Fat Chicks Rule

Parallel Lives

Shadows on a Tightrope has the distinction of being one of the earliest fat activist/liberation books. It was a collaboration of works by different fat feminists over a decade, of essays, narratives and poems all about standing up to the diet industry and reclaiming fat bodies. Many of the authors had body re-awakenings and learned to love, accept, and cherish their fat bodies while rejecting mainstream objectification. Others are hoping to reach that path, while some were just telling their story about how hard it was to live in a fat body.

"We know what they mean they say "attractive"-- It's not us."

When the book came out in 1983, I was 12. At the same time some of the writers were already on their fat path, already fighting against the Hollywood, medical and diet industry cookie cutter, I was at the beginning of my body hating journey that wouldn't end for 20 years.

I got fat when I was 9. I ate the same junk food as my peers, but when I got fat, the teasing and the "well-meaning" lectures began. Somehow I resisted dieting and body hatred until I was 12. Even though Shadows on the Tightrope was out, it was not part of my world. At 12, I wanted nothing more than to be accepted by my peers. I believed that "dieting worked" because that was no discourse. At 12, you went on a diet, you got thin, the end. There was nothing in the mainstream media, from my doctor or my parents that mentioned anything about the high failure rate, the dangers of weight cycling or the fact that I would completely destroy my self-esteem. I always assumed I was overeating. If someone had just handed me Vivian Mayer's essay on the fat illusion where she points out that fat people are assumed to be overeating when more often they are eating normally, my life might have been different.

Today this book is still relevant especially with the pressure now on children to be thin or else. Some of this has changed since Shadows on the Tightrope.  Many of the writers wrote about dealing with doctors who gave them pills and/or screamed insults at them. Women talked about being fat as a child and having to become bullies so they wouldn’t be picked on. One personal by Lynn Mabel-Lois "We'll Worry About That When You're Thin" taked about how she became addicted to diet pills and first getting access to them when she was 10. We would never think of giving our children amphetamines now, but we are still willing allow growing teens and children to have weight loss surgery. And it would be socially unacceptable for a doctor to scream at a child, yet it’s perfectly okay to scare children into thinking they are dying like the ads in Atlanta.

Reading the stories in the book sometimes made me sad because I saw my story from the 1980’s in the narratives that took place in the fifties and sixties. The only change was doctors went from pills and screaming to diet sheets and lectures.

But things have changed because of what Shadows on a Tightrope started. It influenced countless fat authors who then influenced hundreds more. I didn’t have Shadows on a Tightrope at 12, but when I finally decided to stop hating my body at 30, it had created a loving fat positive environment.

Today we have more than just this book that tells us to resist the message of hatred. We have countless books such as Fat? So! By Marilyn Wann, Taking Up Space by Pattie Thomas, Health at Every Size by Linda Bacon, Hot & Heavy by Virgie Tovar, my own book Fat Chick Rules and so many others I don't have space to name. We have activist groups, blogs, websites, e-groups, and Facebook groups which project the same message: You are perfect just the way you are.

Those blogs today will all be giving thanks on how Shadows on a Tightrope changed everything for the better.

 

 

Related articles

Out of the Shadows

Nothing About Us, Without Us

UCLA and Duke are late to the HAES Party

UCLA school of nursing has done a study showing that fat and thin children when doing lifestyle changes rather than dieting improved their health with very little weight loss. 

"These findings suggest that short-term lifestyle modifications through changing diet and exercise can have an immediate impact on improving risk factors such as cardiovascular disease and diabetes," said Christian Roberts, an associate research professor at the UCLA School of Nursing and the study's lead author. "This work underscores the need to focus on changing lifestyle as opposed to focusing on body weight and weight loss.

Duke, instead of the usual banter of either get thin or die or lose just 5-10% is now on the "Just maintain." 

"Many people go to great lengths to lose weight when their doctor recommends it. They may try a series of diets or join a gym or undergo really complex medical regimens. The complexity of these treatments can make it difficult for many to lose a sufficient amount of weight," said lead author Gary Bennett, an associate professor of psychology and neuroscience and global health at Duke who studies obesity prevention.

Neither are exactly Health at Every Size (HAES™). Duke completely misses the boat by still focusing on weight rather than health.  While both bring  us closer to HAES as the removal of weight as a health indicator, the weight factor is still there especially with the Duke study. People sometimes gain weight from stress, aging, hormones, and certain medications. For the UCLA study, it assumes that being unhealthy leads to being fat (Although there is a little disclaimer that perhaps it is metabolic issues that cause fatness not the other way around). 

Unhealthy lifestyle factors that begin in childhood, such as physical inactivity, lack of exercise training, and diets that are high in refined carbohydrates and fat, contribute to both the development of obesity and other chronic diseases, but it is unclear whether obesity itself or the associated lifestyle factors are underlying causes of cardiovascular and metabolic dysfunction and the related development of chronic disease.

Instead of telling people to just maintain, or lose a little or focusing on weight at all, they need to remove weight completely as a health indicator. This means that everyone, fat, thin, young, old, learns to listen to their body, give it the foods it needs (without a moral implication of it i.e. good vs bad foods), and love it without worry that it doesn't fit in the ever changing society norms.

Massachusetts wastes our time and money

Almost two years ago, I wrote about the absolute failure in Arkansas of BMI report cards. The program ended up wasting taxpayer money and it not only did not make fat kids thin, but there was no increase of healthy behaviors and even an increase in junk food.

