Walking into a championship fight, a man in the stands yelled “that’s the black girl who came here to get knocked out.”
Fredia Gibbs was often bullied for her athletic frame, as Western beauty standards systemically put girls like Gibbs in a bubble. Luckily for the Pennsylvania native, she had a family who helped build her confidence.
Gibbs once said, “My grandmother’s] words were like magic: ‘God blessed you with that body. You have something special to do with that body.’” Her grandmother encouraged her to embrace her athletic frame, and after training in martial arts with her uncle, it sparked her promising kickboxing career.
In 1994, Gibbs became the first Black female kickboxing world champion, proving the hecklers in the stands wrong. Now, she teaches free self-defense lessons to her community, and wants to be a role model for children who also experience bullying.
Gibbs was a rare talent in martial arts, but many women deal with the pressure of conforming their physical appearance to Western standards. True liberation and acceptance comes when we realize that all of us are beautiful in our Blackness.