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Newsweek: America’s War on the Overweight



 
 
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  #1  
Old August 29th, 2009, 02:32 AM posted to soc.support.fat-acceptance,misc.consumers,alt.support.diet.low-carb
Tina[_3_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1
Default Newsweek: America’s War on the Overweight

http://www.newsweek.com/id/213646?GT1=43002

America’s War on the Overweight
Anti-fat rhetoric is getting nastier than ever. Why our overweight nation
hates overweight people.
By Kate Dailey and Abby Ellin | Newsweek Web Exclusive

Aug 26, 2009 | Updated: 8:08 a.m. ET Aug 26, 2009

Practically the minute President Obama announced Regina M. Benjamin, a
zaftig doctor who also has an M.B.A. and is the recipient of a MacArthur
"genius grant," as a nominee for the post of Surgeon General, the criticism
started.

The attacks were vicious—Michael Karolchyk, owner of a Denver "anti-gym,"
told Fox News' Neil Cavuto, "Obesity is the No. 1 issue facing our country
in terms of the health and wellness, and she has shown not that she was
born this way, not that she woke up one day and was obese. She has shown
through being lazy, and making poor food choices, that she's obese."



"This is totally disgusting to have some one so big to be advocating
health," wrote one YouTube commenter.


The anger about Benjamin wasn't the only example of vitriol hurled at the
overweight. Cintra Wilson, style columnist for The New York Times, recently
wrote a column so disdainful of JCPenney's plus-size mannequins that the
Times' ombsbudman later wrote that he could read "a virtual sneer" coming
through her prose. A NEWSWEEK post about Glamour’s recent plus-size model
(in fact, a normal-sized woman with a bit of a belly roll) had several
commenters lashing out at the positive reaction the model was receiving.
"This model issue is being used as a smoke screen to justify
self-destructive lifestyle that cost me more money in health care costs,"
one wrote. Heath guru MeMe Roth has made a career out of bashing fat—she
called size 12 American Idol Jordan Sparks a "bad role model" on national
television, and derided size 2 Jennifer Love Hewitt for having cellulite.
(That Roth is considered something of an extremist doesn't stop the media
attention.) Virtually any news article about weight that is posted online
garners a slew of comments from readers expressing disgust that people let
their weight get so out of control. The specific target may change, but the
words stay the same: Self-destructive. Disgusting. Disgraceful. Shameful.
While the debate rages on about obesity and the best ways to deal with it,
the attitudes Americans have toward those with extra pounds are only
getting nastier. Just why do Americans hate fat people so much?

Fat bias is nothing new. "Public outrage at other people's obesity has a
lot to do with America from the turn of the 20th century to about World War
I," says Deborah Levine, assistant professor of health policy and
management at Providence College. The rise of fat hatred is often seen as
connected to the changing American workplace; in the early 20th century,
companies began to offer snacks to employees, white-collar jobs became more
prominent, and fewer people exercised. As thinness became rarer, says Peter
N. Stearns, author of Fat History: Bodies and Beauty in the Modern West and
professor of history at George Mason University, it was more prized, and
conversely, fatness was more maligned.

At the same time, people also paid a lot of attention to President Taft's
girth; while Taft was large, he wasn't all that much heavier than earlier
presidents. Newspapers questioned how his weight would affect diplomacy and
solicited the funniest "fat Taft" joke. "This [period] is also when you get
ready-to-wear clothing," says Levine. "For the first time, [people were]
buying clothes in a certain size, and that encourages a comparison amongst
other people." Actuarial tables began to connect weight and shorter
lifespan, and cookbooks published around World War I targeted the
overweight. "There was that idea that people who were overweight were
hoarding resources needed for the war effort," Levine says. She adds that
early concerns were that overweight American men would not be able to
compete globally, participate in international business, or win wars.

