The world could always stand to be a little kinder, but for Scottish OnlyFans star Summer Robert, she’s learned that far too many people didn’t absorb the classic lesson of “if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all” from Bambie even a little. Summer lives with macromastia, a rare medical condition that causes her breasts to continually grow, meaning that her everyday life contains more than her fair share of physical and emotional struggle.
“I don’t go places alone anymore because of the cat calls, woman look at me with disgust and judge me, I can’t find clothes that fit me. I can’t do physical activity without my back being in pain,” says Summer. She’s learned how to navigate through unwanted attention from men, but Summer says that other women (middle aged and older white women, to be particular) are the worst perpetrators when it comes to dishing out undeserved hostility. Summer says, “Men are simple. They look at me, then either look away or say something, but it’s never something deeply offensive. Women look at me, and insult me and my character. I get a lot of women calling me a whore, attention seeker, slut. I’ve had women throw drinks over me in bars. I always just respond with kindness now because it shocks them.”
Summer has a theory that the sight of a young woman who is confident in and comfortable— back pain aside— in her own body triggers a deep sense of resentment in an older generation that was taught to hate their bodies. “I think a lot of older women who are already unhappy with their lives react out of jealousy. When they see a young woman who’s genuinely confident in her body, it makes them angry because they were raised to hate their own bodies and to live with that bitterness. Seeing someone who actually likes their body feels threatening because it’s different.”
According to Summer, the persistent backlash from women alone was so draining that she turned to full-time content creation so that she could fully control her working environment. Prior to OnlyFans, Summer was in the service industry, and her appearance received no shortage of resentment, professional sabotage, and even violence from female customers. In one incident, a woman threw a drink on her while she was serving her and her husband, and Summer remembers the woman’s reaction being not only immediate, but entirely focused on her chest. “She was like, ‘He doesn’t want to look at your boobs, he doesn’t want to see it.’ And I was like, ‘I’m just trying to get a tip, I don’t care.’” Summer believes that the woman’s visceral response is a reflection of a deeper problem: a lack of connection with her husband. “They’re married to someone who probably doesn’t even like them, and they’re having an awful time. That sucks for them, but they should grow up, don’t take it out on me.”
Summer may have left the service industry for OnlyFans, but the animosity has continued to follow her. During a recent trip at the Getty in Los Angeles, women continued to complain about Summer’s appearance. A staff member even approached her to let her know that guests were complaining that she was “getting her boobs out and jumping up and down.” Summer was baffled, saying “I was literally just taking pictures. Do you think jumping is easy? I can’t jog, I’d give myself a black eye!”
Even at the happiest place on Earth, Summer faced discrimination because of how she looks. While at Disneyland in California, she was told by a male staff member that he’d received complaints about her outfit. When asked, he indicated that there didn’t seem to be anything wrong with her appearance, but then angry female staff member told Summer that she needed to “cover up or leave.” Apparently even though she was fully clothed and dressed similarly to other people at the park, other guests complaining about her outfit meant that Summer wasn’t welcome. That same staff member followed Summer and her friends into a store outside the park, which seems incredibly unfair, given the fact that her condition causes excessive breast growth that is fully beyond her control. Summer described the whole experience as degrading, and humiliating. “I don’t think Disney is a place I’ll ever feel comfortable in again. Especially not the California one,” says Summer. I can’t say I blame her.
Being a traveler has helped Summer to have a clear understanding of where to anticipate the most open hostility. When she’s home in Scotland or in England, there’s subtle disapproval, “tutting,” and the occasional dirty look. In these United States? Yikes on bikes. People’s reactions are much more vocal, but it varies sharply from region to region. “In LA, people will just say stuff. In Nashville, they’re taught to hold their tongue. They’ll just stare instead,” says Summer. While in the Southern US, Summer had a case of emotional whiplash one day. “I had older Black women come up to me and say, ‘Yes, you did that! You look so good!’ and the same day, a white Southern Baptist told me, ‘You need to cover up, that’s not right. That’s disgusting.’”
Summer says that over time, she’s more or less become immune to the noise, but she’s not afraid to dish it back out. “I just ignore it,” she says. “But if it gets to the point where someone won’t stop, I’ll throw out a snarky comment.” Summer says that her favorite method of shutting people down is returning their ire with unwanted life advice. “I’ll say, ‘Go have sex or something.’ You need sex to have a good time. If you’re not getting laid, you’re bitter.” I have to give her props for that one, I bet that shuts rude people up real fast!
Summer’s condition is ongoing, the growth does not stop. She even consulted a breast reduction surgeon who warned her that the procedure might not be effective long-term. Says Summer, “He said, ‘I’ve had patients without your condition whose breasts grew back, that’s just a risk you’d have to take.’ And I was like, ‘What’s the point then? They’d just come back.’” When asked what she would say to judgemental women if she knew they’d listen, Summer says “I would tell them to look at their biggest insecurity and imagine someone always commenting on that.”
Summer’s managed to turn her condition into a lucrative content creation business, and knows that for every angry woman with a drink in her hand, there are millions more who are willing and eager to pay to follow her story. Even so, there’s no call to openly berate someone for an aspect of their appearance that they have no control over. When asked if she would change anything about the way people perceive her, Summer says that “I would just make people nicer.” Here’s to hoping that more people start acting with kindness instead of letting their own bitter insecurities ruin someone else’s day.
