In 2021, Aaron Beaumont decided it was time to create more queer connections in New Brunswick. While doing their undergrad at St. Thomas University in Fredericton, Beaumont’s work in fat studies led them to learn more about fat activism online. After realizing that most groups were based in the U.S., and the few Canadian groups […] More »

When I learned I had precancerous lesions on my cervix and that my doctor was recommending I remove them surgically, my reaction went as follows: One, muted panic. Two, I’m definitely going to die. Three, Wait, what does that even mean? So I did what anyone in possession of an Internet connection in 2021 would […] More »

Michelle Peek Photography courtesy of Bodies in Translation: Activist Art, Technology & Access to Life, Re•Vision: The Centre for Art & Social Justice at the University of Guelph. Fashion spaces have long excluded people who aren’t straight, white, cisgender, able-bodied men. But for many disabled folks, the field also represents opportunity—a place where it’s possible […] More »

Illustration by Diana Nguyen We practiced saying no in class. If a boy wants to have sex with you before you are married, you must be ready to steer the ship away from troubled waters. If you loved me, you’d have sex with me. If you loved me, you’d know I was waiting. Why? We’re […] More »

Illustration by Michelle Simpson I’ve been a high school teacher for 16 years now. That means I’ve spent roughly half my life in high school something I’d never have predicted as a teenager. All I wanted then was to get the hell out. I was a fat teen in the 1990s, when “heroin chic” was […] More »

Photo by ISTOCK/YNGSA The thought only seems to come in the mirror. It plays out staccato, like a chess game, tennis match, sword fight. It’s helping. No, it’s not. It could be. It’s obviously not helping. Look, the spot there, a bit back from the front, to the left—no, the right—it’s barer than before. OK. […] More »

Photo by Dimitri Nasrallah Dimitri Nasrallah’s Hotline (Véhicule Press) transports readers to mid-eighties Montreal when weight-loss centres were a burgeoning industry, and “body image” and “health consciousness” were terms just entering the vocabulary of self-care. Muna Heddad, a French teacher by trade, takes a job as a hotline phone operator at meal delivery company Nutri-Fort […] More »

Photo by XURZON; Design by Valerie Thai At least 595 people died in B.C. from heat-related deaths during the summer of 2021. Most of these occurred during the province’s “heat dome” event, which took place from June 25 to July 1, and saw temperatures rise as high as 49.6 degrees Celsius. Many climate activists and […] More »

In Scarborough, Ontario, in Cedarbrae Mall, down the escalator and across from the Dollarama, there’s Frugo, a store that feels very much like a flea market. There you’ll find an assortment of items that range from vintage to essential. A few years ago, I found a small orange faux leather handbag and modelled it in […] More »

I think about bodies all the time. As a person who lives with chronic illness. As a newly plus-size person. As a person who got pregnant in an unconventional way. As a person who grew up in a mixed-race family. As a parent with a kid entering adolescence. I think about bodies in a political […] More »

No joy is more fulfilling for me than shattering the expectations someone has of me. To be unpredictable is to be individualistic. And in my skin, standing alone as an individual gives me the chance to take solace in myself. Because I am an unambiguous Black woman in a predominantly white community, escaping the stereotypes […] More »