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New York, 3:46 AM
Tue Nov 10
67 posts in the last 24 hours
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04/30/09
On one hand, I completely agree that we need to be more accepting of different body types and it is totally possible to be overweight or obese and completely healthy. I've known regular marathon runner with BMIs that would classify them as obese, I get it.
On the other hand, we do have a skyrocketing obesity rate that the general medical community thinks will lower our longevity considerably in a generation. Fat activists often brush past this with "My whole family is heavy, not everyone is meant to be a size 2!" No reasonable doctor says that the only way to be healthy is to be stick thin and we are eating more food than we did in the 70s. The whole country didn't just get a new genetic code.
04/30/09
04/30/09
Did you miss the whole discussion?
You write like you've missed every post on this issue since the dawn of Jezebel, and certainly all the ones this past couple of weeks.
I have a sneaking feeling you sometimes think I'm unnecessarily obnoxious, so I won't point you to a few of my comments upthread about corn subsidies and the food pyramid having been supervised by the Department of Ag, not any doctor, and HFCS and the hormones in American food that the Europeans have banned and the sedentary extended-hour workweeks that the Europeans don't have, and rebound weight gain from eating disorder recovery due in part to narrow, unreasonable, unnecessarily tiny and conformist sizes for American women, with which, as a dancer and martial artist, I have an uncomfortable amount of personal experience.
Just go read Kate (and FJ and SM's blog). You're an intellectual. You may even enjoy it.
www.kateharding.net
(P.S. One of the blog's principal writers is thin. So is one of their frequent guest posters. I won't tell you which one, though.)
04/30/09
Also part of the problem is that what people are worried about are chronic disease, which cost a lot more to treat than most infectious diseases.
@Rooo sez BISH PLZ: I didn't read the 100 comment thread until after I posted.
I know all about the food pyramid and ag subsidies. I have a masters in public health. And I feel a decent amount of the studies hyped in the fat acceptance studies are overhyped or misread. A lot of it is true, but there isn't a distnction made between an individual's weight and a society's weigh. The EU is on the same path as us, just a little further behind, even with their less altered food.
04/30/09
05/01/09
I would posit that that would be, at least in part, because they're beginning to get more and more both food and "lifestyle" imports from us, in an effort to keep up with the global economy.
Didn't you read about how the obesity rates started to rise in Italy, France, and China once McDonald's was permitted to establish itself in capital cities?
Did you read about how provinces in India didn't want to let them in at all?
*sigh*
Oh, well, never mind. I wasn't even talking about this particular 100-comment thread. I was talking about things like the fact that Kate and her co-writers have been talking about this for, like, years or so. I wasn't talking only about the discussions on Jezebel.
And whatever you believe or don't believe about studies that support a POV that opposes yours, the same types of things can be said about studies that support your POV -- especially when you check the funding sources of these studies and find that they're paid for by corporations like Weight Watchers, and the pharma that manufactures Alli.
(Somehow, I just don't get the feeling you've cared to checked those sources.)
Lies, d*mn lies, statistics. Any data can be manipulated.
You say you have a Masters in Public Health. You should know.
(It amazes me how many data-heads who insist their arguments are "grounded in logic" can't seem to wrap their minds around that concept.)
Also, I read what you said about portion sizes getting bigger. I do agree with you about restaurant portion sizes, but I can't believe
1) that you wouldn't follow the money chain as restaurants take advantage of Americans' extended workweeks and the manufactured national obsession with "getting our money's worth" (in a reversal of the trend, did you notice that once McD's began to post their nutrition information, the SuperSize option generated less and less revenue until it was removed from many menus?), as at least partial rationales for those portion increases; and
2) that you would completely ignore what I mentioned about some of the who struggle(d) with eating disorders NOT EATING AT ALL for as long as 5 and 6 days at a time (and the rebound weight gain that can result from that, and the distorted notions of "required" feminine frailty that contribute to their widespread and continued proliferation. These things may originate in neurotransmitter imbalances, but they don't just flourish in a psychological and cultural vacuum, and I really wish people like you sheltered MPH types -- as opposed to the IMPH types who attempt a little intersectional analysis -- would stop pretending that they do. Waving credentials around in the air with no attempt at practical application doesn't impress me so much).
