Whatever people (justifiably) complain about in regards to discrimination here in the west–U.S., and I’m assuming other countries–I felt like kissing the ground when I came back after living in Japan for five years, and working in one of the most conservative (read: backward) environments. The level of fat hatred, not to mention general disdain for women, is truly astounding. Impossibly thin Japanese women who worked with me were teased for being chubby. I never felt so much like a piece of meat on display. Meanwhile, men smoke like chimneys everywhere in public and no one has a discussion about the effects on people’s health….(could be this has changed, but I tend to doubt it). As much as I appreciated many things about Japan, I was so happy to leave.

Japanese people can be wonderfully kind, but there is a really strong bullying aspect to the culture, so be prepared for it if you want to go live there. If you’re a gaijin, but if you’re female in particular, being thin won’t even get you off the hook because you can still be too old (another blatant source of discrimination), too tall, too analytical, too whatever. Aaargh.

What we are dealing with here is a system where everyone is required to conform. As the saying goes, “the nail that sticks up gets hammered down.” Most Japanese are slim, so 33.5 inches is not a particularly small waistline for a man there, although I am quite certain that many of my male coworkers (and some of my female ones) had a waist larger than 33.5 in. (As a size 6-8, I had to shop at the back of the rack in the women’s department. Sometimes even those clothes were too small, and when they did fit, they often didn’t fit my western “pear-shaped” body well.) However, this is disgusting to the extreme. There is already lots of discrimination that goes on in hiring in Japan, and this will surely just add to the laundry list of “undesirable” qualities in an employee.

The dieting culture in Japan can get quite extreme at times. I’ve seen several Japanese TV programs that invite large women on as guests, and then proceed to taunt them before having them go on a diet. I remember one TV show in particular where they had a girl come on who was about 5’2″ and 200 pounds; they analyzed and made fun of her diet; they calculated that she ate 10,000 calories a day, which I’m guessing was probably a huge overestimation. In “before and after” pictures in magazines, the “before” pictures are usually healthy looking average or somewhat slim girls; the “after” pictures tend to look emaciated (it’s important that the legs don’t touch in the middle). As a foreigner, I was usually exempt from this, as foreigners are expected to be fat. As a size 6-8 US, I was fat to many of them. I think the fact that I’m a long distance runner and I don’t like meat caused a lot of cognitive dissonance to the people around me.

Anyway, I apologize for rambling somewhat off-topic; I guess the article on the new draconian measures in Japan brought up a lot that has bothered me for quite a while. The idea of financially punishing people simply for being larger than average makes my blood boil.

See, I read this book called The Fit Or Fat Woman that said the only reliable measure of fatness was body-fat-percentage. The doctor who wrote it said that 33% body fat was normal for an American woman. Completely normal, nothing to worry about, fine and healthy. 25% was ideal, but few people could reach that. Olympic-level female athletes get down to 18% body fat, but at that level you stop menstruating because your body doesn’t trust the food supply to support pregnancy.

So, 33% was normal in The Fit Or Fat Woman. This Mayo Clinic team is defining 30% body fat as obesity.

My skinny diabetic friend – probably formerly a case of Petite Syndrome X – is an enthusiastic proponent of laying off the baby donuts if you’ve got jelly in the belly, but he agrees that the goal is not to get rid of jelly in the belly and even understands that the visceral fat is harmless in itself. It’s simply a side effect of overworked insulin doing its job as much as it’s been able to, according to him, and the production of the belly fat is actually how your body is keeping your blood sugar from reaching toxic levels.

Great post over at Shakesville, Kate.

The Brits already covered this ‘issue’ in 2006, and better (they concluded you need to look INSIDE a body to be able to draw conclusions – but oops for all health care systems: that would cost some serious money if you had to do it with every patient). Check out this article in The Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2006/dec/10/medicineandhealth.health

The Brits – as they like their acronyms – dubbed the thin at risk for disease “tofis” (thin outside, fat inside). Although unfortunately there’s still some automatic ‘Britain has a waistline crisis’ bull there, the article is worth a read, I think. Some quotes (sorry, don’t know how to place these things into the cute yellow quote frames, or turn something bold or italic, so the capitals are my emphases):

“ ‘Doctors are increasingly concerned that people can look slim on the outside but still have a problem with fat.’ […] Bell has spent years studying how human beings store and use their adipose tissue, or fat. He has carried out studies showing that people who would be considered slim can have large quantities of fat within them. ‘This is particularly true of MEN who have a slim build but who do little or no exercise,’ he said.”

Men – interesting, as women are so much easier perceived as fat.

“Genes also play an ENORMOUS role.”

Sounds like the reporter jotting this down was amAAAAAzed by that.

“Britain has a waistline crisis, with study after study warning that at least two-thirds of us are heading for a life of chronic illness and disability because of our weight. […] BUT IS IT POSSIBLE that doctors and the public have become SIDETRACKED by BMI? […] The problem with BMI is that most rugby players, sporting heavy muscles, would come out with a high BMI when in fact they have low levels of visceral fat. […] In JAPAN, sumo wrestlers have been put through MRI scanners to look at their fat composition. Even though they have a BMI of 56 and are eating up to 5,000 calories a day, they have very little internal fat. ‘They have low cholesterol, they have low insulin resistance and a low level of triglycerides [fatty acids],’ said Bell. ‘Their fat is all stored under the skin, on the outside.’ ”

So, particularly in Japan, they should know better! Also: you can “cure” lots of visceral fat by exercising (although the article doesn’t say how much you need, but probably the well-known half an hour a day of moderate exercise like walking or biking would suffice).

And I loved this quote:

“ ‘Over the past five years, we’ve DEMONISED FAT AND BECOME OBSESSED WITH OBESITY, which is mostly talked about in TERMS OF WEIGHT LOSS. But what matters is where it is distributed. As you lose weight, it tends to go from the top and bottom of your body first, so it can become concentrated in the abdomen. That is the most dangerous zone of all, and IT’S POSSIBLE THAT GOING ON A CONSTANT SERIES OF DIETS ACTUALLY ENCOURAGES THE STORAGE OF FAT IN THIS REGION.’ […] Body shape is often governed by genetic factors. People shaped like apples, carrying excess weight in the abdomen, are more at risk than those built like pears, who deposit fat in the hips, thighs and backsides. Women tend to fall into the latter category. CONSTANT DIETING MAY INTERFERE with the way the body lays down fat, and there is evidence that this will increase visceral fat.’ ”

Well, I would’ve liked to have known that when I was twelve, as I’ve turned from a pear to an apple after all those years of dieting (about twenty of them).

But anyway: do some exercise and stop dieting, that might help you to become/stay healthy, and don’t forget genetics, is basically the bottom line of this researcher’s thoughts. Hmm, I kinda like that concept. I’m just sorry these researchers are STILL NOT teaming up to say: BMI BULLSHIT, let’s focus on more important things like ending world poverty or something along those lines. It’s like everyone is walking around in the dark and not really trying to find the exit.

As for the WHO estimate, that’s probably a not-quite-accurate average of 2,000 (women) and 2,500 (men). Actually, fat people need more calories to sustain their weight, but then again, no one wants us to know that, because we need to LOSE weight of course (which with that silly calories-in-calories-out theory should work if a person who needs 2,300 were to eat only 2,000 a day…)

Well, sorry for the long post – but I do need to add: the baby otter made my day, I’m smiling for the rest of it!

PS Kate: I’m totally gonna read some more over at Shakespeare’s Sister, you rock there too!