Today I found this wretched piece of dreck by Shirley Skeel entitled "What if no one were fat?" via a link from Cthulhu's Cafeteria, where Teppy gives it a proper (and hilarious) skewering. I won't even bother, myself.
There are some other good responses to the article here and here.
I was looking for info on this Shirley Skeel person, but didn't find much. She has a page on Biznik, which describes itself as "business networking that doesn't suck" -- of course Biznik never claims that "people who use our business networking don't suck".
That is all for now.
Friday, April 25, 2008
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Things that make you go hmm...
My buddy K sent this link yesterday, which he found via a nifty site that our other buddy works on called Allvoices. The article is about how France is going to ban pro-anorexia (a.k.a. "pro-ana") websites and blogs.
Pro-anorexia websites, you ask? Oh, yes. They have been around for a long time. I'd link to an example of one, but then again, I think I won't. You can find them yourself through the miracle of Google if you really want to. In a nutshell, these websites give you instructions on how to eat as little as possible without dying, how to negotiate your everyday life without people finding out you're anorexic, etc. And they also give you pictures of super-thin people (and, I suppose, fat people) to be your "thinspiration" (no I am not making up that term, but how long before some diet company starts using it?).
Some people may be a bit concerned that banning pro-ana websites sets a bad precedent for restricting free speech on the Internet. People who maintain these sites seem to claim that they just want an online community and that they're not trying to recruit new anorexics. Here's a sample of the sort of rhetoric you find: 'when i was younger, i was always told of how anorexia was a "mental illness" and that it was a hideous one at that! Now that i have it, i dont see it as a mental illness, even though deep down i know it is, i would not encourage anybody to attempt to find ana, however, for those of us who ana has already found, this website is for you! This website is not encouraging any kind of eating didorders and i will not be blamed for anybodys! [sic]' So yeah.
My first reaction when I read the article was two-fold. First I thought "Yay," because encouraging people to starve themselves amounts to incitement to (self-inflicted) violence and (self-) hatred, and therefore shouldn't be protected as free speech. That's basically what the French official quoted in the article has to say about it. And I also thought hmm, this is sort of a slippery slope, because if you examine regular old diets, a lot of them use language and suggest dieting techniques that are quite similar to what you get on pro-ana sites. For example, you get tips about colon cleansing, drinking lots of water to feel full, cutting your food up into tiny little pieces -- all stuff that gets promoted on various mainstream diet sites. Of course I figured that mainstream dieting sites would never be banned, but I thought it would be swell if there was a big argument about it that caused people to realize that dieting and disordered eating have more overlap between them than one might think. Fillyjonk over at Shapely Prose makes this point.
But on further reflection, my feelings about this thing are a bit more mixed. The French government has decided, based on published scientific reports and a widespread general consensus, that anorexia is unhealthy and often deadly. So they are going to prohibit people from having websites that tell people it's OK to be anorexic, that being ultra-thin is attractive, and give tips on how you can keep up your anorexia, including how to handle other people (like family members and doctors) when they accuse you of being anorexic and tell you it's unhealthy. But suppose that a government (say, the US government) decided that "obesity" is unhealthy and often deadly (check). Suppose then that they decided to prohibit people from having websites that tell people it's OK to be fat, that being fat is attractive, and give tips on how to recover from disordered eating ("dieting") and eat what you want when you're hungry even if that means you're going to stay fat, and tips on how to handle other people when they tell you how unhealthy and disgusting you are for being fat. That would mean that virtually every blog in the fatosphere would get banned.
So, I dunno, I'm feeling kind of torn about the ban... I feel like there's a big difference between pro-anorexia and fat acceptance, but when I try to come up with the specific differences, they break down. For example, contrary to popular belief, fat acceptance blogs generally aren't "pro-fat" per se. But then again, the pro-ana sites claim not to really be "pro-anorexia" either. They say they're just for people who are already anorexic and just looking for support from other people like them. Sounds like acceptance. And then there's the science -- I can say all I want (and I do truly believe this) that being fat has not been shown (in any credible studies not funded by the diet industry) to cause diabetes, heart disease, hypertension, etc. But in fact there is a close association between these disorders and some lifestyle choices that can also lead to weight gain, e.g., a high-calorie, high-fat diet and not enough exercise, so people are going to keep on believing that fat "causes" those diseases. I could imagine (though I haven't seen this) someone who's pro-anorexia trying to make similar arguments, like that it's not being super-thin that causes death, but rather fasting for too many days in a row, not getting enough vitamins, etc. I would be inclined not to buy such arguments, but then most of our society is inclined not to buy my arguments about fat. I could point to the fact that anorexia has a vastly higher death rate than "obesity", even if were to use the CDC's original wildly overstated numbers for "deaths caused by obesity" that they later had to retract because they were (at least) 14 times the actual number. But then I'd be reducing the whole thing to a matter of degrees, and I don't think that's quite the right thing either.
