Don’t You Realize Fat Is Unhealthy?
Here’s the thing: I blog about fat acceptance.
Fat acceptance, as you can probably guess from the words “fat” and “acceptance” being right together like that, does not go over so well in some circles. Even in some progressive circles — which are usually known for not hating entire groups of people because of their appearances, not thinking what other people do with their bodies is anybody’s beeswax, and not uncritically accepting whatever moral panic the media tries to whip up, but wev. Fat is different! Don’t you know there’s an obesity epidemic? Don’t you know that fat kills? Haven’t you ever heard of Type 2 diabetes? Don’t you realize how much money this is going to cost society down the line? Won’t someone please think of the children?
So, before I start getting comments like that, I want to lay out ten principles that underlie pretty much everything I write about fat and health.
1. Weight itself is not a health problem, except in the most extreme cases (i.e., being underweight or so fat you’re immobilized). In fact, fat people live longer than thin people and are more likely to survive cardiac events, and some studies have shown that fat can protect against “infections, cancer, lung disease, heart disease, osteoporosis, anemia, high blood pressure, rheumatoid arthritis and type 2 diabetes.” Yeah, you read that right: even the goddamned diabetes. Now, I’m not saying we should all go out and get fat for our health (which we wouldn’t be able to do anyway, because no one knows how to make a naturally thin person fat any more than they know how to make a naturally fat person thin; see point 4), but I’m definitely saying obesity research is turning up surprising information all the time — much of which goes ignored by the media — and people who give a damn about critical thinking would be foolish to accept the party line on fat. Just because you’ve heard over and over and over that fat! kills! doesn’t mean it’s true. It just means that people in this culture really love saying it.
2. Poor nutrition and a sedentary lifestyle do cause health problems, in people of all sizes. This is why it’s so fucking crucial to separate the concept of “obesity” from “eating crap and not exercising.” The two are simply not synonymous — not even close — and it’s not only incredibly offensive but dangerous for thin people to keep pretending that they are. There are thin people who eat crap and don’t exercise — and are thus putting their health at risk — and there are fat people who treat their bodies very well but remain fat. Really truly.
3. What’s more, those groups do not represent anomalies; no one has proven that fat people generally eat more or exercise less than thin people. Period. And believe me, they’ve tried. (Gina Kolata’s new book, Rethinking Thin, is an outstanding source for more on that point.)
4. Diets don’t work. No, really, not even if you don’t call them diets. If you want to tell me about how YOUR diet totally worked, do me a favor and wait until you’ve kept all the weight off for five years. Not one year, not four years, five years. And if you’ve kept it off for that long, congratulations. You’re literally a freak of nature.
5. Given that diets don’t work in the long-term for the vast, vast majority of people, even if obesity in and of itself were a health crisis, how the fuck would you propose we solve it?
6. Most fat people have already dieted repeatedly. And sadly, it’s likely that the dieting will cause them more health problems than the fat.
7. Human beings deserve to be treated with dignity and respect. Fat people are human beings.
8. Even fat people who are unhealthy still deserve dignity and respect. Still human beings. See how that works?
9. In any case, shaming teh fatties for being “unhealthy” doesn’t fucking help. If shame made people thin, there wouldn’t be a fat person in this country, trust me. I wish I could remember who said this, ’cause it’s one of my favorite quotes of all time: “You cannot hate people for their own good.”
10. If you scratch an article on the obesity! crisis! you will almost always find a press release from a company that’s developing a weight loss drug — or from a “research group” that’s funded by such companies.
So let’s just be clear that if you want to tell me fat people are disgusting and unhealthy in comments, all I’m gonna do is point you back to this post. And/or point you to other posts from my blog, or Junkfood Science, or one of my favorite fat bloggers, and/or bombard you with quotes from the aforementioned Gina Kolata, or Paul Campos, or J. Eric Oliver, or Michael Gard and Jan Wright, or Glenn Gaesser, or Marilyn Wann, or Laura Fraser. Seriously, you don’t even want to get me fucking started.
Oh, also? BMI is complete horseshit.
Very nice post! I’ve thought BMI was a crock since I heard about it; I’m busty and there is no allowance for those two large pillows of fat and glands that reside on the front of my body.
wow…this is amazing!!
With people like you and Joy Nash in this world we might actually have a chance to be seen as human beings and not just fat lazy slobs.
You rock and stuff.
JOY ,
I’M SO GLAD SOMEONE HAD THE GUTS TO JUST STAND UP AND SAY “THIS IS NORMAL AND SEXY”.EVERYBODY NEEDS TO KNOW, CAUSE MOST OF THE WORLD ISN’T PENCIL THIN.THANK YOU FOR BEING A TRUE ROLE MODEL ! I HOPE YOU STAY FOREVER! MUCH LUCK AND LOVE.
-MARIA
wow…this is great….
I understand your points and believe some of them to have valid thoughts and feelings.
I am a nurse and work in the hospital. The majority of our critical ill patients are obese. Obese patients, however they got there, are usually congestive heart failure, Diabetes, and respiratory problem patients.
I respect you very much and love that youre trying to build “fat” rights, and I use the word “fat” seldom because I think its a hurtful word.
YES!!! You are AWESOME!!! Thanks for saying what everyone should already know.
Thanks, everybody! And thanks, Joy, for linking to me!
Ian, here’s why I use the word “fat” freely.
Joy you are so inspirational. And not in a Dr. Phil kinda way. Rock on my fellow fat folk! Rock on.
Y’all, psst, I’m not Joy.
I adore Joy. I would be thrilled if I were Joy. But I’m not. I’m just somebody she linked to.
That said, I’ll cheerfully take the compliments directed at her. :)
Too funny. :)
“You wanna start a revolution…”
Girf=lfriend, let me tell you, between you and Joy, I am filnally coming to grips about myself. I will always be fat, I accept that now. So, will I be accepted ? Probably not, but fuck it. I don’t care. I’m past caring what others think o fme.
My time has finally come !
Thank you So Much !!!!
Thank you for putting this up! I feel better about having my extra baggage.
I am sorry I did not get the “Skinny” gene, I got my dad’s genes. And my husband, who weighs 100 lbs. less than me is the one who has high blood pressure and had a heart attack from eating poorly……
Thanks for speaking up! I think it’s disgusting that it’s still considered pc to put us down; publicly, to our faces, behind our backs, on tv, in books. Maybe if we all start to stand up for ourselves like this, we can break out of that negative, ignorant mold!
Kate! Thank you so much for writing this! So informative and uplifting! I will never understand why it’s ok for people to call fat people names or discriminate against us, but prejudice about other things is practically criminalized. Maybe we should all unite and make it against the law to run around saying all the things that folks say about fat people. Include it in the hate crimes laws. Ha! That’d be great! See? Between you and Joy I am getting some smarty pants confidence!! ;) Thanks so much!!
Great list, but let’s add number 11. Fat people should stop feeling sorry for themselves. I am not saying that you should be proud just because you are fat, but because of who you are. I am pretty sure each of us has something to offer the world, and if we let our self-confidence get in the way, we are not only denying ourselves fullfillment but we are depriving the world of US.
