Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
The Schmooze

‘Shameless’ Actress Emmy Rossum Attacks Diet Culture

“Shameless” actress Emmy Rossum garnered 59.3K likes on her latest Instagram post and I can’t even get a text back.

The post reads: “Want to know what I Weigh?” with an accompanying caption that says: “@i_weigh BECAUSE YOU ARE SO MUCH MORE THAN A NUMBER.”

Her 3.3 million followers were probably expecting another one of Emmy’s intense kickboxing workouts. In lieu of that, she joined the “I Weigh movement” to list all of her outstanding qualities and showed viewers that the number on the scale doesn’t depict who you truly are on the inside. The Instagram movement started by “The Good Place” star Jameela Jamil aims to counter the beauty ideals imposed by social media by raising awareness of a woman’s worth and promoting body positivity.

A picture of herself sans makeup and post-workout became the backdrop for her laundry list of traits and values.

Some of her most prized blessings include:

3 Best Friends Since Kindergarten
Daughter
One happy marriage
3 episodes of television directed
JEWISH AND PROUD

Rossum wears her Jewish identity like a badge of honor. In 2016, before the 31-year-old married “Mr. Robot” creator Sam Esmail, she tweeted about her plight as a sexual assault survivor. First and foremost, she identified herself as a woman, followed by: “I am Jewish.” Emmy has said that her mother of Jewish Russian descent taught her the “Jewish code of ethics and morals.”

In her inspiring message, she goes on to say: “During my life the scale has told me that I’ve gained and lost and gained and lost. Somewhere in the range of 20 pounds. But that piece of metal doesn’t really know.” In a video message, Emmy urges her followers to join in on the movement because: “When you add everything you are, the size of your thighs don’t really matter anymore, do they?”

Bonnie Azoulay is an intern at The Forward.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at editorial@forward.com, subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.

Exit mobile version