Southport woman body-shamed after women’s march on Washington

WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) — A Southport woman is speaking out after she was body-shamed online in social media posts seen across the nation.

Elizabeth Flora had just gotten done marching in Washington DC Saturday when she saw this picture of her going viral on Twitter.

“At first, I actually kind of felt pride, because it’s like yeah, obviously we made an impression,” Flora said.

The tweet by David A. Clark, Jr., the Sheriff of Milwaukee County in Wisconsin says, “An absolute freak show. P-T Barnum should have delayed the announcement to shut down.”

“The tweet itself is not very upsetting, because it’s not a good joke,” Flora said. “It’s just disappointing, because it’s a public official.”

Flora sent him a response.

“Just to remind him, you know, even though it took you a second to send that tweet, I’m still living my life,” Flora said. “You know I’m still going day-to-day. I’m still a human being.”

A writer at Breitbart also used her photo on Facebook. The collaboration of pictures of all different types of women said, “These women want free birth control.” It garnered a million views and thousands of responses. Many of them were negative and hurtful.

She said these pictures and comments are exactly why she was marching with thousands of other women that day.

“To focus on someone’s appearance instead of their message, you know–what I was there for seemed very, exactly why we were marching, because we’re not here to look pretty for you 100 percent of the time,” Flora said. “We’re here to make an impact.”

That is why Flora is not letting them impact her.

Flora said she e-mailed the sheriff and a few of the city officials in Milwaukee about the tweet. She said so far she has not gotten a response.