Fat/Size Acceptance

I judge very fat 'people' - I don't see why a women should escape my judging purely because she's a 'women' - I think I understand what you're saying though, depression and other factors can lead to overeating ( women will use food whereas men will use alcohol ) - but on the whole, I'd say fat people are fat because they love their fatty food and don't exercise enough. I agree there is more pressure on women to be slim, but that's because women have always been more into fashion and looking after themselves generally, more so than men. I don't Judge a persons value on their weight or looks however - I'm not that shallow - but at the same time I wouldn't allow myself to get dangerously overweight or turn a blind eye to my dd's doughnut obsession.

I mean to say ... I don't think it's true that what every woman really 'wants' to eat, is enough food to make her a size 20. I think the reasons why many people eat that much are far more complex than 'this is delicious and I want it'.

See, I could be wrong, but I don't even think that's what'd happen, carmina. I think people who genuinely eat what they like, and don't eat for comfort, or to keep themselves awake on a shift, or because they've decided to call iceream their 'treat', probably don't end up at size 20 anyway. There isn't something intrinsically delicious about cheap carb/fat/sugar stuff. How often do you buy a cheap 'treat' and feel cheated?

So I agree that having money for better food, and time to cook it, and getting rid of the mindset (and that Orwell quotation is spot on) that certain things are treats, is important. But how will you do that for women if you don't adress the fact that, increasingly, being size 12 or over is 'fat' and there is a widening gap between what's healthy and what's considered pretty?

To be honest, I think lots of women are in this position where they're a decently healthy weight and maybe a size 12/14/16 ... but they are so convinced they're unattractive, it doesn't 'matter' any more and they eat crap for comfort.

Do you determine a woman's value on the basis of their mass, or her appearance in general? Are all size 20 women identical and universally to be reviled?

(I think I'm getting what Liss means in the Shakesville piece now )

Are you saying women should eat what they like and ballon to a size 20?

I don't understand.

Isn't this a bit like the simplistic arguments about teen pregnancies? Folks rabbit on about there being no excuse, that there are lots of contraceptive choices, you can get condoms free from clinics, kids have sex education in school, everything is laid out for them, so it HAS to be loose morals/wanting a council flat/unbridled promiscuity/etc. that means girls still get pregnant. That fails to recognise the complex influences on the lives of many young women that sometimes result in them becoming pregnant. Unless you take on those (e.g. abuse and coercion in relationships, poor self-esteem, lack of aspirations, lack of nurturing in their own families, early sexualisation, background noise of sexism everywhere, etc.) then stuff won't change by just handing out free johnnies.

Imho, it's the same with weight. It's not just about having healthy food at the shop next door or the skills to select, cook and serve it. Sooooo much more than that. And, expectations of the "correct" body size and shape ARE gendered in our society. Fat still very much is a feminist issue.

True. And you're quite right that the job you do (mine is totally sedentary) and your food options around that are also partly to blame for levels of fatness.
I do mostly eat healthy food and take the time to exercise, but I earn a fair enough wage, and have the spare time to shop for and cook healthy food and to exercise. If I had DC, or other big time committment, and I earned significantly less, I'm pretty sure I would eat more crap convenience food and I would definitely take less exercise.

That's the thing, though, the reasons for the rise in obesity are many and varied, but the sense of unreflecting defense in the linked article get my goat may prevent the author and readers of that article from identifying the real factors causing obesity.

You're quite right, Theala, but there wasn't one in the snack machine, which post-7pm is my only work catering option. I could have brought one in, but you never go in to work expecting to flag and need to constantly eat in order to stay alert, it sort of creeps up on you after 3pm...

Oh and dittany, quite right. Knowledge is power in all regards, and feeding shit food to children so they grow up not even realising it is shit food, is not empowering.

Although you could have had a banana or peanut butter sandwich instead, Robot, which would have given you the carb and blood sugar boost, without the crap.

I also think that blog was ridiculous. There are many reasons for people being obese, from poverty and lack of education, to the promotion of unhealthy food and the premiums on healthier stuff. Throwing up your hands and saying "I was born like this, there's nothing I can do about it" is very obviously bollocks. If I ate a load of unhealthy food on a regular basis, and didn't take exercise, I would put on a shitload of weight - that wouldn't mean that I was meant to be like that. Some people might be more genetically disposed to store fat, but that doesn't mean they're incapable of being a healthy weight.

There are a number of other factors to diet as well, including what job you do and how physically tired it makes you. I work unsociable hours. Yesterday I worked very late after a DC-related broken night's sleep. I was shattered. I ate two packets of crisps, a Wispa and a bakewell tart. Basically, to keep me awake and functioning. There are good studies which back up what I did - that it is a) typical (shift workers eat more carbs) and b) effective (a boost in blood sugar helps with concentration)

GothAnne; - I'm a size 14/16 and I hate it. Dh loves me being 'curvy' ( as he puts it ) and keeps telling me I look great and to stop worrying. I'm putting pressure on myself. It's the same with shaving legs etc, Dh doesn't give a toss ( and wouldn't even notice ) it's me who thinks it looks awful. It's women putting pressure on other women ( although I think fat men look awful too )

I'm just responding to where you said "all the toxic time wasting shit women have to put up with' - I wouldn't say women are putting up with it, clearly a lot of them don't care ( see obesity statistics ) but some of us like being thin for our own self esteem.
Women are the biggest critics of other women. In my experience anyway.