Fatness has always been seen as a slight on the American character. Ours is
a nation that values hard work and discipline, and it's hard for us to
accept that weight could be not just a struggle of will, even when the bulk
of the research—and often our own personal experience—shows that the
factors leading to weight gain are much more than just simple gluttony.
"There's this general perception that weight can be controlled if you have
enough willpower, that it's just about calories in and calories out," says
Dr. Glen Gaesser, professor of exercise and wellness at Arizona State
University and author of BigFat Lies: The Truth About Your Weight and Your
Health, and that perception leads the nonfat to believe that the overweight
are not just unhealthy, but weak and lazy. Even though research suggests
that there is a genetic propensity for obesity, and even though some obese
people are technically healthier than their skinnier counterparts, the
perception remains "[that] it's a failure to control ourselves. It violates
everything we have learned about self control from a very young age," says
Gaesser.

In a country that still prides itself on its Puritanical ideals, the fat
self is the "bad self," the epitome of greed, gluttony, and sloth. "There's
a widespread belief that fat is controllable," says Linda Bacon, author of
Health at Every Size: The Surprising Truth About Your Weight. "So then it's
unlike a disability where you can have compassion; now you can blame the
individual and attribute all kinds of mean qualities to them. Then consider
the thinner people that are always watching what they eat carefully—fat
people are symbols of what they can become if they weren't so virtuous."

But considering that the U.S. has already become a size XL nation—66
percent of adults over 20 are considered overweight or obese, according to
the Centers for Disease Control—why does the stigma, and the anger, remain?

Call it a case of self-loathing. "A lot of people struggle themselves with
their weight, and the same people that tend to get very angry at themselves
for not being able to manage their weight are more likely to be biased
against the obese," says Marlene Schwartz, director of the Rudd Center for
Food Policy and Obesity at Yale University. "I think that some of this is
that anger is confusion between the anger that we have at ourselves and
projecting that out onto other people." Her research indicates that younger
women, who are under the most pressure to be thin and who are also the most
likely to be self-critical, are the most likely to feel negatively toward
fat people.

As many women's magazines' cover lines note, losing the last five pounds
can be a challenge. So why don't we have more compassion for people
struggling to lose the first 50, 60, or 100? Some of it has to do with the
psychological phenomenon known as the fundamental attribution error, a
basic belief that whatever problems befall us personally are the result of
difficult circumstances, while the same problems in other people are the
result of their bad choices. Miss a goal at work? It's because the vendor
was unreliable, and because your manager isn't giving you enough support,
and because the power outage last week cut into premium sales time. That
jerk next to you? He blew his quota because he's a bad planner, and because
he spent too much time taking personal calls.

The same can be true of weight: "From working with so many people
struggling with their weight, I've seen it many times," says Andrew Geier,
a postdoctoral fellow in the psychology department at Yale University.
"They believe they're overweight due to a myriad of circumstances: as soon
as my son goes to college, I'll have time to cook healthier meals; when my
husband's shifts change at work, I can get to the gym sooner.…" But other
people? They're overweight because they don't have the discipline to do the
hard work and take off the weight, and that lack of discipline is an
affront to our own hard work. (Never mind that weight loss is incredibly
difficult to attain: Geier notes that even the most rigorous behavioral
programs result in at most about a 12.5 percent decrease in weight, which
would take a 350-pound man to a slimmer, but not svelte, 306 pounds).

But why do the rest of us care so much? What is it about fat people that
makes us so mad? As it turns out, we kind of like it. "People actually
enjoy feeling angry," says Ryan Martin, associate professor of psychology
at the University of Wisconsin, Green Bay, who cites studies done on
people's emotions. "It makes them feel powerful, it makes them feel greater
control, and they appreciate it for that reason." And with fat people
designated as acceptable targets of rage—and with the prevalence of fat
people in our lives, both in the malls and on the news—it's easy to find a
target for some soul-clearing, ego-boosting ranting.

And it may be, that like those World War I-era cookbook writers, we feel
that obese people are robbing us of resources, whether it's space in a row
of airline seats or our hard-earned tax dollars. Think of health ca when
president Obama made reforming health care a priority, it led to an
increased focus on obesity as a contributor to health-care costs. A recent
article in Health Affairs, a public-policy journal, reported that obesity
costs $147 billion a year, mainly in insurance premiums and taxes. At the
same time, obesity-related diseases such as type 2 diabetes have spiked,
and, while diabetes can be treated, treatment is expensive. So the
overweight, some people argue, are costing all of us money while refusing
to alter the behavior that has put them in their predicament in the first
place (i.e., overeating and not exercising).