Trace, I hear what you’re saying, but given the degree to which fat people are shamed and alienated in this society, I’m not going to rush to tell people to buck up and drop the self-pity. Because I don’t think it’s just self-pity; I think it’s very understandable frustration. In some cases, desperation. Keeping your chin up only goes so far.
This post was very eye-opening and informative, thank you for linking me, Joy! By the way, I love what you have to say and I think you should get out there even more then you already are in the media and let the world know that it’s OKAY to be fat. It’s not a crime, or a four letter word, and we shouldn’t walk around with our heads in the sand anymore. Show off your curves, walk tall with pride in your eyes! If you practice self confidence and acceptance in YOURSELF, then the world will eventually come around and accept YOU too. Since I “met” Joy Nash on-line I have had a dramatic change in my perception of myself. I have a new “can do” attitude that is unstoppable!! Rise up, my fat cohorts! Do not be ashamed any longer! Be the best “you” you can be!!! Now get to it!!
So, Kate, you’re pretty much one of my heroes.
I work at a women’s gym and honestly, I see women there who are heavier treating their bodies a thousand times better than women who are thin. Sometimes it seems like the heavier women are actually enjoying life more.. I find some of them more conscious of their health, finding camraderie in the hard work, and celebrating their bodies much more than the skinny ones. I know a lot of thin, neurotic woman whose manifestation of insecurity is acting like they have a one-up on bigger women.
Unfortunately I think that’s the problem — self-acceptance is often a necessary pre-req for acceptance of others :/
Keep up the great work :D
Amen sister. I myself eat at least 20 grams of fiber everyday and I am VERY active. I walk and exercise daily. Not to mention, gardening and odd jobs around the house. I try to drink as much water as I can stand and limit my fat and sugar intake.
And I am and have been a size 14/16 (sometimes 18) for some time now.
Have you noticed how much Ann Coulter and MeMe Roth look alike? And I thought evil came in many forms…hum..
Thank you. A million times.
Great blog. I read “Rethinking Thin” By Gina Kolata as well. It has helped me more than I though imaginable. What really got me in the book is where she talks about working hard. Where she says people dieting are the most determined, hard working people you will ever meet. Society calls us fat and lazy, yet we take on the diet challenge all the time and do it for years upon years, but hey we must still be lazy right. Thanks you for blogging about this, It does mean a great deal to many many people that someone is putting the word out there, so Thank you.
Thanks. :) I needed to read this today.
Brilliant.
Kick ass! Why the hell can’t my pro size blogs on myspace be this good? :p
As soon as I saw sources: You got me hooked. ^_^
Thanks so much, everyone!
This is a wonderful post! I have so much amo now for the jerks who post nasty hateful comments about me just because I’m a bigger woman. You rock!
sometimes i think the first path to general acceptance is through sexual imagery. everywhere one looks, it’s always about the surgically enhanced, ‘thin’, adult film actress. In modeling, it’s always about the thin, six foot plus, tall model (the average woman isn’t that tall to begin with), and this rolls onto mainstream film and television. I can’t remember seeing a mainstream film with a fuller figured actress, the only exception to this rule is watching foreign films starring actresses like Monica Belluci and Sophia Loren.
You’re right, a lot of the supposed issues are a crock, and it’s interesting to see that diet industries/corporations earn millions of dollars each year. If companies like Jenny Craig were so successful, and they provided a permanent ‘fix’, then why are they around decades later, and why do all of their celebrity speakers relapse, and what gets me is that no celebrity or journalist addresses this on a wide level.
I have to say to Ian, the nurse, although I doubt he will get to read this, but are there not almost an equal amount of patients that are skinny (or not obese) that have heart problems, congestion, and diabetes? Also, like this blog states, it is likely if there are more obese people it is because they got that way by doing nothing (i.e. exercise) and eating crap.
As many have said before, thank you so much for just speaking the true. No, not speak, screaming it for all to hear. It’s been too long that we as a culture have been obsessed with the impossible (and unhealthy) ideal of the waif as being beautiful. I mean come on, looking like you just escaped from a concentration camp is not sexy to me and I’m sure it’s not to a lot of other people. For me, I look in the mirror and say ‘hell yeah, my body is rocking!’ and I feel great most of the time, but when I get to seeing pictures of myself especially those next to my friends who are all pretty small, I can’t help but think, ‘man, I look big.’ but I’m not. Unless you count a size 8 as being big. It’s a (no pun intended) huge problem that we need to face and I give you a standing ovation with crazy whistling and yelling for just being plain old right. Thank you.
You are my hero!
Thank You!
What i hate, is the fact that Dr. Phil and everyone have on these shows with 500 pound people. Yes this does happen, yes they dont mean to make them selfs that way, even yes to the fact in some right they didnt always have a choice. But they feed the coman mis conseption that if your fat, i mean 2 pounds over weight or 2000 pounds over weight that you don’t eat right and dont exersize. I eat better then just about any skinny person i know. And i hate to watch people i love and care about “starve” themselfs because sociaty is telling them there to fat! And even when they hate it because sociaty is ragging on them, they rag on someone else.Why cant people see us as people? Why cant we all just get along
Kate, thank you. Thank you thank you thank you. It is because of people like you that I am finally coming to terms with myself. I have so many medical conditions that have nothing to do with my weight, or if they do they only make my weight worse, not better that I have easily become discouraged. My father has been horrid through it all, and I have finally come to the decision (after years of allowing him to abuse me through his fat hatred) that the next time he decides to treat me as if I’m stupid and don’t see the news that I’m going to tell him to blow it out his ear. If it weren’t for people like you, Joy Nash and Paul at BFB I wouldn’t have the cajones to finally stand up for myself.
To the nurse: The reason all your critically ill patients are fat is because the thin ones with the same health problems died already.
Your patients have survived as long as they have because of the protective nature of their fat!
It’s like the research showing that helmet laws lead to an increase in head injuries: The injured folks are those who would have died in the past because they weren’t wearing helmets.
Nice try, though!
7. Human beings deserve to be treated with dignity and respect. Fat people are human beings.
It’s too bad that these three points alone aren’t enough for everyone:
“8. Even fat people who are unhealthy still deserve dignity and respect. Still human beings. See how that works?
9. In any case, shaming teh fatties for being “unhealthy” doesn’t fucking help. If shame made people thin, there wouldn’t be a fat person in this country, trust me. I wish I could remember who said this, ’cause it’s one of my favorite quotes of all time: “You cannot hate people for their own good.”’
Good luck. I hope all your postings convert one or two here and there.
I AGREEEEEEEE bmi is ridiculous… according to my BMI by the way im “very obese”… lemme just ask you… DO I LOOK “VERY OBESE” TO YOU? (i’m the tan girl in the white tube top) no… bc i weight train.. i grew up a competitive cheerleader/dancer. i can leg press close to 1,000 pounds… muscle weighs more than fat. so i weight ALOT more than ud think… im 5′9 and weigh 230… im a size 12. wouldnt think huh. AND IM EVEN WEARING WHITE IN THE PICTURE… THE *duh duh duh* FAT COLOR! so yea BMI.. not worth it. be healthy. my blood pressure is good, my cholesterol is good, i have no medical problems. THATS what matters. not the number or the size of your thunder thighs!
