Fat Shaming in Second Life, and the June and Jonathan Piggu Mesh Avatars

All my life, from childhood on, I have struggled with my weight. At the moment I am at my heaviest, and it does bother me a great deal. Losing weight is so hard; keeping it off is even harder! I need to haul my raggedy ass back to Weight Watchers…

I want to make this very clear: everybody has the right to choose the avatar that they feel best represents them! In no way do I want to tell people what to do with their own avatar appearance. You do what you want!

I do have two avatars who are fat like me; one uses the Piggu June female mesh avatar, and the other is the Piggu Jonathan male mesh avatar. I love trotting them out to events where everybody else looks like a fashion model who hasn’t eaten in a month 😉

In Second Life, there is a mesh avatar body and clothing store that is unashamedly up-front with its negative opinions about fat people (I’m not going to post a SLURL, although you can probably figure out the store from the photograph):

Fat Shaming in Second Life.png

According to this blogpost by Wagner James Au of the blog New World Notes, this was the site of a recent protest by people who were offended by this sales approach. I wish I knew about it at the time; I would have joined the protest!

Piggu 2 21 May 2018.png

My avatar is wearing:

Mesh Head and Body, Glasses, T-shirt and Shoes: Piggu June mesh avatar (L$700 from the SL Marketplace)

Hair: Sakura hair from Argrace (free group gift)

Jeans: June’s denim jeans (L$100 from the SL Marketplace)

AO: (Almost) Still AO for Fat Girls by Voir (L$350 from the SL Marketplace)

TOTAL COST OF THIS AVATAR: L$1150

And here is my Jonathan avatar:

Piggu 4 21 May 2018.png

He is wearing:

Mesh Head and Body, Glasses and Hair: Piggu Jonathan mesh avatar (L$700 from the SL Marketplace)

Shirt, Pants, Sneakers and Watch: Jonathan’s Techwear outfit (L$200 from the SL Marketplace)

AO: Fat Boy mini AO by Voir (L$300)

TOTAL COST OF THIS AVATAR: L$1200

If you wish to support the creator of the Piggu avatar system, here is her Patreon page, and a link to her store on the SL Marketplace. She also has a Facebook page.

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7 thoughts on “Fat Shaming in Second Life, and the June and Jonathan Piggu Mesh Avatars”

  2. I won’t lie, if that were me at that store with the type of avi they’re “protesting,” I’d be up there on the display with the mannequins giving people the bird. >(

  3. Huzzah, Ryan! I’m trying to address the same body image issues with my shop. These Piggu avatars are an interesting answer to the dilemma. I’m so glad there’s a choice!

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  5. I have both them as well, I just wish they would make more skins for them , so they look little less plastic and be keeping up with some of the realism that SL now has to offer in mesh , I know it cost a small fortune in the making and modding , and I can’t wait for the new Jamie avi to be release and its companion female as well rather excited about that ,

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  7. I’m an old man in SL yet I’m 22 years old. I created and avi that is fun. No one is forcing you to appear be overweight in SL Make a avi how you would want to see yourself as if you were not overweight. You’re so self conscious about your real life weight problem but you buy avis that keeps you in that constant state of depression about your weight. Now a days in SL the trend all about how big of a butt they can get. LOL Very few males want to appear overweight. It’s a woman’s thing to want to appear over weight.

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