Oprah Winfrey, who recently confessed to taking weight loss medication to moderate her weight, continued to speak about the toxicity of diet culture. On the inaugural episode of the podcast The Jamie Kern Lima Show, Oprah revealed she was publicly mocked for her weight and hasn’t forgotten being mistreated in the industry.
During the podcast, talk show legend Oprah Winfrey, 70, recalled the most offensive remark about her weight, written by late critic Richard Blackwell, on a TV Guide cover. Oprah said that late critic Richard Blackwell gave her the title “bumpy, frumpy and downright lumpy” on the cover. Oprah noted she swallowed the insult “like it was a pill designed just for my body, and I took in all the shame.”
The talk show host revealed for years, she believed the insults from the media, adding, “I accepted that this thing that people have labelled me with–being fat, being overweight, being unable to control my willpower, not having any willpower–that’s my shame. That’s it. They’re right, they’re right.”
Oprah also recalled disparaging The Living Color skit that had the audiences laughing at her expense. Referencing the skit where Kim Wayans portrayed her, she said, “In Living Color had done a skit where the woman was doing something, and she just kept eating and getting fatter and fatter and fatter, and the comedy bit was that eventually she just exploded. The whole audience fell out [laughing], and the woman was me.”
During this time, Oprah recalled not attending a party hosted by Miami Vice actor Don Johnson, admitting, “I wouldn’t go because I thought I was too fat to go.”
Oprah said she no longer holds on to the shame she once had around her weight.
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