Harmful for the same reason as the 'healthy at any size' campaign, and anti progressive because if they claim health at every size, then they deny there's a huge malnutrition problem in America. It would be solving the problem of food deserts and obesity by just saying 'no no these people are actually healthy' instead of making sure they don't live in a fucking food desert.
Let's compromise and say "Make healthier food more accessible to everyone and at the same time not be dicks to overweight people".
Harmful for the same reason as the Healthy at Any Size campaign
The campaign that advocated for healthier activity for all people with a focus on positive reinforcement, and had it's message willfully misinterpreted by reactionaries?
Healthy at any size doesn't mean you're healthy at any weight, no matter what. It means that no matter your weight, you can still engage in healthy habits. There's discussion to be had about structural changes to be made in America about how food is produced, advertised, and sold, but engaging weight issues on a positive level is only helpful for everyone.
There was a very deliberate effort to push the idea that HAES meant being overweight was healthy by reactionaries, to the point where the misinterpretation and the overblown reaction to that actually happened overshadowed the actual ideals of the modern movement. Anyone on reddit a few years back might recall /r/fatpeoplehate and /r/fatpeoplestories. From https://www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/size-diversity-health-every-size:
"The basic premise of health at every size, as written in [Lindo] Bacon’s Book, Health at Every Size: The surprising truth about your weight, is that 'Health at Every Size'(HAES) acknowledges that well-being and healthy habits are more important than any number on the scale.
- Accept your size. Love and appreciate the body you have. Self-acceptance empowers you to move on and make positive changes.
- Trust yourself. We all have internal systems designed to keep us healthy — and at a healthy weight. Support your body in naturally finding its appropriate weight by honoring its signals of hunger, fullness, and appetite.
- Adopt healthy lifestyle habits. Develop and nurture connections with others and look for purpose and meaning in your life. Fulfilling your social, emotional, and spiritual needs restores food to its rightful place as a source of nourishment and pleasure.
- Find the joy in moving your body and becoming more physically vital in your everyday life.
- Eat when you’re hungry, stop when you’re full, and seek out pleasurable and satisfying foods.
- Tailor your tastes so that you enjoy more nutritious foods, staying mindful that there is plenty of room for less nutritious choices in the context of an overall healthy diet and lifestyle.
- Embrace size diversity. Humans come in a variety of sizes and shapes. Open to the beauty found across the spectrum and support others in recognizing their unique attractiveness."
The way informationated is disseminated these days is troubling. It's not like there was ever some golden age of truth, but social media and the internet in general has really amplified the way misinformation spreads.
healthy at any size means it’s not too late to treat your body with respect. One of the things fatphobia, as ingrained as it is in America, does to your psyche is that it treats you as sub-human and incapable of doing the things you want to do for yourself. Changing your state of mind from “i’m a lazy and fat piece of shit” to “It’s never too late to do right by me, I’m ok”; helped me out tremendously and I actually lost weight in the process.
A lot of fatphobes use “health” as an excuse to treat fat people like shit. It’s wrong. It doesn’t seem them as human, but as bodies that need correcting. And it engenders a lot of problems, my Dumb Bitch of a Dad is fat and he would call my brother and I fat, my brother developed ED and anxiety over his looks. I barely talk to the piece of shit nowadays.
The sheer vitriol often leveled at fatties like myself is disheartening and humiliating. Can we just, like, be nice and treat everyone with respect? There’s fatphobia in this very thread.
It's liberal identity politics, seeing all social issues through the lens of "Identity X is oppressed by majority Y, and we just combat this by proclaiming the virtue of identity X". And the liberal view of oppression basically consists of others having negative opinions of the to the given identity and acting on them, not a structural problem that exists regardless of the motivation of actors within the system. The way they talk about the pay gap, which does exist, but not quite in the form liberals often claim it does, is a perfect example of this.
So while socialists might see obesity and the issues surrounding it as extensions of artificial scarcity, capitalism making food as cheap as possible in the name of profit, poor people having less free time, and a Healthcare system that's based on making money instead of promoting health, liberals can't see past "society is mean to fat people", or if they can, then all their analysis stems from that point.
There's no material solution offered in this massive post, just tolerance and acceptance, or as Cushbomb likes to put it, fighting in the realm of the symbolic. Because being a walking joke does feel shitty, and for fat people, at least not being treated as a disgusting failure of a person would probably be nice. But that's the limit of the liberal imagination: being nicer.
The post is kinda... weird.
I'm all for destigmatizing being overweight, but acting like its not unhealthy at higher levels just isn't right. People have no obligation to maintain a body in high health obviously, but saying that obesity and unhealthiness aren't related is straight up wrong.
