Confidence is dead. And I killed it.
Because as the ball dropped in Times Square, so did my tolerance for “confidence.” I know—a plus-size Black woman rejecting confidence? The truth is, confidence is the one thing people both expect and reject from plus-size women. We’re supposed to be confident, but not too confident, because how dare you feel good about yourself if you’re not pursuing thinness? We’re supposed to love ourselves loudly, but only if that love doesn’t make anyone else uncomfortable. We’re supposed to feel empowered, but only if that empowerment makes other people feel better about their own insecurities.
We can’t want clothes our size, we can’t want better treatment from airlines, we can’t want accurate medical care, or dignity, or ease. But we better be confident. Because if we’re not, the whole illusion falls apart. If we’re not, people might have to confront their own bias that lets them pretend “confidence” is the cure.
To be completely honest with you, confidence is corny now. It’s been co-opted, commodified, filtered, packaged, and sold back to us through clothing brands who don’t even make plus-sizes. It’s all a performance. A song and dance. An eight count for TikTok that goes viral enough for people to think we’re making some sort of progress in dismantling fatphobia. But we’re not. We haven’t been for a while. We’ve just gotten better at performing the illusion that we are.
So that’s exactly why, when the clock struck midnight on January 1, I kissed confidence goodbye and said hello to cockiness.
The great thing is society already embraces cockiness—just not from women. Suddenly cockiness becomes “arrogance.” “Delusion.” “Doing too much.” But everybody’s favorite NFL linebacker is allowed to be cocky. We prefer him to be. And that’s actually where I first embraced cockiness: playing football.
I was the only girl on the team, going up against offensive lineman at other schools who were bigger, faster, louder, and convinced I didn’t belong. I showed up every game wearing my shiny cobalt blue cleats, pink headband, and red lipstick that my coach would usually make me wipe off.
Every workout, every practice, every game was a small act of rebellion. I wasn’t just playing football; I was learning my true power. And when I got double-teamed, I flipped my hips and kept my feet moving with the kind of self-assurance that makes people pause and reconsider their assumptions. I learned to laugh, even when I got pinned to the ground. I learned to smile, even when other teams would try to make me cry. I learned that being cocky doesn’t mean being cruel or flashy—it means knowing your worth, even if the world doubts it.
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