But never mind. I see your mind is made up.
I wouldn't want to confuse you with something so unsettling to your worldview as, you know, um, facts.
I do have to note that it's a little disturbing to see what closed minds TPTB appear to be purportedly gilding with the MPH degree, though.
Nice degree. Real shame.
05/01/09
For reasons I hope are obvious above, I believe the "movement", such as it is, is more inclusively referred to as "Size Acceptance" as opposed to "Fat Acceptance" (with which stance some of the "movement"'s more militant members have arguments, but that's a corollary issue).
What I want to know is this -- when a Size Acceptance activist approaches you and says, "You know, a central tenet of the movement is that human beings of all sizes should be treated like human beings (e.g., not actively - and, I might add, documentably - discriminated against for employment, not to have trash thrown at them from moving cars when they go out to walk or bike for exercise)" --
what's the first thing you say to them?
To someone who says to you "Human beings of all sizes should be treated like human beings", do you say -- like you say here -- "Yes, but obesity rates are skyrocketing OMG!!"
??
And if that is the type of response you generally offer, what kind of message do you believe you're sending to that person?
Or are graduate level communications and psychology coursework not required for the MPH?
04/30/09
Just as I get tired of people telling me to "eat a fucking cheeseburger", I'd get tired if people were telling me not to eat a fucking cheeseburger.
We all have a right to do what we want with our bodies and there will always be people telling us that what we are doing is wrong.
If you know the consequences (assuming there are any) of what you are doing, its nobody's fucking business.
eat away
fuck away
exercise away
smoke away
etc etc
that all said, the minute you stop doing anything FOR yourself is the moment you should start questioning what you are doing and why - but this is a personal journey and nobody's damn business.
04/30/09
The scale shows no difference whatsoever. I am perhaps slightly heavier when I exercise regularly. This has been going on basically since I finished puberty.
I do think that the increasing set weight point of the American public is a problem for urban planners and makers of agricultural subsidies, and I would please like them to get on that and make local produce easily available and cities walk and bikeable. But as an individual, look, this is how I'm going to be shaped, I'm just going to keep trying to eat my greens.
04/30/09
Me too, purpleshoes, me too. That is my dream. I feel so much better when I get a chance to be outside like that, and so few cities are built with those goals in mind. They've done studies! Having trees around makes people less depressed.
Now I'm all pumped to revolutionize the urban planning field. Too bad I'm a scientist.
04/30/09
2. Fat and bodies in general are such a major feminist issue. The entire issue of fat shaming is so intertwined in issues of misogyney that you can not even divide them.
People come in all sorts of sizes and shapes, none better or worse than the others. Because there is nothing like deciding to disinfrancise and 'other' huge percentages of the american population.
I sometimes wonder if the 'obesity epidemic' is now the new thing, as it is one of the only remaining acceptable prejudices. People have more or less got the idea that you can't be openly racist in public. That you have to at least pay lip service to women being equal, and so on.... But the fatties?
We're the new Communists.
04/30/09
"People have more or less got the idea that you can't be openly racist in public."
is not quite accurate.
If you enjoy what Kate writes, you may want to go over to her and her co-writers' blog and put "last acceptable prejudice" in the search box. It's a little more complicated than that.
04/30/09
However, to this day I'm still bitter about it. gotta love my poppy...
04/30/09
04/30/09
04/30/09
Kate has 5 million hits. She's been doing this awhile.
04/30/09
04/30/09
People don't really care about those who're short, plain and simple. How often do people Google "petite" or "short" vs "plus size" or "fat"?
04/30/09
04/30/09
04/30/09
Fat Acceptance is a huge deal, separately from that issue. There is a huge level of latent bias against overweight people, and it needs to be discussed. Many people in these comments have touched in how feminism and the FA movement are interconnected, and these comments (and the post the spurred them), provide great insight into why your skinny-problems aren't getting the attention of the FA movement.
Look, I'm just trying to explain the disparity in post number.
Also - please do not post your sizes. It isn't relevant to anything.