The reality is much more complicated. It's a fallacy to conflate the
unhealthy action—overeating and not exercising—with the unhealthy
appearance, says Schwartz: some overweight people run marathons; eat only
organic, vegetarian fare; and have clean bills of health. Even so, yelling
at the overweight to put down the doughnut is far from productive. "People
are less likely to seek out healthy behaviors when they're criticized by
friends, family, doctors, and others," says Schwartz. "If people tell you
that you're disgusting or a slob enough times, you soon start to believe
it." In fact, fat outrage might actually make health-care costs higher. In
a study published in the 2005 issue of the Journal of Health Politics,
Policy and Law, Abigail Saguy and Brian Riley found that many overweight
people decide not to get help for medical conditions that are more
treatable and more risky than obesity because they don't want to deal with
their doctor's harassment about their weight. (For instance, a study from
the University of North Carolina found that obese women are less likely to
receive cervical exams than their thinner counterparts, in part because
they worry about being embarrassed or belittled by the doctor because of
their weight.)

The bubbling rage against fat people in America has put researchers like
Levine in a difficult position. On the one hand, she says, she wants to
ensure that obesity is taken seriously as a medical problem, and pointing
out the costs associated with obesity-related illnesses helps illustrate
the severity of the situation. On the other hand, she says, doing so could
increase the animosity people have toward the overweight, many of whom may
already live healthy lives or may be working hard to make heathier choices.

"The idea is to fight obesity and not obese people," she says, and then
pauses. "But it's very hard for many people to disentangle the two."



  #2  
Old August 29th, 2009, 06:52 AM posted to soc.support.fat-acceptance,misc.consumers,alt.support.diet.low-carb
Billy[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 72
Default Newsweek: America’s War on the Overweight

In article
emailer.net,
(Tina) wrote:

http://www.newsweek.com/id/213646?GT1=43002

America’s War on the Overweight
Anti-fat rhetoric is getting nastier than ever. Why our overweight nation
hates overweight people.
By Kate Dailey and Abby Ellin | Newsweek Web Exclusive

Aug 26, 2009 | Updated: 8:08 a.m. ET Aug 26, 2009


Thanks for the article.

It is a subject that should be irrelevant, but if that is not to be,
then people should remember that we are all doing the best we can.
Should you be judged on your intelligence, or looks? Should the
developmentally disabled woman with the sweet laugh be mocked, and the
churlish mathematician, who can describe the interaction between two
mathematical models, be applauded? Perhaps your view of the environment
displays more about you, than it does about the environment.
--
³When you give food to the poor, they call you a saint. When you ask why the poor have no food, they call you a communist.²
-Archbishop Helder Camara

http://tinyurl.com/o63ruj
http://countercurrents.org/roberts020709.htm
  #3  
Old August 29th, 2009, 02:57 PM posted to soc.support.fat-acceptance,misc.consumers,alt.support.diet.low-carb
[email protected][_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 61
Default Newsweek: America’s War on the Overweight

On Aug 29, 1:52*am, Billy wrote:
In article
emailer.net,

(Tina) wrote:
http://www.newsweek.com/id/213646?GT1=43002


America’s War on the Overweight
Anti-fat rhetoric is getting nastier than ever. Why our overweight nation
hates overweight people.
By Kate Dailey and Abby Ellin | Newsweek Web Exclusive *


Aug 26, 2009 | Updated: 8:08 a.m. ET Aug 26, 2009


Thanks for the article.

