This Woman Is Calling Out Those Who Think She And Her Husband's Relationship "Doesn't Make Sense" Just Because Their Bodies Are Different
Alicia McCarvell, a self-love advocate with a massive following of 5.4 million on TikTok, has been with her husband Scott for 16 years.
Recently, the high school sweethearts shared an endearing video where they showed off their wedding guest attire by transitioning from towels...
...to their evening glam:
It's a common video style found throughout TikTok, but Alicia's clip — which garnered over 40.3 million views — was met with an onslaught of hateful comments centering around her and her husband's bodies.
Nearly 70,000 people have weighed in on the couple's clip. In the comments, there's a range of people who are far too concerned about another person's relationship and/or body, and others who offer words of support for the pair and praise their stunning outfits. After two days of back and forths, Alicia shared another video responding to abhorrent comments:
"I posted a simple transition video of me and my husband going from towels to dressed up together," she started. "This is not unlike what all kinds of different couples do on this app. My video went viral, and I think we all know why. It's because, by beauty standards, we don't make sense."
"The world looks at us and immediately values Scott more than me, and since we don't 'add up,' people try to add things to my side of the equation to 'make it make sense' by saying things like, 'Oh, she must not have been fat when they met' or 'She's got to be rich,'" Alicia continued. "Or they try to decrease his side of the equation by saying things like, 'He must be gay' or 'He fetishes fat women.'
"We've been made to believe that somebody who is physically fit like Scott could never in a million years be in love with or compatible with a fat woman. And that's solely because the world has literally taught us that we have to value our worth [based] on our bodies."
Alicia went on to explain that, after her video went viral, an unnamed woman slid into Scott's DMs and told him that he should be with someone who looks like her — thin. "Here's the thing, though," the 32-year-old pointed out. "Me telling myself for the majority of our relationship that I'm not worthy of his love because of my body is the exact same thing as this thin woman telling him that she is worthy of him because of her body.
"I'm under-valuing myself, and she is overvaluing herself. We have both been made to believe that our value lies in our body."
"When people slide into his DMs, they're leading with their body first. And on the scale of what my husband values, how well my body fits into the beauty standard is not at the top of his list. He values my humor and my commitment and my love and my caring heart — and none of these things he values about me changes when my body changes.
"So when someone slides into his DMs leading with their body first, he's asking, 'But what else?' Because he, like I, know that people's values don't lie in how well their bodies fit into society's trash beauty standards.
"And I get it. If this is the way you think, it's the way you've been taught. However, it is your responsibility to unlearn it."
You can view Alicia's full response video here.