I’ve been thinking about this entry, and how very valuable it is. I’m wondering if someone could create a button image that says “But don’t you realize that fat is unhealthy”, with maybe a cute representative graphic (or several buttons for choice? I don’t know) for some of us size positive bloggers to link to here on our blogs. I would totally go for that. I am teh suck at graphics design, though.
You officially KICK ASS.
wOOt!
I’ve linked to you.
While I’ve heard some argument from the so-called health community that fat cells can contribute to internal inflammation, that’s about all I’ve heard about fat being unhealthy in any real sense. Otherwise, either it is an expression of genes or it is an expression of an underlying medical condition or it’s both.
With me it’s definitely both. I’m on what you’d call a diet, although not calorie deprivation, because of this. I’m very close to becoming diabetic and it’s not caused by my body fat; rather, the increase in body fat is related to the onset of my prediabetic condition. So I changed my diet to deal with the underlying condition and we’ll see what, if anything, it does for the weight. I know my body’s permanently changed regardless. I’m almost a hundred pounds overweight. I am not doing this to look like a swimsuit model; my skin’s stretched out way too far for me to ever do that even if I were interested. (I hated swimsuits even when I was slender!)
I guess what I am trying to say is it is not always fat hatred that motivates this stuff. OK, I’m not totally comfortable in my body, but I never went above 200 pounds before two years ago and I’m still having a hard time with it in terms of physical range of motion and so on. But I really don’t give a rip what guys think of me anymore, I’ve been burnt one too many times, so this is totally for me.
That said, I am totally not in denial about fat hatred in general. I have noticed that being 5′6″ and 230 pounds has made me invisible in a way that being 130 did not (and I will never see 130 again, and it’s just as well). Then again, I don’t think the little twerps realize they’re doing me a favor ignoring me. The last time I got hollered at from a moving vehicle was in 2003 and it hasn’t happened since. Yay!
Someone once said, ‘if at first you don’t succeed try, try, try again, and then give up, ‘cos you don’t want to make an idiot out of yourself.
Not sure of the relevance, but just felt like repeating it. Thank you.
Right on! Yo go ,girl! You just about said it all! {{{{kisses on head}}}}
Look!
http://photos1.blogger.com/x/blogger2/7223/43558033219710/240/z/177762/gse_multipart21618.jpg
:)
[...] epidemic’ is largely a moral panic and many of the fat=unhealthy factoids are myths. See Kate Harding’s blog and various other Health At Every Size (HAES) blogs on her blogroll for more [...]
[...] myself because I don’t fit someone else’s idea of appropriate? Even if there’s nothing wrong, even from a health perspective, with being [...]
Amen, sistah.
I’m decended of a long line of peasents who have survived many famines - my family are predisposed to being fat.
I have heard that dieting can be successful if you maintain your weight at the lower level for 2 years, as your metabolism can ‘reset’ to the new weight. I’ve not managed this myself. Part of the problem is that at the new weight, you have to eat less - if you go back to the way you ate at your higher weight, you will put the weight back on - I’ve done it (twice).
[...] Don’t You Realize Fat Is Unhealthy? « Shapely Prose [...]
Amen! I love your blog and this essay is a perfect retort to all the massively stupid “studies” in the news every single day.
I am linking to it because everyone I know should read it!
Thank you.
I think I love you!
And I think I’ll go hug my “large belly that would have totally won in a battle for survival cause it hordes food 300 years ago” a little bit now. Cause it loves me back. :)
I’m new to blogging but really loving it because of people like you! Seriously, I’ve been out here thinking that I’m the only one with these thoughts and now I’ve managed to connect with people thinking the same way. Just fantastic. Thanks!
Wow, finally - a curvy woman with sense and confidence!
I’m a UK size 20 and get narky comments even though I don’t look that big (most people think I’m about a UK 16).
I also suffer from PCOS and have had years of being told it will “go away if you lose weight” - Newsflash people…I starved myself down to a size UK 8 once. The PCOS was just as bad.
Glad to have found your blog - I’ll be reading regularly from now on!!
So pleased to have found your blog. Keep up the good work!
[...] myself because I don’t fit someone else’s idea of appropriate? Even if there’s nothing wrong, even from a health perspective, with being [...]
[...] The hypothesized link of obesity to disease is tenuous at best, often perpetuated by companies who have a vested financial interest in seeing obesity further stigmatized and classified as a disease. For more information about the health fallacies surrounding obesity, here’s a primer. [...]
I love this blog. I really do. I completely agree with the notion of fat acceptance and I think it’s great that people are like, adopting, y’know, sane views on fatness and all that. I never completely bought that weight and health go hand in hand always.
However, I have to take issue with one little thing you said in this post: “Weight itself is not a health problem, except in the most extreme cases (i.e., being underweight or so fat you’re immobilized).”
I’m underweight (5′6 and 110 lbs.). I am not this way because I starve myself, nor am I this way because of some illness. I am this way because of my genetics. My dad is underweight too, more so than I am, and he has no health problems either. How can you say the obesity epidemic is a load of crap and then say that underweight is extreme and on par with being so fat you’re immobilized?
Maybe I’m misunderstanding what you mean by “underweight” (because you do seem to believe people can be naturally thin) But even if you didn’t necessarily mean BMI underweight, you may want to revise that. Some (not all!), it seems, in the FA community have no problem believing obesity isn’t always unhealthy, but can’t POSSIBLY bring themselves to believe one can be underweight (BMI) and healthy or underweight through genetics. People, it’s only bad if you starve yourself to get that way, or have an illness that made you lose weight.
(It’s actually my underweight that enabled me to be more accepting of the notion that hey! Weight and health are not really all that intertwined! And if I’m underweight through no fault of my own, people can be overweight through no fault of their own. Oh, and I realize that not many people my height could be healthy at my weight. *I* can, however.)
Margaret, this is a great point. From the sentence construction I think Kate intended “underweight” in this case to be the other extreme of BMI from “so fat you’re immobilized,” but of course the phrase should be “dangerously underweight.” And, like fat, the health risks there are also either from habits (that is, not from being underweight but from starving to get there) or from common cause (e.g. you have Crohn’s disease which causes both low weight and other health problems). Weight as a POTENTIAL INDICATOR of poor habits or health problems, or even an exacerbating force — but NOT a cause — is something we need to embrace on both sides, just as we need to embrace body autonomy across the board.
fillyjonk is right Margaret. Kate is not saying that being underweight is unhealthy in itself, but rather becasuse the risks are likely to be there: When you compare someone in a closer range, that lives better, they are likely to be healthier. And it’s not about the weight, but how one nurtures themself, genetics (A big one, and this is why you would not be included in her example), and more. The fact that you are genetically underweight, and you live right is is simple fact in why you would be ok as long as you live the way you do. And I defend thin people in my activism as well: Whether you’re underweight because of habits or not, you deserve respect, equality, and defense.
