Fat Chicks Rule

Kiss this Maura Kelly

Love your Body and Bullying

Last Wednesday was not only Love your body day but it was a day to wear purple against bullying because some gay and lesbian youths were bullied into suicide.  The anti-bullying message was "It gets better"

For young people, this message is true. No matter how you are bullied now, it will get better. I was also bullied in school, teased, (including sexual taunts) and physically abused due to my weight and because I was a weird kid. Some abuse was so bad that if I were an adult, the police would have gotten involved.

However, it did get better. By the time I was in high school, many of my bullies had gone to other schools or matured out of their habits.  I finished school, went to college, eventually got two master's degrees, married a wonderful man, have close friends, a decent job and wrote a book.  My life became so much better that I was able to put that part of my life to rest. Mostly because I didn't allow taunts to bother me anymore.

Even as adults, there will be assholes who still think they are in junior high and must feel better by teasing others. (I've been called all kinds of unoriginal names on my blog). I say if they can't grow up, more pity for them. 

Watch and vote for a terrific short movie Gordita, which is about a young Latina who is depressed with her life because of her body and dead end job.  When she reminisces about a positive moment in her past, she begins her journey to self-respect. 

Author and Blogger Pattie Thomas talks about Love Your Body day and her similar reaction to mine in reference to fat free talk week. 

And remember every day tell yourself how wonderful your body is!

Do you look fat in that? Yes!

I understand the concept of having a fat talk free week. I understand that women, especially young ones are constantly bombarded with images and talk that say you must be thin or (a) die, (b) die alone (c) have no friends (d) have no future (e) never meet a man or (f) work at Walmart.

My problem is there is nothing to be ashamed of for being fat. Fat should not have a negative connotation. Instead of having a fat talk free week, it's better to have a body love talk week. Remove the negative out of fat. And teach young women to be happy no matter what their size.  This event seems more like "Stop thin people from feeling fat (i.e. bad)".

Also we are not in fact destroying the US health care system. I've mentioned for several years now, a Kaiser report (see figure five) which states that the elderly cost the most.  Here is a blog post (not fat friendly either!) which states that expensive diseases are not infact "obesity diseases" and "obesity costs" aren't enough to explain why we are paying so much per person for health care.

And if my ass doesn't look fat in my pants, then I need to see a doctor because it means that my butt fell off. Is that considered an obesity related disease?

Stop dieting now

Small steps that should be bigger.

I'm sorry to say I never watched more than two episodes of Huge.  I find it kind of bittersweet. I'm drifting away from TV, only watching maybe half-dozen regular shows as I am tired of seeing either no fat people or when I do it has something to do with dieting, fat jokes, thin people in fat suits, fat=mental disease or overeating.  While the one thing Huge had going for it was the large number of fat actors which was awesome but of course it's all about how fat they are at this fat camp.  

That being said, there is petition to save the show.  I wouldn't mind keeping it around, only for the actually having more diverse actors. 

The Surgeon general of the United States after all the obesity=evil rhetoric kind of said something that sounds a bit like Health at Every Size stating "The good news is we can be healthy and fit, at any size or any weight." This is a start. The SG website still points all the same rhetoric we heard before. So until I see stigma decreased, and a true promotion of health over weight, this is just lip service. 

And finally after something like 7 years since Public Citizen asked to take the crappy and dangerous drug meridia off the market, the FDA has finally done it!

see more Funny Graphs

WLS and Biggest Loser cuts down fat people

I won't ever stop saying it. Weight loss surgery is deadly, forced anorexia and not as effective as it seems and it seems to have a risk factor of suicide. And if you have it done as a teen, you might be increasing the risk of birth defects if you get pregnant in the future.  The worst part is that the procedure is marketed as something easy but instead you might be trading one set of symptoms for others.

So let's see . . . so-called "obesity related diseases" might be controlled by a change in diet, movement or taking a medication. (This might not result in weight loss). Side effects are minimal and probably mostly have to do with adherence issues and medication side effects.  

But if you "cure" these dieases with weight loss surgery you run the following risks: death, malnutrition, malabsorption, suicide, follow up surgery, gallstones, dumping syndrome, no weight loss, weight gain, forced anorexia, vomiting, pneumonia, kidney stones, hernia, blood clots, birth defects. Not to mention a return of these diseases. With these kind of side effects? Is it even worth it?

Also good news Biggest Loser ratings are way down.  Are Americans tired of it? Realize it's stupid and mean? Or are they watching Glee? It doesn't matter as long as it dies before it kills one of their contestants.