So I guess I'm kind of stumped at the moment. I haven't had a chance to read the comments on Shapely Prose or other places where people have blogged about this story, but maybe that will give me some ideas. In the mean time: your thoughts?
Pro-anorexia websites, you ask? Oh, yes. They have been around for a long time. I'd link to an example of one, but then again, I think I won't. You can find them yourself through the miracle of Google if you really want to. In a nutshell, these websites give you instructions on how to eat as little as possible without dying, how to negotiate your everyday life without people finding out you're anorexic, etc. And they also give you pictures of super-thin people (and, I suppose, fat people) to be your "thinspiration" (no I am not making up that term, but how long before some diet company starts using it?).
Some people may be a bit concerned that banning pro-ana websites sets a bad precedent for restricting free speech on the Internet. People who maintain these sites seem to claim that they just want an online community and that they're not trying to recruit new anorexics. Here's a sample of the sort of rhetoric you find: 'when i was younger, i was always told of how anorexia was a "mental illness" and that it was a hideous one at that! Now that i have it, i dont see it as a mental illness, even though deep down i know it is, i would not encourage anybody to attempt to find ana, however, for those of us who ana has already found, this website is for you! This website is not encouraging any kind of eating didorders and i will not be blamed for anybodys! [sic]' So yeah.
My first reaction when I read the article was two-fold. First I thought "Yay," because encouraging people to starve themselves amounts to incitement to (self-inflicted) violence and (self-) hatred, and therefore shouldn't be protected as free speech. That's basically what the French official quoted in the article has to say about it. And I also thought hmm, this is sort of a slippery slope, because if you examine regular old diets, a lot of them use language and suggest dieting techniques that are quite similar to what you get on pro-ana sites. For example, you get tips about colon cleansing, drinking lots of water to feel full, cutting your food up into tiny little pieces -- all stuff that gets promoted on various mainstream diet sites. Of course I figured that mainstream dieting sites would never be banned, but I thought it would be swell if there was a big argument about it that caused people to realize that dieting and disordered eating have more overlap between them than one might think. Fillyjonk over at Shapely Prose makes this point.
But on further reflection, my feelings about this thing are a bit more mixed. The French government has decided, based on published scientific reports and a widespread general consensus, that anorexia is unhealthy and often deadly. So they are going to prohibit people from having websites that tell people it's OK to be anorexic, that being ultra-thin is attractive, and give tips on how you can keep up your anorexia, including how to handle other people (like family members and doctors) when they accuse you of being anorexic and tell you it's unhealthy. But suppose that a government (say, the US government) decided that "obesity" is unhealthy and often deadly (check). Suppose then that they decided to prohibit people from having websites that tell people it's OK to be fat, that being fat is attractive, and give tips on how to recover from disordered eating ("dieting") and eat what you want when you're hungry even if that means you're going to stay fat, and tips on how to handle other people when they tell you how unhealthy and disgusting you are for being fat. That would mean that virtually every blog in the fatosphere would get banned.
