Aubrey Gordon (born 1983), also known as Your Fat Friend, is an author, podcaster, and activist. She writes about fatness, fat acceptance, and anti-fat bias, and her podcast, Maintenance Phase, focuses on the poor science behind health and wellness fads.

Early Life and Education

Aubrey Gordon was raised in Portland, Oregon. Growing up, she attended a mix of public and private schools. Gordon studied for two years at

Portland State University Portland State University (PSU) is a public research university in Portland, Oregon, United States. It was founded in 1946 as a post-secondary educational institution for World War II veterans. It evolved into a four-year college over the next ...

before transferring to

Brown University Brown University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. It is the List of colonial colleges, seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the US, founded in 1764 as the ' ...

Career

Before beginning her writing career, Gordon was an

LGBTQ LGBTQ people are individuals who are lesbian, Gay men, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or questioning (sexuality and gender), questioning. Many variants of the initialism are used; LGBTQIA+ people incorporates intersex, Asexuality, asexual, ...

community organizer Community organizing is a process where people who live in proximity to each other or share some common problem come together into an organization that acts in their shared self-interest. Unlike those who promote more-consensual community buil ...

. After an argument with a friend about the differences between thin and fat people's relationships with their own bodies, Gordon wrote a letter to the friend to try to convey her thoughts. She shared it to a different friend to get feedback on whether the letter came off as rude, and her friend asked her to post it online so he could share it. Gordon, who was concerned about her professional reputation after beginning a new job, shared the letter anonymously with the name "Your Fat Friend." The letter was widely read, and Gordon decided to keep writing and posting essays about fatness, and hate and discrimination directed toward fat people. Gordon writes a regular column for ''

Self In philosophy, the self is an individual's own being, knowledge, and values, and the relationship between these attributes. The first-person perspective distinguishes selfhood from personal identity. Whereas "identity" is (literally) same ...

'' magazine. She also publishes essays on

Medium Medium may refer to: Aircraft *Medium bomber, a class of warplane * Tecma Medium, a French hang glider design Arts, entertainment, and media Films * ''The Medium'' (1921 film), a German silent film * ''The Medium'' (1951 film), a film vers ...

, and has written for publications including '' Vox'' and ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

.'' Gordon remained anonymous for five years. In October 2020, just before publishing her first book, she revealed her identity and began including her name in bylines. The following month, she published the book ''What We Don't Talk About When We Talk About Fat'', which focuses on fatness and anti-fat bias. Since October 2020, Gordon and Michael Hobbes have co-hosted the podcast '' Maintenance Phase.'' They use the show to debunk the myths and "

junk science Junk science is spurious or fraudulent scientific data, research, or analysis. The concept is often invoked in political and legal contexts where facts and scientific results have a great amount of weight in making a determination. It usually con ...

" behind health, nutrition, and wellness trends, and have discussed topics including popular

diets The Low Countries comprise the coastal Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta region in Western Europe, whose definition usually includes the modern countries of Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands and parts of Northern France. Both Belgium and the ...

and

diet food Diet food (or dietetic food) refers to any food or beverage whose recipe is altered to reduce fat, carbohydrates, and/or sugar in order to make it part of a weight loss program or Dieting, diet. Such foods are usually intended to assist in weigh ...

s, anti-fat bias, and

eating disorder An eating disorder is a mental disorder defined by abnormal eating behaviors that adversely affect a person's health, physical or mental health, mental health. These behaviors may include eating too much food or too little food. Types of eatin ...

s. Gordon's second book, ''“You Just Need to Lose Weight”: And 19 Other Myths About Fat People'', was published on January 10, 2023, by Beacon Press. A documentary following Gordon's life in 2020 and 2021, '' Your Fat Friend'', directed by

Jeanie Finlay Jeanie Finlay is a British film director, producer, screenwriter, and artist from Stockton-on-Tees. Early life Finlay was born to an English mother and a Scottish father, who worked in life insurance. Her mother encouraged her artistic, creativ ...

, was released in 2023. It premiered at the 2023 Tribeca film festival.

Personal life

Gordon describes herself as "very fat." She identifies as

queer ''Queer'' is an umbrella term for people who are non-heterosexual or non- cisgender. Originally meaning or , ''queer'' came to be used pejoratively against LGBTQ people in the late 19th century. From the late 1980s, queer activists began to ...

. , she lived in

Portland Portland most commonly refers to: *Portland, Oregon, the most populous city in the U.S. state of Oregon *Portland, Maine, the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maine *Isle of Portland, a tied island in the English Channel Portland may also r ...

Oregon Oregon ( , ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is a part of the Western U.S., with the Columbia River delineating much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while t ...

Works

* *

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Gordon, Aubrey 1983 births 21st-century pseudonymous writers 21st-century American women writers 21st-century American non-fiction writers Activists from Portland, Oregon American health and wellness podcasters Fat acceptance activists American LGBTQ rights activists Living people Pseudonymous women writers American queer women American queer writers Writers from Portland, Oregon 21st-century American LGBTQ people American women podcasters