(Courtesy Hachette Book Group)

Lindy West

(Courtesy Hachette Book Group)

The book cover for "Shrill: Notes from a Loud Woman"

The writer Lindy West is not afraid to bring up complex topics, like sexism, racism and abortion.

She’s probably best known for being part of what’s called the fat acceptance movement,” which is trying to change social attitudes toward weight. West was in Phoenix last night to promote her new book, “Shrills: Notes From a Loud Woman,” at Changing Hands Bookstore. KJZZ’s Stina Sieg was there.

Interview highlights:

On humor as way to communicate tough messages:

"It's a lot easier to get them to read those things if you make the article really funny. And then people just send it around and say 'hey read this funny article,' and then secretly you are consuming some tougher notions that you might not otherwise seek out on your own."

The goal of West's body positive writing:

"What I want to do is abolish these societal expectations that say if you have a body that deviates from this one very, very specific ideal then you're garbage and you need to apologize and you need to torment yourself. That's what I want to get rid of."

Will she write about it forever? 

"I don't know. I hope that I don't have to write about it forever. Because I already feel like I'm writing the same article over and over and over. It just says 'please respect me and my humanity and treat me as a person' and there's only so many ways you can say that."