The images are all around us in the media – braless young women whose boobs appear to defy gravity…perfectly packaged in seductive outfits displaying their ample cleavage. Sometimes the boobs are real…. but most times these breasts have obviously been surgically enhanced…duh!
There is this expectation that when you’re young and you haven’t had a kid/haven’t breastfed, your breasts are supposed to be perfectly perky. Well a lot of the time, this isn’t the case.
This is why we are totally here for the #saggyboobsmatter online movement, which was started by 23-year-old British-Nigerian blogger, Chidera Eggerue.
Populary known as “the Slumflower,” Chidera started the movement in order to challenge unrealistic expectations of what breasts should look like, Buzzfeed News reports.
Speaking on what inspired her to start the movement, Chidera says, “a lack of representation of saggy-looking boobs when I used to go bra shopping in M&S [as a young teenager] made me realise that something is wrong with the way the world views women’s bodies. The packaging would always have a picture of a white woman with perky boobs, yet when I’d try on the same bra in my correct size, my boobs just wouldn’t look like the model pictured.”
This caused her to start feeling insecure about her boobs.
“It was so bad that at that age I had already decided that I’d get a boob job once I got my first job at 18. I reached 18 and didn’t get a job, let alone a boob job, so I continued self-loathing until I reached 19 and became tired of feeling like a stranger in my own body. I decided I’d had enough and made the choice to stop wearing a bra.
Fast-forward to 23: I’ve now reached a position of feeling comfortable in my body, but I wanted other women to feel like this, so I had to start the conversation by using my own body as an example.
Through creating #SaggyBoobsMatter, I have been able to help women articulate their own body image hangups – especially slim women who don’t really know where they stand in the body positivity movement,” she said.
Since July 2017, she has been sharing pictures of herself with no bra on, with captions that are brave, quirky, and inspirational. And although the feedback has been great in some instances, there have been lots of haters.
“Overall, I think the movement has been received with a lot of sarcasm and insults from men and a few confused women, which doesn’t surprise me.
This concerns me a lot because other women who look like me are seeing some of the horrible responses to this movement and are now probably feeling more insecure about their bodies when they see the vitriol I receive for showing up boldly and proudly.
Most of the responses have been horrible and disappointing, but I’ve learnt to not take them so personally.
Men are socialised to see women as vaginas that think, sometimes. Because of this, women’s bodies are picked apart as if we only exist to satisfy.
Women who condemn other women’s bodies are simply seeking comfort by aligning themselves with their oppressor, who will still use that very same patriarchal system to oppress them, too.”
She recounts that one of the most hurtful instances of being ridiculed online was when music producer, Don Jazzy, who has 3 million instagram followers, reposted a disrespectful meme in which her photo was featured.
“It was quite hurtful to see that a stranger had gone to my page, stolen a photo of me that I took on my birthday, and thought it would be a good idea to turn it into a meme comparing women to phone battery life.”
After she called him out, Don Jazzy apologized and deleted the post.
“For the women who look like me: Your saggy boobs matter. And from now until you die, what’s going to matter, ultimately, is your character. Sometimes people are scared of what they haven’t been taught to accept. We still have to exist loudly, though.”