My stance on it is the same as other unhealthy things: as long as you accept the risks and they're worth it to you, go for it. Alcohol and smoking aren't good for your body, but I'm not going to be a dick to you about it. Same with obesity.
This is going to shock you, but they aren’t related. You can be obese and be healthy. The science shows that diet and exercise is what is correlated to health, not fat percentage. And for elderly people, life expectancy is higher in overweight groups. The assumption that you know someone’s health by looking at their body is harmful and unscientific.
Are these 'fatphobia' people going for a record in worst argumantation for a correct point?
Yeah that’s kinda how I feel. Fat phobia definitely exists and people don’t deserve to be shit on for their weight but OP also has a point that it’s not helpful to normalize a problem that’s a result of a food desserts and the capitalist approach to making food as addictive as possible. It’s so annoying how liberalism can never name the source of these systemic issues. Solidarity with all fat comrades, your bodies are beautiful and you don’t deserve to live with extra precarity in your health and wellness because capitalism is a fuck.
Hate against fat people and some body types is an actual societal problem, in multiple ways.
But then these people make claims like "fatphobia kills more people than fatness itself" or "[...] black, poor, disabled, and especially fat bodies are deemed as 'unhealthy'". They are also obviously anti scientific. I would quote more, there are really bad takes on almost every page of that post, but they can't be copy pasted.
I think the problem for them is, ironically, internalized fatbhobia causing them to way overcorrect.
So you are saying that the people I knew who died of sleep apnea just happened to die and then the doctors lied to us? That the people who have mobility problems in their older age have them completely unrelated to their weight?
Well, let's go through it slide by slide.
Second slide
People's bodies do not naturally come in "all shapes and sizes." Yes, people have very widely different body types and people of wildly varying sizes can be healthy, but that is not all-inclusive. A 400 pound person will never, ever be healthy. And it doesn't matter what that weight is made of. If you're 400 pounds of muscle, that's unhealthy too. And while, yes, thin people can be unhealthy for various reasons, they are not unhealthy because they are thin. A 400 pound person is unhealthy because they are overweight.
Third slide
Yes, fatphobia sucks and I guess probably has killed people before. But the claim that fatphobia kills more than fatness does is frankly insulting and disgusting. It is a complete and surely intentional lie and I would be ashamed of myself for ever saying something like that.
Fourth slide
The reason doctors go straight to weight loss is because they are doctors and they want you to minimize your health issues where you can. Just like a dentist telling you to brush your teeth and floss every day, a doctor will and should advise you to maintain your body so that it doesn't cause or exacerbate health issues. The same reason they will and should tell you to stop smoking, to stop excessively drinking, or to stop jumping off of tall buildings for an adrenaline high.
Fifth slide
The "reality" section doesn't even address the "assumption" section. And the assumption section is, barring extreme crippling medical conditions, is completely true without qualification. Just like a smoker "chooses to be unhealthy" (though that's not how I'd word it myself), a fat person chooses to overeat consistently. No one's body is fat naturally, that results from eating too much. Plain and simple. Your body can't store calories it was never provided, you can't create matter from thin air.
Sixth slide
This is loser talk. "Boo hoo I can't control my body, all I can do is live in it." Fuck that. I'm being harsh, but it's just bullshit. Your weight is something you have complete, 100% control over. It is a reflection of your actions and your actions alone.
Seventh slide
Aside from the same loser talk I already called out, I can't really comment on this. I'm not reading some random paper.
Eighth slide
This is another one where the "reality" doesn't address the "assumption," and predictably, the assumption is correct again. And yes, people often do regain weight after losing it. Because they started overeating again. "I can't possibly stick to a healthy relationship with food, look at all these other people who failed" is just loser talk again.
Ninth slide
This slide literally tries to argue that high blood pressure is a good thing for fat people because it's made necessary by their excess fat. It's difficult to overstate just how absurd this claim is, and how thoroughly it counteracts their argument that being fat doesn't necessarily mean being unhealthy.
Tenth slide
I mean sure, that happens sometimes. That sucks. That's a real problem. Fatphobia in general is a real problem.
But anyway, yeah. So the vast majority of the points made here are utterly offensive. I hate it. I hate that you showed me this. I hate that I bothered to respond to it.
I'm glad you responded cos it articulated what I wanted to say a lot better.
I thought you had a fun shitpost when only this was what I could read:
"What do you think of this post? I think it's harmful and anti progressive in places." to /c/main by MaoTheLawn
Cause it would be a fun self ironic play with self critique. Sadly it wasn't such a shitpost.
bullshit idpol masquerading as some deep political movement.
Well for starters, it isn't "healthy at any size", its "health at any size" which is more about making sure you eat and exercise correctly even if you're fat. While I have mixed feelings about the instagram post, OPs argumentation is kinda stupid lmao. Reminds me of r/fatpeoplehate on reddit.