So, I dunno, I'm feeling kind of torn about the ban... I feel like there's a big difference between pro-anorexia and fat acceptance, but when I try to come up with the specific differences, they break down. For example, contrary to popular belief, fat acceptance blogs generally aren't "pro-fat" per se. But then again, the pro-ana sites claim not to really be "pro-anorexia" either. They say they're just for people who are already anorexic and just looking for support from other people like them. Sounds like acceptance. And then there's the science -- I can say all I want (and I do truly believe this) that being fat has not been shown (in any credible studies not funded by the diet industry) to cause diabetes, heart disease, hypertension, etc. But in fact there is a close association between these disorders and some lifestyle choices that can also lead to weight gain, e.g., a high-calorie, high-fat diet and not enough exercise, so people are going to keep on believing that fat "causes" those diseases. I could imagine (though I haven't seen this) someone who's pro-anorexia trying to make similar arguments, like that it's not being super-thin that causes death, but rather fasting for too many days in a row, not getting enough vitamins, etc. I would be inclined not to buy such arguments, but then most of our society is inclined not to buy my arguments about fat. I could point to the fact that anorexia has a vastly higher death rate than "obesity", even if were to use the CDC's original wildly overstated numbers for "deaths caused by obesity" that they later had to retract because they were (at least) 14 times the actual number. But then I'd be reducing the whole thing to a matter of degrees, and I don't think that's quite the right thing either.
So I guess I'm kind of stumped at the moment. I haven't had a chance to read the comments on Shapely Prose or other places where people have blogged about this story, but maybe that will give me some ideas. In the mean time: your thoughts?
Friday, April 11, 2008
I'd say they could lose 150 or so right off the bat by getting rid of Michele Martinez
The city of Santa Ana has decided that its citizens need to lose a million pounds in one year. Councilwoman Michele Martinez sure seems like a lovely person and all, but her quotes in the article are obnoxious. For starters, in support of this initiative Martinez says, "We want to really change the culture here in this city." Umm, from what to what exactly? When I think Orange County I don't exactly think "too open-minded; need to scrutinize people's bodies more." I don't suppose that's what she meant exactly, but then who knows. But even worse is when Martinez says, "We want to say, 'You know what, you need to get moving.'" Argh, that pisses me off for so many reasons. It's smug, it presupposes that fat people don't "move", and worst of all it starts out with "You know what..." which is about as patronizing as you can get. You know what, Michele, it's counterproductive (not to mention poor form) to talk down to people as if they're idiots and you have the simple solution to all their problems.
As part of the initiative, the city plans to organize some 5K races. That is really swell, and I'm always looking for good 5K's in the area. But after reading the stupid xenophopic comments on the article made by some of Orange County's finest mouth-breathing morons (e.g., someone called "ocgrandma" who helpfully suggests that "if they got rid of all the illegals they would shed 3 million pounds and exceed their goal!"), I really think I'll just stay home, thanks.
And yeah, the picture doesn't really have anything to do with the article, but I thought it was too awesome for me not to use it.
Thursday, April 03, 2008
A small revelation
I was folding some pants and came to a realization about how stupid "fat pants" pictures are. You know, like the famous photo of Subway tool Jared Fogle, or like this lady? Yeah.
Anyway, I realized that if you just hold up your own pants in front of yourself, they look a lot wider than you are, even if they are pants that fit you perfectly well at your current size. This is because -- wait for it -- a person is three-dimensional!!
Granted, we all know that Jared lost a lot of weight. But who knows about that other lady or anyone else who poses for those stupid photos. And anyway, I feel like the whole thing is just a little sick. I know part of it is just to illustrate one person's change in size, but surely another part of it is to make fun of how huge the pants look. Golly, fat people's pants sure are hilarious!
There is the other type of fat pants photo like the one on this page, where the person is actually *in* the pants, so at least there's not the same exaggeration of the size difference. But there's still the ridicule factor, I think.
That is all.
Anyway, I realized that if you just hold up your own pants in front of yourself, they look a lot wider than you are, even if they are pants that fit you perfectly well at your current size. This is because -- wait for it -- a person is three-dimensional!!
Granted, we all know that Jared lost a lot of weight. But who knows about that other lady or anyone else who poses for those stupid photos. And anyway, I feel like the whole thing is just a little sick. I know part of it is just to illustrate one person's change in size, but surely another part of it is to make fun of how huge the pants look. Golly, fat people's pants sure are hilarious!
There is the other type of fat pants photo like the one on this page, where the person is actually *in* the pants, so at least there's not the same exaggeration of the size difference. But there's still the ridicule factor, I think.
That is all.
Friday, March 28, 2008
They'd still never make it as supermodels
Saw this disturbing piece at Shapely Prose yesterday. In a nutshell: the Sweet Valley High twins have had their size changed to a 4 in the latest version of the books, down from a size 6. And this is a big deal in the SVH series, because *every fucking book* has the same stupid description of the twins and their blonde hair, aqua-colored eyes, and perfect size X. So they really hammer it in. I could even swear that it used to be a size 8 back when I was reading, but Feministing's original post says that the 1983 versions had them as a size 6, so maybe I'm misremembering.
