Today in fat hate

[sebastienne]

What is the "obesity crisis"? Every day I get more and more confused.

Today, I read an article in the Guardian that said "exercise protects against heart disease, type 2 diabetes, osteoperosis and high blood pressure". (Which I think has already been pretty well evidenced, to be honest, but it's still a useful thing to put out in the public domain, encouraging people to adopt healthier lifestyles.) But it said this in paragraph ten. The first nine paragraphs of the article? Maybe the headline alone will give you a clue - Exercise alone 'will not solve obesity crisis'.

So exercise has a positive effect on all of the illnesses commonly correlated with fat bodies, but doesn't erase those fat bodies, so isn't good enough. The mask is slipping; anti-obesity campaigners like to hide behind the idea that their determination to erase my body comes out of concern for my health, but here they show themselves encouraging dangerous behaviour (aggressive food restriction) over healthy behaviour (daily exercise) because the former has a perceived aesthetic benefit while the latter "only" protects against heart disease, diabetes, osteoperosis...

Well, fuck them. They want me to fight to be happy? Then I will fight and fuck and dance and laugh and scream and fight.







I'm just gonna keep calling it out when I see it, because I don't know what else I can do.

Comments

[sebastienne]

I accept that you don't want to continue this discussion, and will not judge you for leaving the thread at this point.

But unless I've misunderstood your position quite drastically, I'm afraid I'm not happy to leave the discussion on a "both are equally valid".

For clarity's sake, I read you as saying that it's a good idea to advocate extreme calorie restriction because it might have the side effect of reducing the intake of saturated fat and refined sugars. Perhaps I've read you wrong, and we do just have different approaches to the issue at hand, in which case I'm sorry.

But I keep pushing the point, because I can't quite believe that's really what you're saying. If that's the outcome you want, why not just advocate the reduced intake of saturated fat and refined sugars? Why choose the option that approaches obliquely, through reference to calories, and causes so much collateral damage? It just makes no sense to me, and so I can't accept it as a "difference of opinion" point - I'm sure there must be something I'm missing that makes your argument make logical sense to you!

I am, however, happy to end the discussion here if you cannot see any way that our opinions could be reconciled.

[chiasmata]

No, restrict saturated fat and refined sugar intake (i.e. the highly-processed foods the article talks about), which might have the effect of decreasing an individual's calorific intake and will have every bit as much of a positive effect on health as exercise. The article seems (lazily) to be using calorific intake to mean intake of highly-processed foods.

Exercise isn't enough to protect against disease, so advocating a reduction in the amount of processed food is still advocating a healthier lifestyle, and not just the attempt to erase your body that you describe it as.

(And now I really am leaving it here.)

[sebastienne]

So, in fact, we both think that the article misrepresents things, and says "eat fewer calories!" when it should have a more nuanced message?

I have no idea how we've managed to get a flame war out of that agreement, but I'm sorry for my part in it!

[chiasmata]

Ha! (To the flame war, that is *grin*)

I'm sorry, too - I am thesis-ing madly, so am doubtless making even less sense than usual...