'Read an excellent comment on here recently about how carers overeat as a form of self-medication because drink and drugs aren't an option. They put it better than that but was very interesting.'

I'd agree with that, if you are the only one responsible for a vulnerable individual 24/7 anything that you can't drop in a second and be instantly alert is no good as a form of relaxation or comfort.
So food, rather than drugs, drink, activities that require any sort of timetable, a lover, holidays...
But you can stuff an eclair in your mouth whilst running down the road to the next crisis.
That's me.

I'm officially obese.

I also have Rheumatoid arthristis which makes it hard for me to type let alone run!

There are some of us with little option (illness, drugs etc)

Every time this topic comes up I think of The Road to Wigan Pier, where George Orwell wrote about living among miners (often unemployed) in northern England in the 1930s, and his chapter on their budget and diet is fascinating. He has an odd mixture of affection and frustration when he talks about how they spend the little money they have on expensive food that's guaranteed to keep them in poor health--but then he says
And the peculiar evil is this, that the less money you have, the less inclined you feel to spend it on wholesome food. A millionaire may enjoy breakfasting off orange juice and Ryvita biscuits; an unemployed man doesn't... When you are unemployed, which is to say when you are underfed, harassed, bored, and miserable, you don't want to eat dull wholesome food. You want something a little bit 'tasty'. There is always some cheaply pleasant thing to tempt you. Let's have three pennorth of chips! Run out and buy us a twopenny ice-cream! Put the kettle on and we'll all have a nice cup of tea!

Someone always mentions the difficulty for some people of getting to a place where they can buy decent food cheaply. But if that's true, anyone who lives round the corner from a supermarket should be eating a healthy diet, and I bet it doesn't work that way. It's just like in Orwell's time, the cause of poor eating choices (and they most often are choices, not compulsion) is social or psychological more than anything else.

And there really is an "epidemic of obesity". More of a problem in America at the moment, but Britain is catching up. It is a fine thing not to demonise fat people, but it's a genuine public health issue.

I like some 'fat blogs' - Kate Harding is v. interesting.

But that's an absurd blog post.

2 particular absurdities - calories in/out isn't fat hatred: it's science. No-one's arguing that there aren't many, many other factors, but denying the primary one helps no-one.

Secondly, equating being fat with being gay, and therefore equating fat-'hatred' with homophobia, is downright offensive. No-one ever became straight by an effort of will or by succumbing to basic science. But it is possible to become slim by both of these means.

And I'm speaking as someone of decided heft (currently calorie counting to lower my BMI for a specific medical reason!)

that blog is tosh

My best friend is clinically obese. Her diet is fine, it's lack of exercise and medication that's the problem. Her diet is a model of what it should be but she is still overweight.

I have another friend who smokes, drinks, hardly ever exercises, eats an appalling diet and is a size 6 (if that).

I am quite happy to accept that body weight is in part a matter of genetics. Some people are naturally slim, some naturally more solid. I find it appalling that someone who is 9 stone can be considered overweight by the media. From a feminist perspective it annoys me even more, since women are subjected to far greater scrutiny than men when it comes to body weight.

However, within a certain amount of weight either way, I think it's silly to pretend that any size is perfectly ok. Being more than a couple of stone over or underweight carries serious health consequences. I wouldn't dream of punishing people or telling them what to do because it's a basic human right to do with your body as you will, but acceptance and tolerance is not the same as endorsement.

i think we've got a completely backwards approach to nutrition in this country though. We've lost the art of preparing a balanced diet on a low budget. Eating healthily costs time and money unless you have quite a lot of knowledge about food and where to get it from. And it needs to be balanced by regular exercise. You can have a great diet but if the only walking you do is around your house and to your car you're still way more likely to suffer from cholesterol and high blood pressure, etc.

One way we could tackle this is through sensible home economics classes (for both genders of course). I am horrified that my local secondary school has HE classes that each week involve ingredients to the value of about £10-£15. For one dish! My diet is excellent and I can feed 3 of us for about 3-4 days on that.

I can't help feeling that if food was more about nutrition as part of an overall healthy lifestyle than about appearance and being 'good', a lot of the problems would magically disappear.

I don't think anyone is saying obesity is unavoidable and unaddressable but an average is made up of a range of sizes from very large to very small. Society expects us all to fit into the small end of that distribution which, by definition, is not possible as the average would change IYSWIM.

I am fat but do not think I would be more talented, charming or generally adorable if I was thinner. Size is not relevant to my worth as a person.

BTW I can't stand Jamie Oliver. He is a knob of the highest order IMO who just looks for social issue bandwagons to jump on to self-publicise.