Now that I'm thinking more about it, I remember that there were a couple of poor pathetic chubby girls in the books. I'd love to go back and reread them with a more critical approach to the treatment of the chubby girls... but then again, fuck it.
And before anyone says the change is probably just due to size inflation (which is a comment I've seen on a couple of other sites), let me ask you this: why the fuck do the books have to mention the girls' size in the first place?
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Tell us something we didn't already know
I guess I shouldn't be so cynical, but it's Oprah, so I can't help it. I was just tipped off to this short article that appeared in the February issue of O, The Oprah Magazine. It reports on the CDC study that showed that "overweight" people have the longest lifespan of all BMI groups (including, notably, people of "normal" [sic] weight). The thing is, we already heard about this study three years ago. So, like, why did it take so long for Oprah to find out about it?
I guess I should be glad that this study is getting some attention, but it's just kind of annoying when, three years after the fact, it gets reported on as if it's the News of the Weird. The first sentence of the article begins, "As if America's weight problem weren't already complicated enough..." and already I'm thinking, "Is it, really?" Argh. But I do have to admit that the rest of the article does a better job. Now, if we could just get Oprah to pass this along to her pal Barack Obama, who claimed that "if we could go back to the obesity rates of 1980, we could save the Medicare system a trillion dollars." Gee, Barack, where'd you get that nice, round trillion dollar figure? Maybe straight out of your (skinny) ass? (See a good reaction to Obama's remarks here.)
I guess I should be glad that this study is getting some attention, but it's just kind of annoying when, three years after the fact, it gets reported on as if it's the News of the Weird. The first sentence of the article begins, "As if America's weight problem weren't already complicated enough..." and already I'm thinking, "Is it, really?" Argh. But I do have to admit that the rest of the article does a better job. Now, if we could just get Oprah to pass this along to her pal Barack Obama, who claimed that "if we could go back to the obesity rates of 1980, we could save the Medicare system a trillion dollars." Gee, Barack, where'd you get that nice, round trillion dollar figure? Maybe straight out of your (skinny) ass? (See a good reaction to Obama's remarks here.)
Friday, March 14, 2008
Check this out
Hi everyone, I'm sorry I have been so negligent lately... blah blah blah, insert excuses here...
Anyhoo, until I have time to post something longer, check this out. It's funny.
Anyhoo, until I have time to post something longer, check this out. It's funny.
Tuesday, March 04, 2008
Lose 60 lbs. instantly!!!
I don't think this is my original idea, but I can't remember where I got it (don't you hate that?). Anyway, at some point I started thinking about all these glib promises you see in advertising and magazine fluff pieces that a particular product will allow you to "lose 10 lbs. instantly!" etc. So I decided to see just how much weight one could hope to lose instantly by using all of these products simultaneously. A search of the internets reveals that you can lose a full 60 lbs. instantly -- and this only counts claims that gave a specific amount of weight (i.e., I didn't count ones that just said "lose weight instantly"). So I give you: Mary's Guaranteed Instant 60-Pound Weight Loss Strategy! (Note: do not try this if losing 60 lbs. will cause you to be unhealthily thin. I don't want to be responsible for any delayed aftereffects.)
Mary's Guaranteed Instant 60-Pound Weight Loss Strategy
Improve your posture (lose 10 lbs.)
Wear Spanx (lose 10 lbs.)
Wear a Jeunique bra (lose 10 lbs.)
Wear a top made out of Slinky fabric (lose 10 lbs.)
Get highlights in your hair (lose 5 lbs.)
Get a smaller purse (lose 5 lbs.)
Wear a Body Shaper (lose 5 lbs.)
Wear Bend Over slacks (lose 5 lbs.)
Do all of these things at once (what a fucking awesome outfit that would be) and LOSE 60 LBS. INSTANTLY!!!
I also want to point out that this does not count claims that you can "look 10 lbs. thinner," etc. If you add those in, you can probably look hundreds of pounds thinner (maybe at some point I'll investigate that and let you know).
Update on last week's post: Seamus sent me this relevant article. Scary stuff.
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