It is a subject that should be irrelevant, but if that is not to be,
then people should remember that we are all doing the best we can.
Should you be judged on your intelligence, or looks? Should the
developmentally disabled woman with the sweet laugh be mocked, and the
churlish mathematician, who can describe the interaction between two
mathematical models, be applauded? Perhaps your view of the environment
displays more about you, than it does about the environment.
--
³When you give food to the poor, they call you a saint. When you ask why the poor have no food, they call you a communist.²
-Archbishop Helder Camara

http://tinyurl.com/o63rujhttp://coun...erts020709.htm



Tina might want to check the laws concerning copyrights before making
another post.
  #4  
Old August 29th, 2009, 06:05 PM posted to soc.support.fat-acceptance,misc.consumers,alt.support.diet.low-carb
Billy[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 72
Default Newsweek: America¹s War on the Overweight

In article
,
wrote:

On Aug 29, 1:52*am, Billy wrote:
In article
emailer.net,

(Tina) wrote:
http://www.newsweek.com/id/213646?GT1=43002

America¹s War on the Overweight
Anti-fat rhetoric is getting nastier than ever. Why our overweight nation
hates overweight people.
By Kate Dailey and Abby Ellin | Newsweek Web Exclusive *


Aug 26, 2009 | Updated: 8:08 a.m. ET Aug 26, 2009


Thanks for the article.



Tina might want to check the laws concerning copyrights before making
another post.


True, NEWSWEEK may not want the attention they will get when people find
out what an interesting site they have (it was my first time there).
Next thing they'll have advertisers offering them more money to
advertise on their site, and MAYBE, all they want is to be left alone
;O)

Unless you some how are making scads of money by reposting an article, I
wouldn't be, and haven't been concerned.

In a somewhat related article, a fat (her term, not mine) nutritionist
discusses health and fat, and the idea of "Health at Every Size".

http://blog.newsweek.com/blogs/thehu...09/08/28/the-f
at-nutritionist-how-i-learned-to-love-my-body.aspx


Posted Friday, August 28, 2009 7:11 AM
The Fat Nutritionist: On Loving My Job and My Body
Newsweek
By Michelle Allison
Let¹s start with this: I identify as fat because, well, I¹m fat, and
also because I don¹t think being fat is necessarily a bad thingÑüit¹s
just a thing.

But calling myself a nutritionist feels like a fantastic act of
audacity. I¹m still technically a student, though I¹ve completed the
work core to my nutrition degree and am now taking a psychology minor.

I initially got interested in nutrition by going on a diet to lose
weight when I was 21. I did it to feel better about myself, because I
hated my body, hated being fat. What I told everyone, naturally, was
that I was losing weight for the good of my health.

Except I didn¹t get healthy. I was constantly injured from
overexercising, and I came down with a virus that developed into really
nasty pneumonia that I couldn¹t seem to shake.

What kept me on the diet was the intoxicating sense that, for the first
time in my life, I was following the rules. I was doing it right. I was
compliant. I was a model eater and exerciser. My habits were above
reproach.

In the end, I lost 30 pounds and gained a bunch of disorder behaviors.
And I hated my body more intensely than before.

I knew that wasn¹t how it was supposed to workÑüyou were supposed to
lose weight and feel great about yourself and be healthy.

But when I asked all of my dieting friends, no one could give me an
answer. We were all so focused on eating the right number of calories
and getting the right amount of exercise that no one had managed to
figure this part out yetÑühow to actually be healthy? How to stop hating
yourself?

Around this time, I stumbled onto fat acceptance and Health at Every
Size.

In a nutshell, fat acceptance is the idea that human bodies naturally
come in a range shapes and sizes, and that being fat is not necessarily
pathological. It recognizes that there is a strong prejudice in our
culture against fat people, resulting in yet another form of
appearance-based discriminationÑüwhich is morally wrong, and requires a
political response.

Health at Every Size is complementary to fat acceptanceÑüit¹s the belief
that people can do positive things for their health (like eat well and
exercise) in a positive, compassionate, nonpunishing way, without
pursuing weight loss, and that even fat people can be healthy by all
other objective measures. It¹s the belief that self-acceptance, whatever
your size, is good for youÑüespecially when combined with other
health-promoting behaviors.
*
After discovering these things, I decided to make nutrition my
profession, and no one has ever questioned my credibility or competence
based on my body size.