Actually, Fillyjonk and Jon B. are both close but not quite on the money. (Thanks, though, guys.)
What I meant was, studies show that on both ends of the BMI chart, there’s a slightly higher mortality risk than in the center.
That has nothing to do with the respect due the very fat or very thin. And it doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with the way people in those categories live. It just means that, to the extent that BMI relates to health at all, “underweight” and “extremely obese” are the categories most at risk, and their risk is about equal.
I certainly believe that one can be underweight through genetics, and that one can eat well and exercise moderately and remain underweight. Eating well and exercising will improve anyone’s health, but they won’t necessarily change anyone’s weight. That might be the number one point of this blog, and it applies equally to thin people and fat.
But statistically, the “underweight” category is still associated with slightly more health risks than all but the “extremely obese” one. That doesn’t mean any given person in that category is less healthy than any given person in the “overweight” category (which has the lowest mortality risk). It just means that when you reduce people to numbers and categories (which is categorically NOT the point of this blog), that’s how it shakes out.
I gotcha.
I do wonder if many of the underweight health risk “discoveries” have the same problem as the overweight ones–that is, saying “oh, well more people who are this weight have x health problem more so than others so the WEIGHT causes the problem” while conveniently failing to take diet and family history and other such things into account.
Anyhow, that’s enough of that. I’ll stop derailing the comments. :P
Hi Kate. I really like your site and your writing style. Please have a look at my site. http://www.onexsport.com. I would like to invite you to send in a photo of yourself doing yoga to my photo contest. My site One X Sport is for plus sized women who enjoy sports and fitness activities.
Cheers and warm regards.
Melanie
[...] to my RSS feed or sign up to receive my weekly healthy recipe. Thanks for visiting!Here is all that’s sane and good about Fat Acceptance, in contrast to my earlier post. Still, I’m not ready to join the movement, for pretty much [...]
I just found your blog. I think this is a wonderful post. I myself have never been even close to overweight (not bragging) but my father was very obese. All the hostility toward the obese is not helping any supposed problem. I have become convinced that if anything it hurts the problem. Those with real over-eating disorders are only going to respond negatively by the anti-fat media and make their disorder worse. Those who are not “skinny” but are healthy are then guilted or shamed into feeling worse about themselves. Good for the beauty and diet industry, bad for people’s health and self-esteem.
I LOVE that quote: “You cannot hate people for their own good.” It’s exactly how I think.
[...] Don’t You Realize Fat Is Unhealthy? at Shapely Prose 9. In any case, shaming teh fatties for being “unhealthy” doesn’t fucking help. If shame made people thin, there wouldn’t be a fat person in this country, trust me. I wish I could remember who said this, ’cause it’s one of my favorite quotes of all time: “You cannot hate people for their own good.” [...]
Gee, thanks for deleting my comment! I thought you were too broadminded to censor people who don’t subscribe to your own beliefs - but I guess not.
I thought you were too broadminded to censor people who don’t subscribe to your own beliefs - but I guess not.
Nope, guess not!
Also, you might want to look up the difference between “censorship,” and “refusing to tolerate nonsense on one’s own blog.”
Also, try reading the fucking comments policy.
the “fat” issue is always a thought provoking one, so it is always interesting to hear the voices that are out there, scientists and lay folks alike. the most important point here is certainly that you can’t hate someone into being thin, and that compassion is essentially, regardless of whether you stand on the relationship between body weight and health problems.
as a researcher, i naturally find parts of the blog problematic, but that is very much part of the point: constructive discussions need to happen, on this issue especially. so keep writing and reading, i’ll keep doing research, and hopefully, at some point, the two will find the truth.
You rock! I have always had a problem with BMI as fundamentally skewed. It’s a great project! It’s time for the woman of the world to take back the media. It is a woman’s body not a little boys. We are supposed to have tits and ass!
Keep up the great blog!
Great site - I found you through the BMI photos on Flickr. I’d like to respond to Ian, the nurse who said that most of his/her patients were obese. I worked as a critical-care Registered Nurse for 18 years, half that time in upstate New York, and half that time in San Francisco. And in both places, I observed that the absolute sickest patients were bags of bones. It was such a pronounced difference from what I saw out on the streets that I wondered, “If fat makes you sick, where do all the sick fat people go?”
as a researcher, i naturally find parts of the blog problematic
Dear matt, sorry, but your comment sounds a bit arrogant and condescending to me. Dropping your “researcher” status like that sounds very much like “your science is bullshit, but trying to love yourselves is kind of cute” to me.
Well, I’m a medical doctor and certainly a researcher, too, and it’s not “natural” at all for me to find anything about this blog problematic, as you call it. Nor is it for any of my colleagues. Whatever part of our researcherness is supposed to do that, it’s not working.
Whatever beliefs you adher to in this question, I hope you’re not forgetting they are no more than that, beliefs. Being a scientist does that to us sometimes. Giving us a delusion of absolute truths. Sadly, there are none, and we’re all free to read the existing evidence any way we personally think is more convincing. If you read it differently than e.g. Kate does, I’d love to hear your arguments.
But if you honestly believe that the points made in this blog are somehow inherently antithetic to current research, I’m afraid you just haven’t been reading your resources thoroughly.
Em, can I give you a trophy? You have made my day several times today and it’s only 4:00 here.
Em, can I give you a trophy? You have made my day several times today and it’s only 4:00 here.
Ditto. And it’s only 3:00 here.
*lol* Instead of a trophy, how about giving me something brave, smart, thought provoking and brilliantly written to read, every day? …oh, wait.
Maybe we should have a Comment of the Week feature, like the Comics Curmudgeon does! Only ours will be uplifting instead of pants-pissingly funny.
Maybe.
Reading a doctor using a word like “researcherness” makes me happy. : )
Which is to say, of course, that Em would be the first recipient. ;-)
This is the most wonderful blog I’ve found in all of 2007! I even enjoy the comments! I already said this via email, but you guys TOTALLY ROCK! Don’t change a thing and never stop. –Natalie
I even enjoy the comments!
Seriously, the commenters here are so fucking awesome.
And yes, Sweet Machine, I’ve actually had that idea before, and Em just might be our reason to start!
Everything about this post, and then everything about Em’s comment, just made my week. And possibly my month. And maybe my year. Hero Trophies all around.
-S
[...] that while now manageable, still doesn’t have a cure – and focus instead on obesity, despite volumes of evidence that show fat isn’t necessarily unhealthy. Because isn’t that so much more effective than [...]
Look for my comment in a future Douchehound of the Day post!
Nice job on this blog, Kate!!! People are just so crazy about weight nowadays that sometimes I think fat is the new leprosy.
Keep posting!
“If fat makes you sick, where do all the sick fat people go?”
Well said Anna, I’ve had reason to consider this question again recently after Sandy Szwarc was criticised on another blog re: heart health and fatness claiming she was biased stating that PubMed numbers of studies are conclusive.
