Fat Chicks Rule

Size Discrimination is alive and well.

A lot of people get angry when we compare fat discrimination to racism but a study found it to be much worse. Although racism still exists, it is considered socially unacceptable, where as fat discrimination is considered a joke, or not to be taken seriously (i.e. it wouldn't happen if fat people went on starvation diets and lost weight).

For women it is even worse.  The same study from the Rudd Center (not exactly a fat friendly place) states that women suffer from bias with even with a small amount of gain, meanwhile men have to get much fatter before dealing with the same bias.  Discrimination starts at about a 27 BMI which three studies have shown to have a longer life expectance than “normal” weight. For men it starts at about BMI 35.

We see it in fashion: Fat chance for 'fatties', Despite the "anorexia look" backlash, models are still super thin.  They do not come in all shapes and sizes.

Even our mind can betray us: Feeling fat may be worse for you than being fat.  This is a great call for HAES, that a person's weight must be taken out of what is considered Healthy. 

What is fueling the bias?  Do you think it's concern for our welfare or the almighty dollar? Inside Drugmakers' War on Fat

EDIT 4/29/08

Just a quick note.  I 100% believe racism/sexism/classism etc is alive and well and should NEVER be ignored.  It still continues (Katrina and New Orleans is a great example).  However in theory it is not legal or okay to discriminated against someone due to race/class/gender/religion etc.  While it is perfectly okay and even acceptable to discriminated against some due to their weight.

Fat, get used to it.

A little busy today, so I decided to cover some fabulous fat positive stories and projects:

This beautiful picture:

Is estimated to fetch about 25 to 35 million.  So ha!

Great slideshow from Kate Harding proving how ridiculous BMI is.

Here's an old story covered in Diary of a Fat Teenager about is a beautiful dance troupe from China.

Fat and Happy. Big Beautiful Women show us that being large isn’t the end of the world

And for those lucky enough to live in the UK: Big Ballet.

Princess Latifah

As some might know Queen Latifah is doing and promoting Jenny Craig; calling it "being a size healthier".  I know for the most part Queen Latifah has been relatively proud of her curves although she occasionally tries to lose weight.   However this is the first time she's promoted a commercial diet.  While she is allowed to do what she wants with her own body, I'm annoyed that she's pimping the diet industry.   I'm not the only one.

Jenny Craig may want you to think they are not a diet but they 100% are.  According to consumer reports they average just about the same calories as all the other DIETS.  They are a diet, Weight Watchers is a diet, Atkins in a diet.  Don't ever let them tell you anything different.   They are a diet, they don't work in the long run, all you do is lose money.  Real lifestyle changes shouldn't have a weight based focus because when you stop losing weight (as most low-calorie diets do because your body goes into starvation mode), you stop doing things that are healthy for you.

And to contact Queen Latifah, this is the contact info for her publicist: Amanda Silverman
42West 220 W. 42nd St.  12th Floor New York, NY 10036 Phone: 212-774-3683
Fax: 212-277-7550 amanda.silverman@ 42west.net

I was on the Brian Lehrer (scroll down to the second "Weighty issues" headline) show on Wednesday April 2.  I got to be on with Anna Kirkland who wrote the fabulous book Fat Rights.   I was hoping we'd talk more about Massachusetts but we ended up talking about discrimination against fat people in the workplace.  It was still good.   I was really nervous but I hope I got my points across.

Speaking on which, we still need voices in MA!  If you haven't contacted your reps, do it now!  This law is so very important.  If you read Anna's book, you find out about some horrifying cases of fat discrimination.

Despite that any obesity is considered harmless, this story from Canada notes that obesity aids in illness survival.  So ha!