appointment, praising her work as “significant and meaningful”, she hopes this is an opportunity for us to widen the conversation around body image. Being white, able-bodied, and relatively thin, Hélène-Horton suggests Brumfitt is a “relatable” face of the body acceptance movement who represents the core demographic her message is trying to reach.

She hopes Brumfitt’s “relatability” will put audiences in a position in which they are able to receive a message about body acceptance from people who occupy other kinds of bodies.

Worimi woman Dr Liz Dale celebrates Brumfitt and her work, but says “she occupies a position of privilege,” and is promoting body acceptance from a western perspective.

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“Indigenous people still live below the poverty line, still experience racism, and are not represented in the media,” she says. “We’re still fighting to be part of the constitution and still fighting to be recognised.” As a result, Dale says that Indigenous people don’t yet have the privilege of participating in body positivity.

And, she adds, “It’s still not safe for us to put our bodies out there, as the call from the body positivity movement implores.” The body positivity movement will not be for Indigenous people until we achieve equity in our society, she says.

Like Hélène-Horton, Dale says it’s important that Brumfitt also promotes a message “for Indigenous peoples, in favour of Indigenous peoples,” and “raise awareness to the fact there’s a lack of understanding of how body image issues are understood outside of a western framework.”

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