Your question is the question, where are the actual (fat) bodies in actual heart wards ( and of course other wards) in actual hospitals as opposed to studies.
I do not say this to be provocative biased but it is something that needs to be asked, because the people I’ve heard ask this question based on their own experiences i.e. being medical professionals (mainly nurses like you for some reason) or hospital visitor volunteers, I’ve never heard it directly from a fat person, funnily enough as I think we still believe it or are unsure.
The upshot is, is there a disparity between bad heart health in fat people according to studies and actual heart health in actual fat people ?
[...] does not equal unhealthy. That’s a fallacy of our culture. But don’t you realize fat is unhealthy __________________ Dawn, mama to Maxine Day(8/01), partner to Jason. my feedback my [...]
WOW,
Im in love with you. Seriously!
Ive been dissing BMI everywhere possible forever!
DId you know (in my case) that one can be overweight and anorexic at the same time?
No?
Well when I went into treatment at one point in my life, I was.
What a mixed message. Gain weight, you fattie!
Oy.
I LOVE your blog. I have been both 400 lbs at one point in my life, then later on, underweight.
Ive lived both sides of this sick twisted socially constructed issue.
Im excited to read an intelligent blog by a fellow quirky smart blonde on the matter!
i loved this!
people always say you can’t be “fat” & healthy at the same time, and scoff at me when i say “I AM!!!”
i work out most days, i eat healthy, yet i cannot lose enough weight to put me into the “healthy” BMI–i got close once & looked skeletal (i was also bulemic at the time!)
i have a great resting pulse, great blood pressure, wonderful cardiac health, very flexible and strong. i belly dance, weight train, do martial arts, walk almost daily.
i’m in better health than my healthy weight friends!
[...] I didn’t realize then that there is an entire movement of people who could have supported me. http://kateharding.net/but-dont-you-realize-fat-is-unhealthy/ [...]
Awesome site. I have long raged against the unhealthy body images that are constantly shoved down our throats by our culture and was recently labeled as morbidly obese by a health care “un-professional” who spoke it in such a way that it sounded like an epithet. As an artist, I also think that humanity would be a pretty boring looking lot if we all looked like super models…
Thanks for this post! I always believed that it is the lifestyle of the person that determines health rather than weight.
I am considered obese based on my weight (a UK 16/18). I have a classic hourglass shape - large breasts (but a small ribcage), tiny waist and large hips. I have no health problems except an underactive thyroid and asthma. Plus, I have been a lifelong vegetarian.
I used to work out 6 hours a week in the gym with a personal trainer plus water aerobics an Tai Chi 2 days a week. I did this faithfully for two years when I was a size UK 22. I did not own a car and biked or walked everywhere. Did I lose weight? Not at all. I just toned up.
I did the slimming club stuff and after a year, I lost 1.5 stones. I went on a drastic liquid diet and did lose weight. But, the calorie intake was around 500 per day. And I did kung fu 4 hours a week. However, a friend of mine did the same diet, started the same day, cheated midway through and never exercised. Yet, she lost more weight than I did.
In total, I’ve lost 6 stone and it has taken me years. I’ve kept most of it off, but it is a struggle because my body is just designed the way it is.
My GP was determined that I, at 39 years old, must suffer from either high blood pressure (normal) or diabetes (tested every year since I was 20, blood sugar remains on the low side of normal). She had my cholesterol tested and was shocked to see that out of all her patients I had one of the lowest levels. She no longer says anything to me about my weight.
I think it is genetics. Of course, there are some lifestyle choices that come into play, but that is not the whole thing. Some of us are destined to be overweight and others underweight or “normal” weight.
Either way, whether a person is fat or not, he/she is still a person. Everyone should be treated with respect, not judged or ridiculed.
Can I just say how much I LOVE this? And this whole site….haven’t had much time to explore yet but it’s looking good.
I’m a UK size 18. I don’t know how much I weigh because I refuse to have those insidious machines of torture, bathroom scales, in my home.
I’m from a family of two halves: stick-thin people who burn it all off on my mother’s side, chunky farm laborers on my dad’s. Guess which side I take after. Was thin myself till age 7 or so - then someone found out I’d been skipping school lunch (they were, in the UK in those days, truly nauseating) and I got packed lunches and wham - on 3 meals a day rather than 2, I was suddenly a Big Girl overnight.
And have been ever since. And nowadays, I can’t get through the day without lunch if I wanted to, so even if I get the hang of eating slightly less crappily than I have in recent years (undoubtedly a good thing, and I’m working on it), and find a dance class that isn’t full of thin people who’ll look down their noses at me, I am never going to have my mother’s build. And yet still she keeps up the hate. But then, weight is the first thing she judges anyone by, and if they’re fat, usually the last. (She, meanwhile, shoves veggies to the side of her plate, but dives into a huge dessert…and when she’s finished, will steal bits of anyone else’s! Pardon the pun but, go figure.)
I ended up here because we just had a news article here in the UK on a reseatch project that was ‘hey…you know, fat people AREN’T necessarily to blame for being fat!’…and I think you can guess what the comments were mostly like, but I was astonished at some of them. Suggestions that we should be banned from public transport, barred from NHS medical treatment, taxed for every BMI point….and yes, according to a few people, put in camps. Excuse me while I emigrate, if they’ll let me on the plane!
Desperate for some sanity I googled ‘fat hatred’, hoping there was opposition to this kind of idiocy…and thank Goddess there is. Definitely going to spend some more time exploring here. Thank you.
I have been everything from merely overweight to obese and back my entire adult life. It took a long time for me to accept myself as I am and who I am. I’m loving life, and when you love yourself, then others will love you too. That’s my philosophy. It works for me. If I get thin, great. If I don’t, I’m not going to be bugged by it. There’s no way I’m going to kill myself to fit someone else’s perception of sexy, alluring, attractive, etc. I’ll never be a size zero… I don’t have the build for that, but if I never get below a size 20 or 18, so be it.
I’m definitely going to put you on my blogroll. Your blog is too important to stay in the shadows where the “beautiful people” would like us to stay.
Its interesting to see the fat= unhealthy equation in America. Everytime I go back to India having lost a bit of weight, my in-laws and random relatives will moan “Oh look how unhealthy you’ve become - are you not eating enough?” and then proceed to fatten me up. Its even worse for my husband - being thin means not only is he “unhealthy” but also he is not “prosperous” and doesn’t look like a man of the world.
And among my husbands family (traditionally a community that places a LOT of emphasis on eating and food) they will always compliment your few extra kilos with a glowing “How healthy you look”.
n!
I also want to add that having lived in France for a year, I saw a completely diffferent approach to food. We never checked any labels on food, the dieting section was in one corner of the supermarche and comprised a few biscuits and we ate well (wine + pasta + chocolate each night) and walked a lot and never ever checked our weight. And we were actually much thinner and fitter in that one year than we have been since in the US - after watching nutrition labels and portion sizes and exercising like crazy. Its just harder to keep to a moderate weight here, I think.
n!
You are obviously very intelligent, and I respect your opinion; but if I were fat I would shoot myself.
