Ashley Graham shut down a critic who said 'fat positivity' is 'getting out of hand' after she posed in a daring minidress

• A journalist criticized Ashley Graham after she posted photos of herself in a daring dress.
• "The fat positivity movement is getting out of hand," Sameera Khan said in a now-deleted tweet.

Supermodel Ashley Graham is encouraging others to embrace body positivity after she was criticized for wearing a bold outfit.

The controversy came after Graham wore a gold, backless minidress from Poster Girl to a friend's birthday party over the weekend. On Sunday, she posted a slideshow of her 2000s-inspired look on Instagram.

According to the Independent, Sameera Khan, a former Miss New Jersey who calls herself an "anti-woke journalist" in her Twitter bio, tweeted a photo of Graham in the dress on Monday and said, "The fat positivity movement is getting out of hand." The tweet has since been deleted.

Khan told Insider via Twitter message that she shared the tweet to criticize what she called "the entertainment industry's glorification of obesity through its promotion of the likes of Ashley Graham, Lizzo, etc."

In response to Khan's now-deleted tweet, Graham shared another photo of herself in the same shimmering dress with the caption, "Quote tweet this with a photo of you taking 'fat positivity' too far. I'll start."

As of Tuesday afternoon, Graham's tweet had nearly 3,500 quote tweets. Representatives for Graham did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

Supporters shared their own photos embracing "fat positivity" following Graham's tweet. And while some just shared photos without captions, others shared the backstories behind their images and thanked the model for her encouragement.

"Not overtly positive about my own body but here we go. Pitbull body man," one Twitter user wrote.

"This is the most recent picture of me taking 'fat positivity' too far. When I posted it, I cropped out below my neck. I need to stop doing that. And I need to take more pictures of ME. Thanks, Ashley," tweeted another user.

Khan told Insider that the public response is a "hilarious overreaction, but expected."

This was not the first time Graham has used comments by people who are critical of her to fuel a movement of positivity.

In September, she was public about the difficulties she had breastfeeding her twin boys, and how she had to "get over" the "stigma" of supplementing with formula. Graham has also encouraged followers to think of words like "big" in a more positive way, and she's been an outspoken advocate for embracing stretch marks for years.