04/30/09
04/30/09
04/30/09
I get that in some cases intervention is necessary, addictions, imminent danger to health etc (no arguments there) but on average doing this is really insulting and condescending. Having people...hell..even strangers commenting, judging or counselling you about your weight is shit NO ONE should have to put up with.
04/30/09
04/30/09
Really, in the society we live in, you know people particularly women have been hounded with messages about dieting and ideal size from a very young age
04/30/09
04/30/09
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04/30/09
04/30/09
Some of them really do give a damn and the person they're addressing is in denial.
Some of them are competitive nosy busybodies who want to feel superior because they're a single digit size while the person they're addressing is a low double digit size who could bench-press the first person if so inclined.
Having all four types in my nuclear family, I have fair amount of experience with the issue(s), even though I'm well aware the plural of anecdote is not data.
04/30/09
04/30/09
04/30/09
I love my parents, who are obese. I ragged on them hard till they finally went to the gym and started eating less junk. They're still obese, but at least they are healthier, and honestly? They're happier.
04/30/09
04/30/09
The argument I made instead was that some things simply come easier to some people than others, and we all have some things that we simply can't control. I have an easier time being hungry than other people, but I spend money I don't necessarily have on my craft projects and that's not always healthier. He seemed to kind of get it. I hope.
04/30/09
This? Is kind of brilliant.
Do I have permission to quote you the next time I'd rather throw something at some bigot's head?
04/30/09
I got called brilliant. Now I'm all smiley. :)
04/30/09
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04/30/09
04/30/09
04/30/09
04/30/09
04/30/09
@Jello Mix inspired Little Chocolate Donuts, No. 5: If you think it would be appropriate, please let him know there are those of us who are very grateful that he served our country for the time that he did.
04/30/09
Ass: what's that noise?
bellzar: uh, i don't know, it's my shoes.
Ass: no, it's not, it's your legs.
bellzar: Nice ass, nice. Whatever.
Ass: They make a noise, you have some big thighs. Maybe if you walked with them farther apart you'd look more like a supermodel.
Of course, I couldn't conjure up the energy or will to formulate some snarky comment because I had a major math test in the morning so I didn't want to get myself too annoyed.
The thing that really shocked me is that his mother and my mother are very good friends and I know for a fact that his mother has been a victim of misogyny on countless ocassions... so for him to say that is like "Whoa", especially in replacement of a kind "goodmorning".
04/30/09
I cried all the way home. I wish I would have told him to fuck off then walked away. The thing was, he didn't even say it like he was insulting me. He didn't understand it was a horrible thing to say.
I feel you. Just shake it off because that guy is an asshole.
04/30/09
04/30/09
04/30/09
It's not up to me or anyone else to decide who is "worth" more as a person, who "deserves" respect based on something as superficial as their size. We shouldn't be okay with this, and we shouldn't excuse it, or hide behind admonishments about "health". I find that excuse to be tired, as though we aren't all very aware of the "health" issues.
What we seem to be unaware of is just how insidious our obsessively diet oriented culture is, the way "health" is being used to advocate discrimination and body shaming, and how NONE OF IT WORKS.
Time to get over ourselves and stop trying to control other people's bodies. It's way more productive to celebrate them.
04/30/09
04/30/09
04/30/09
04/30/09
(Obligatory Mean Girls quote)
04/30/09
"Why do you hate me?"
"Because you're ugly. Now take a shit."
Welcome to the Dollhouse, Todd Solondz, 1995. (Makes Mean Girls look like Pollyanna.)
04/30/09
04/30/09
There's a small slowdown of it, related to the psychology of the recession and all.
But there's so much of it bound up in womens' competitiveness, which, you know, we can barely talk about as a culture, so when it gets further tangled up with the narrow image of the "ideal" body type in terms of what women "should" look like, and the "everyone should strive to be healthy" ethos, which of course we've all heard before somewhere (hmmm, was it Goering's work?), well ...
Not everyone is going to be exactly rational on the subject.
04/30/09
That's awesome that you did that by the way. These threads usually end in fights anyways so it's good to know someone took something positive away from the post and comments. None of us are perfect but we can work to become better. I applaud your honesty and I friend you.