Wow. That’s really sad that you wouldn’t be able to love yourself fat just as you would thin.
Yeah, that’s incredibly sad, really.
But also incredibly trollish.
Funny how we’re allowed to have our opinions and everything, and the trolls will even say that they respect our opinions, but they HEAVILY imply that we should just go off ourselves (in whatever preferred method they suggest; shooting, in Victoria’s case) because we MUST all secretly hate ourselves, because WE HAVE TEH FATZ!!!!!111OMGWTFBBQeleven
@Victoria:
Even if you weren’t fat, I’d encourage you to shoot yourself. No really. And I know you aren’t going to read this because you are either too busy working on not being fat or too busy working on getting a gun license, but shit like this pisses me off.
See, nobody goes around saying stuff like, “If I were an arrogant asshole I’d shoot myself,” because being an arrogant asshole is far more acceptable than being fat.
People who would shoot themselves because they are fat are people who hold other human beings (see rules 7 and 8) that do not live up to their expectations in such disdain that they demote them mentally and emotionally to “wastes of skin”.
In real reality (as opposed to that illusory reality you, Victoria, live in) people who are comfortable in their skin are the ones who are living life instead of avoiding death.
Yes, that is the motivation, isn’t it?
To be fat is to be unaccepted - social death. The lack of others accepting you could cause you to not accept yourself (which is a whole other problem regardless of weight) - emotional death. And it is supposedly responsible for health problems - physical death.
So…if you’re already “dead”, why not make it official, right?
And I, for one, support that decision, Victoria. The world needs fewer folks like you and more folks like Kate.
@Kate: Sorry for sucking up all this real estate, but it was cathartic.
I really appreciate your points regarding the poor body image that is popular in the good old USA. Thin for the sake of thin is gross (size 12+ and fit kicks the crap out of a waif anyday, physically and aesthetically), but cigarettes and coffee instead of excercise and a square meal seems the popular way to be “healthy”. I long for the day when people approach good diet and excercise not as burdensome chores with the one goal of being thin but as activity for the sake of being healthy regardless of body type. As you say, fat in itself is not automatically unhealthy. Active people that eat well and are still heavy are generally quite robust in both physical strength and immunity. With that I totally agree.
However, I think you don’t give enough attention to the phenomenon of increasing fatness in the USA being largely reflective of rotten lifestyle. Our genes haven’t changed in a generation so it is impossible that the increase in average weight is due to genetic factors. On average most people fall between the endomorph and ectomorph ends of the spectrum. Their bodies do respond to training load, calorie intake, and nutrional quality. People that can’t gain weight and people that can’t get rid of it are at the tails of the distribution. The rest of us fall somewhere in between and we accumulate significant amounts of fat only when inactive. Unfortunately our collective size (on average) in the US is reflective not of big robust active people but is reflective of calorie dense nutritionally poor diet coupled with inactivity. Obviously with the massive diversity of body types this does not apply to everbody . However, in places like the deep south and West Virginia where suddenly (within a couple of decades) >30% of the population is obese, the increase in size is not from a sudden increase in the frequency of endomorphy in the population. (I recognize that endomorph and ectomorph are not valid scientific terms but here I am using them as a quick and dirty means conveying the concept of “easily gains/retains weight” versus “has difficultly gaining weight”).
BTW: I just stumbled in here because I googled “Oliver Curry” (someone posted his crackpot shit on a message board that I frequent) and I have to say that this blog kicks ass even if I might catch hell for my comments on this section.
Oh, and before you completely eviscerate me, I am following up Point Number 3 (which is the only point that my comment directly conflicts) starting with the linked book so I’m not just pulling a drive by here.
The actual weight gain of Americans over the past decades is smaller than you’d think. The average American has only gained, what? 5-10 pounds?
Also, the limits for “overweight” and “obese” were lowered in 1998, so that a lot of Americans came into the higher categories without gaining an ounce. From that perspective, it’s not a good idea to simply look at statistics and say we’re - or since I’m not American, you’re - bigger than ever before and it must mean some negative change in our lifestyles. Surely people are less active than before, but that’s also true of normalweight people.
Are you familiar with http://junkfoodscience.blogspot.com? There’s a lot of interesting information about obesity-related studies there. I’m sure Kate or someone else here can give you a much more detailed response, too, these are just things that popped into my head.
Hey Aaron, stick around and read a little more. You’re not totally on target (on a lot of things — for instance experimentally, it seems that almost nobody can permanently gain or lose significant amounts of weight, and in fact our size in the US is due, at least in part, to general embiggening, of a few pounds and a few inches on average). But if you read the stuff posted about Health At Every Size, you’ll see that we are in no way insensible to the fact that a lot of people are leading a “rotten lifestyle.” The difference is that we don’t think it’s causing an “obesity epidemic” in the “HOLY SHIT EVERYBODY JUST GOT HUGE AND SICKLY” sense that most people think when they hear those words. Are corn syrup and car commutes making people gain the five pounds that might move them from “normal” to “overweight” or from “overweight” to “obese”? Maybe, but check the BMI Project tab at the top of the page to see what that really means. Would it be better if people could eat well and be active, regardless of whether they lost those five pounds (or even the 50 phantom pounds that the Obesity Epidemic spokespeople want to ascribe to our Terrible Lifestyles)? Well, to the degree that it’s fiscally and physically realistic, yes it would.
The thing is that we, unlike Anti-Obesity Crusaders, actually think that healthy food and activity for everyone (to the best of their physical ability, of course) is a good in and of itself. We don’t need the myth of permanent weight loss to make it a worthwhile goal. So you won’t find anyone here saying that there aren’t people in the US who are inactive and eat crap — though we will say that this is influenced by myriad factors, not the least of which are socioeconomic — or that this is a boon. We do reject the notion that the way to combat this is to make everyone obsessed with being thin.
I don’t know why I’m explaining all this, but you seem to have gotten HAES on at least a surface level, and you think Oliver Curry is a crackpot, and you’re clearly not a troll.
I have to say, and this is totally tangential but maybe worth posting about and taking the temp of the readership: personally I’m so suspicious of any pseudo-medical categorization of body types that only allows for three kinds of body. Ectomorph/endomorph/mesomorph doesn’t do it for me any more than vata/pitta/kapha — it’s just so simplistic! But if you’re just using it as a shorthand then I understand.
Absolutely.
“”"personally I’m so suspicious of any pseudo-medical categorization of body types that only allows for three kinds of body. Ectomorph/endomorph/mesomorph “”"
The pseudo-medical bit is why I added the qualifier for the use of those terms. At best those terms reflect points on the spectrum and that is how I intended them to be interpreted. We are all quite unique along that spectrum.
“”"The thing is that we, unlike Anti-Obesity Crusaders, actually think that healthy food and activity for everyone (to the best of their physical ability, of course) is a good in and of itself. “”"
I absolutely agree with this. Nothing could be more true. However, CDC quotes an average rise of 24lbs in bodyweight since the 1960’s (both sexes). Given that across the board we are more sedentary, that cannot be reflective of a healthy change in body composition on the average unless we were substantially underweight back then.
that cannot be reflective of a healthy change in body composition on the average unless we were substantially underweight back then.