Even when I worked in one of the more traditional areas of nutrition
practice, diabetes, my superiors never seemed bothered by my weight. I
was hired even after competing against thin applicants, after all. And I
believe my presence in the diabetes clinic as a nice-looking,
intelligent fat lady, often with doughnut in hand, was perhaps
comforting to patients, and deeply subversive to the notion of
³nutrition equals weight control.²

I think people assume nutritionists all eat ³perfectly.² Well, I don¹t,
and I don¹t know any dietitians, even thin ones, who do. I¹ve been lucky
to work with dietitians who have all loved food and would never turn
down a homemade brownie.

As for myself, I¹m genuinely positive about food and my body. I¹m no
longer at war with either one.

When I stopped dieting, it was extremely difficult to relearn ³normal²
eating. I read a lot of books and struggled on my own for five years. In
the end, it was a dietitian who practiced Health at Every Size who
taught me how. I learned to eat lovely, nourishing food without worry
and stress, and my weight finally settled into a stable, happy place.

Four years after being her client, I¹m still doing well, and I want to
help other people the way she helped me, now that I have the education
and experience to do so.

I¹ve done some hard thinking about what it means to be healthy. First, I
learned to separate a person¹s state of health from their value as a
human being. Second, I stopped seeing healthiness as an end in itself,
or as a reward for good behavior.

Instead, I now define health as a combination of the cards you¹ve been
dealt, and the way you choose to play them. Even if you¹re dealt a
s--tty hand that can¹t be changed, you can still play your cards well
enough to enjoy a meaningful life.

AcceptanceÑüthat is, learning to accept the things you cannot changeÑüis
key to health. This philosophy is embodied by the Serenity Prayer, by
Jean-Paul Sartre¹s concepts of facticity and transcendence, by
mindfulness theories, and, lastly, by fat acceptance and Health at Every
Size.


- Allison blogs at The Fat Nutritionist.
--
³When you give food to the poor, they call you a saint. When you ask why the poor have no food, they call you a communist.²
-Archbishop Helder Camara

http://tinyurl.com/o63ruj
http://countercurrents.org/roberts020709.htm
  #5  
Old August 30th, 2009, 05:38 PM posted to soc.support.fat-acceptance,misc.consumers,alt.support.diet.low-carb
Bob Peters
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1
Default Newsweek: America’s War on the Overweight

wrote:
On Aug 29, 1:52 am, Billy wrote:
In article
emailer.net,

(Tina) wrote:
http://www.newsweek.com/id/213646?GT1=43002
America’s War on the Overweight
Anti-fat rhetoric is getting nastier than ever. Why our overweight nation
hates overweight people.
By Kate Dailey and Abby Ellin | Newsweek Web Exclusive
Aug 26, 2009 | Updated: 8:08 a.m. ET Aug 26, 2009

Thanks for the article.

It is a subject that should be irrelevant, but if that is not to be,
then people should remember that we are all doing the best we can.
Should you be judged on your intelligence, or looks? Should the
developmentally disabled woman with the sweet laugh be mocked, and the
churlish mathematician, who can describe the interaction between two
mathematical models, be applauded? Perhaps your view of the environment
displays more about you, than it does about the environment.
--
³When you give food to the poor, they call you a saint. When you ask why the poor have no food, they call you a communist.²
-Archbishop Helder Camara

http://tinyurl.com/o63rujhttp://coun...erts020709.htm



Tina might want to check the laws concerning copyrights before making
another post.


sarcasmOh my god! You mean somebody actually reposted an online
magazine article on usenet? And they even included the URL of the
article itself? What's the world coming to?/sarcasm

--
(If you want to email me, lose the pretenses.)

Don't settle for corporate values misrepresented as Christian values.
Join the Project for a New American Populist Movement.
http://www.populism.us

"Everybody knows everything about all of us. That's too much knowledge.
I can't get behind that."--William Shatner featuring Henry Rollins

"Knee-jerk disdain of Government cannot rebuild our levees or fix our
schools."--President Obama

--
Posted via NewsDemon.com - Premium Uncensored Newsgroup Service
-------http://www.NewsDemon.com------
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