We have also grown though, don’t forget. Up, I mean.
I’ll have to look into the CDC’s data, because I’ve seen a conflicting account. If you happen to have it, feel free to link it, because we’d like to eventually put together a FAQ for new readers like you who feel drawn to HAES but have reservations about whether the obesity epidemic is really as overblown as we say it is (Deniselle’s link to Junkfood Science is good for that too; I wouldn’t trust Sandy implicitly, but she doesn’t distort the facts any more than some researchers, and never because she’s in someone’s pocket!). We’re not scientists and we can’t answer every question, but we would like to at least put all the questions in one place.
Life expectancy has risen during that time, Aaron. So why conclude that the rise in weight is even a bad thing? Because it seems bad isn’t an answer.
And we have absolutely no way to conclude why its increased. As noted, height’s gone up, too. Even still, there is nothing showing that the increase is due to a sedentary lifestyle of excess food consumption. Know what else has happened since the 1960’s? The diet industry has exploded into a billion dollar entity. Know what happens when people diet? They gain back more weight than they lost. So, with so many more people being marketed to for dieting and dieting itself surely going up and dieting being linked to weight gain, why should anyone just assume that a modest increase in average weight is because all us fatties are lazy?
Victoria, maybe you should shoot yourself. Why? Because it’s obvious you are a waste of a human being. If I were as ignorant and insulting as you, I wouldn’t punish the rest of the human race by existing.
I should apologize. I am trying to “enlighten” the anti-fat individuals of the internet by posting a link to this wonderful post. It’s safe to say any new trolls you are getting are coming from extremely hostile spaces to begin with. I post at a lot of message boards where insecure men (and women) worship supermodels who are probably suffering from eating disorders. Needless to say, anybody above a size four is “fat” to them. No doubt Victoria came from one of these spaces.
Victoria’s comment is, very sadly, the way many people of the world think - they would rather be dead than be fat. I’d like to stay as I am….fat and alive rathe than thin and dead. LOL
Kate, you rock, and I would like to thank your mother and father for bringing you into this world. :)
Ok, I retract that statement above about being thin and dead - I’d rather just be ALIVE AND WELL, no matter what size.
I definitely wouldn’t rather be dead than be fat. I just want to be healthy.
Thanks, VLM!
About Victoria’s comment, it was ignorant but don’t encourage her to go and shoot herself, come on now. Like she said, you are all intelligent, why insult her when you can educate her? Or at least question her and ask her why she would shoot herself if she were fat (which by the way I highly doubt she actually meant that.)
Skinnyminny, I don’t advocate telling anyone to shoot herself. However:
why insult her when you can educate her?
Two reasons, mostly.
1) The entire blog is here for people unfamiliar with fat acceptance to educate themselves. She chose to mouth off without reading any of it.
2) She’s a troll who’s not coming back.
(which by the way I highly doubt she actually meant that.)
Do people get to say whatever the fuck inflammatory things they want as long as they don’t really MEAN it? How much do you have to mean it? Enough to do it? Or just enough to say it?
The entire blog is here for people unfamiliar with fat acceptance to educate themselves. She chose to mouth off without reading any of it.
Including the very post she was responding to, which has more education in it than anybody could provide in one response to a comment.
And in any case, why should we be polite and helpful to people who come onto a fat acceptance website just to make nasty remarks about fat people?
That’s understandable. Personally I would have tried to talk to her personally for a minute but everyone is different.
Exactly, fillyjonk. Words mean things. If you actually say it (type it, spray-paint it, embroider it on a damn throw pillow), then I’m not really going to waste my time trying to determine if you *mean* what you *say*.
You said it. You are therefore accountable.
Words mean things.
Speaking of things that should be embroidered on throw pillows…
In that case, I find what Brett and Sarah said in response to Victoria equally as upsetting, encouraging her to fill herself. I don’t think anyone should say things like that, whether they are saying it to someone who is fat or saying it to someone else who insulted someone who was fat.
skinnyminny, I think it goes back to what Kate said. Victoria was not here for an education. She wasn’t looking for more info. She didn’t say, “I feel so badly about myself as a fat person, I think about shooting myself.”
And at the end of the day, it’s Shapely Prose’s house, Shapely Prose’s rules.
I completely understand the ‘her house, her rules’ thing, and yes I’m aware that Victoria’s intent was more about insulting people than educating herself, but I was just saying how I would have handled it myself. Maybe I have more patience for things like that than Kate does, and that’s ok. And yes, she did say that she didn’t advocate anyone telling people to shoot their selves, but only after someone (myself) made a comment about it. It was ignored up until that point.
Okay, Skinnyminny, we get it, and you should stop now. You’ve made your point.
I wish I could make every person I’ve ever known read this (and the entire site, really).
Skinnyminny, Victoria told me point blank to shoot myself because I happen to be fat. Kindness is not in order here.
And to her absolute disgust, I will continue to exist. Flab and all. Because it’s the best revenge.
Thank you for writing this. It was nice. I am overweight. While I have been naturally big my whole life, I didn’t help myself as a teenager by overeating. Now I eat very well, but I have a sedentary life. I am so sick and tired of jackass men driving past me at the bus stop and screaming out things like, “WOO SEXY BABEH!!” and stuff just to humiliate me.
It makes me wonder about some people. What does ME being fat have to do with OTHER PEOPLE. Especially people that I don’t know? Why can’t we all just get along and be friends? Being fat doesn’t make me a horrible person, not worth being friends with. >__>
encouraging her to fill herself
I would highly encourage Victoria to fill herself, as it’s likely that with that kind of fat hatred she’s never let herself really enjoy a meal in her life.
Why is it up to Random Fat Women to educate Victoria. Let her educate her own ignorant ass. She was treated with more gentleness than she deserves.
Ashley/SkinnyMinny: Look, most of us here *get* the point of your ‘thin-acceptance” blog. In fact, if not for your seriously warped perspective of what constitutes thinness and your overarching and offensive assumptions that fat people are fat because they eat too much (as evidenced by comments on here and on other blogs), activists representing the opposite spectrum of weight-based discrimination would probably ally with you.
Having said that, I fail to see why you patrol fat acceptance blogs - here and elsewhere - and continue to stir up shit. At first I wrote you off as someone who is young and inexperienced, but now I’m beginning to wonder if you’re just out to troll.
Rachel, how do I have a warped perspective of what constitutes thinness? I do not think fat people are fat because they eat too much in general. Honestly, I really don’t. I know that there are a lot of fat people out there that are just that way, no matter how much or little they eat or exercise.
Why do I come to fat acceptance blogs? Because but I am sincerely interested in the whole “acceptance” movement, whether it be fat or thin acceptance. I really don’t want to ’start shit’…with all do respect, if I wanted to start shit, I’d take a much different approach. But I just come here to these fat acceptance sites to learn, study, research, to hear what people on, as you called it ‘my opposite end of the spectrum’ have to say, because I’m genuinely interested, and discuss…maturely, or at least try to.
I want to apologize to anyone I have offended though. I don’t mean to come off harsh. Maybe I need to work on how I word things so that people will understand my point of view and not be offended.
This is the first time I’ve been to one of these kinds of sites and I got here pure accident. I was checking out different blogging software because I want to host my own blog, not have someone do it for me.
Anyways, my entire family and extended family is large. Yes, they are fat. Strangely, everyone of them was skinny when they were growing up. We were all athletic super-stars. I’m only 18, and I am still athletic, but it is on the decline. But when everyone in my family hits The Age (21 for females, 23 for males) they begin rapid weight gain. As you could guess we all see the trend and do our best to avoid it. Heavy exercise and dieting begins, and while it helps, none have managed to maintain their skinny appearance.
Some people are flat out large and they can’t do much about it. My family is living evidence. People need to realize this. Anyone who knows my family knows that’s just how we grow, but you should see some of the looks we get in the cities… well I’m sure some of you know what I’m talking about.
I hope to break the cycle in my family, but I’m not the first to say that. Only time can tell.
… I think I love you. If I weren’t already married I might ask you to marry me.
No, seriously, you’ve eloquently and succinctly summed up my thoughts on this subject. From now on, when someone starts whining about the “obesity epidemic”, I point them here.
Thank you!
Thank you for this! Brilliant!
In a two month period, I lost 30 pounds due to illness. I’m so glad I was fat. If I’d been of “normal” weight, I’d have been in serious danger. Now everyone tells me how good I look, but they shut up fast when I tell them I was sick. I hate that it’s seen as some kind of virtue that I lost weight. I’m doing my best to view it as value-neutral but I’m really swimming upstream to do it. I wish people would simply not comment on my body at all.
What I really hate is when someone uses fat as an epithet toward someone he/she doesn’t like for some other reason. I heard this one last week from a friend, when we were talking about a third person that did something that affected both of us, and who happens to be fat. I pointed this out to my friend, that it bothered me that the third person’s weight was made an issue when it had nothing to do with why we were annoyed with her. “I wasn’t talking about you,” my friend said. This friend has never said a single word to me about my size, and I really appreciated it that she was one of the very few who didn’t comment on my weight loss at all. So it really hurt to realize that she does judge people by their weight, and she either doesn’t notice that I’m fat or simply doesn’t comment on it because of our friendship, where she has no qualms criticizing someone else’s weight.
Amen sister. K
Your argument is interesting but, you don’t use any numbers. Without numbers, how to we know whether you are talking about moderate obesity or something more?
In at least one study, involving thousands of women, a BMI of over 30 correlated with a 4x risk of cardiovascular disease and 2x risk of cancer. See:
N Engl J Med. 1995 Sep 14;333(11):677-85
Extract: “Among women with a body-mass index of 32.0 or higher who had never smoked, the relative risk of death from cardiovascular disease was 4.1 (95 percent confidence interval, 2.1 to 7.7), and that of death from cancer was 2.1 (95 percent confidence interval, 1.4 to 3.2), as compared with the risk among women with a body-mass index below 19.0. A weight gain of 10 kg (22 lb) or more since the age of 18 was associated with increased mortality in middle adulthood. CONCLUSIONS. Body weight and mortality from all causes were directly related among these middle-aged women. Lean women did not have excess mortality. The lowest mortality rate was observed among women who weighed at least 15 percent less than the U.S. average for women of similar age and among those whose weight had been stable since early adulthood.”
As for losing weight: If you are deprived of calories, you have to obtain energy from somewhere, and will burn fat. This is not easy, and not fun, and most people don’t pursue it rigorously in the long term, but to encourage your readers just to give up on the whole idea is, I think, irresponsible–if you care about their health.
Oh, well, AT LEAST ONE STUDY. Let’s pack it in, Kate. No more butter and scones for me, Mater, I’m off to play the grand piano.
Shorter FJ: Yawn.
Does this mean I have to give up fried butter?
Fuck if I know what it means, I’m just a girl, we don’t know anything about NUMBERS.
All I know is that if we care about our readers’ health, which we are 100% in charge of (there’s those pesky numbers again), we’ll introduce them to the concept of “calorie restriction,” which they’ve never heard of or tried.
we’ll introduce them to the concept of “calorie restriction,” which they’ve never heard of or tried.
Wait, what’s that? Is there fried butter?
Wait, what’s that? Is there fried butter?
I think it’s got something to do with thermodynamics. So… yeah.
Thermody… nope, too big a word. Girl brain just broke.
I think you need to draw a very detailed map, complete with little illustrations in lui of complicated phrases like “healthy eating,” because CLEARLY someone has missed the point!
You better watch out! The next thing you know they’ll be forming mobs because obviously you are hypnotizing us to all go out there and mindlessly consume mass amounts of anything that is a least 50% corn syrup or partially hydrogenated fat. They’ll be shaking their fists in the air and chanting “Down with the Twinkie Pushers!”
Good grief! Props to your persistent patience and never-ending humor!
Butter? I thought it was french fry grease they used in those biodiesel engines. Butter will just clog up the fuel injectors, right?
I’d like fried cheese with my fried butter, if you please.
*fried butter nom nom nom*
Calorie whoozit now?
What y’all don’t realize is that Kate has invented a way for the internet to DELIVER FRIED BUTTER to her readers’s mouths without their consent. You’re being fattened right now!
Shh! Don’t give away our secrets, SM!
Oh shit, Kate, I should have kept my big mouth shut… I suppose I’m going to get the deep-fried Snickers “punishment.” You are such a harsh blogmistress.
[...] just bring the smart ass comments. Bring your ammo, too. Go re-read Kate Harding’s Don’t You Realize Fat is Unhealthy. Remind your family [...]
I just found your blog highlighted on wordpress.
And I love it, just from the few posts I’ve read.
I don’t pay attention to BMI - I pay attention to when my blood sugar readings go wacky, which is tied to a certain weight. I’ve learned to accept that I won’t be the inactive, skinny college student I was ten years ago, but I also won’t be the inactive, overweight 28-year-old I was three years ago. Because in either case, I was unhealthy. That’s why I think point #2 is the most important thing anyone can take away from this post, though there is incredible importance in the dignity points, too.
I know I don’t exercise enough, but I’m also damned healthy (low blood pressure, low cholesterol, middle-range glucose levels). It’s something I do need to change, but I must have gotten the best doctors, because they haven’t told me that I have to lose weigth just for the sake of it. Even my skinny doctors. :-)
I’m pretty much in love with your entire site, I just discovered popping over from Delicously Naughty’s site.
Thanks for it, I just love it all. :-)
I never had a problem with myself, even though I was about 15kg over my “ideal” weight for a couple of years. Then, after birth of my second child my mother suggested I go to Weight Watchers. Biggest mistake of my life. I went from being a confident, sexy woman to a woman who keeps on putting on weight, feels guilty about every single thing that goes in her mouth and has been on every diet in the world, lose a bit of weight and then put back on twice as much. I have just recently discove