So you would think that other states would learn the lesson of Arkansas, right? Wrong. Turns out Andover, Massachusetts is sending home "fat letters" to children:

They're being called "fat letters"-- notes mailed home from schools in North Andover, Mass., to alert parents that their child qualifies as obese.

"Honestly, I laughed," Tracy Watson, the mother of a fourth-grader who was the subject of one such letter, told the North Andover Patch.

Watson's son Cam is an active member on wrestling and football teams. But a screening by the school revealed that Cam's body mass index -- an indicator of body fat in relation to height and weight -- put him in the category of obese. The letter subsequently advised the Watsons to talk to their pediatrician.

It turns out the same kid mentioned in the above article just won the state championship:

Cameron, 10, now holds the state title in his weight class at 94 lbs. He went 3-0 and won the state title in Salem on Saturday by pinning his opponent in just under 30 seconds.

Andover, I am looking into my magic fat crystal ball. I'm seeing this as another waste of time and money AND I see it increasing eating disorders and dieting among your students.

The good news is the State is attempting to pass a law that prohibits the collection of children's BMI's. Mostly because they don't really tell you anything as for the kid who won the wrestling title.

NAAFA has put out a press release for his. If you live in MA especially Andover, please contact the people below.

Foster City, CA - NAAFA supports the passing of Massachusetts House Bill H.2024, legislation to prohibit the Department of Public Health from collecting data on students relative to height, weight and body mass indexes.

In 2009, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health adopted a "BMI initiative" requiring public schools to calculate the BMI of children and teens of certain ages and to send the results to the children's parents along with advice for parents on how to deal with the child's weight issues.

H.2024 seeks to amend Section 1, Chapter 71 of the General Laws by inserting the following language: "(h): No language in this section shall authorize the Department of Public Health to collect data on height, weight, or calculate a student's Body Mass Index."

Children whose parents were told they were overweight were no more likely to have lost weight than children whose parents were not notified according to the School-Based Body Mass Index Screening and Parent Notification study. The findings were based on data from nearly 7 million children.

The focus on overweight and obesity has led to increases in body dissatisfaction in children as young as six years of age. Lower body satisfaction does not serve as a motivator for engaging in healthy weight management behaviors, but rather predicts the use of behaviors that may place adolescents at risk for weight gain and poorer overall health according to the study, Does body satisfaction matter?

CALL TO ACTION:

NAAFA encourages its members and all concerned residents of Massachusetts to write to or call Governor Deval Patrick as well as committee heads, State Senator John Keenan and State Representative Jeffrey Sanchez, and the Department of Public Health in support of the passing of H.2024. Letters and phone calls of support should be directed to:

Governor Deval Patrick
Massachusetts State House
Room 280
Boston, MA 02133
617-725-4005

Lauren Smith, MD, MPH
Interim Commissioner
Massachusetts Department of Public Health
250 Washington Street
Boston, MA 02108
617-624-6000

State Senator John Keenan
Senate Committee on Public Health Chair
Massachusetts State House
Room 504
Boston, MA 02133
617-722-1494

State Representative Jeffrey Sanchez
House Committee on Public Health Chair
Massachusetts State House
Room 130
Boston, MA 02133
617-722-2130

The biggest future eating disorders and yoyo dieting show!

As I sit here writing this I have never seen an episode of the Biggest Loser. I suppose one day I'll have to sit through one episode just to say I did. However, every time I go to Hulu (I don't have a TV or cable), I can't bring myself to watch even a clip. 

I've read enough stories to realize it's not only a terrible show but could be dangerous to your health and self esteem. And like most reality shows, it's a race to the bottom. 

Each week contestants face various challenges, overexercising, under eating, temptations. The show does not teach you how to follow your natural body cues. Weight loss challenges are the biggest part of the show. Contestants who lose a lot of weight can win big money at the end. 

The thing is that the Biggest Loser even contradicts sensible weight loss which isn't to lose as much as possible but to take off 1-2 pounds a week slowly. Nutition.gov's weight loss plan involves setting a reasonable and realistic weight loss goal. Six hours on the treadmill just ain't going to cut it for the majority of anyone.   

But the contestants on the Biggest Losers are adults and they can do what they want with their bodies and hey perhaps this fad diet will be better than the other ones?

The problem is now the Biggest Loser is adding three teenage contestants. While they are not actually competing with the adults, or will be eliminated or be starving themselves or overexercising yet. But let's show them they'll be treated as fat adults. And hey! Let's all gawk at the fat kids because thin kids don't have to undereat and overexercise because all thin children are healthy and eat right. No matter how "sensitive" they plan to be to the three kids, this will only be encouraging them to go to the lifetime diet train.  

Meanwhile Eating disorders tend to hit teens and young adults the most. 

Ragan Chastain has petitioned the Biggest Loser's producers to keep kids off the Biggest Loser

Besides which, there’s no proof that this will be good for the kids anyway. Studies clearly show that the techniques used by the show produce ratings-friendly short term weight loss but long-term weight regain in most people. 

I urge you to sign the petition, contact NBC and the most important part tell your friends and your family to stop watching. 

Stigma against children is even worse.

Last week I wrote about stigma against fat people in general, but this week I want to talk about a more disturbing trend, namely stigma against fat children. I  have a theory that the diet industry sought to get into the untapped market of men and children (With children, it's the ingrained fat=bad message they will take with them to adulthood.) With billions of more dollars at stake, why not have propaganda and fear campaigns? (like OH MY GOD, ALL FAT CHILDREN EVENTUALLY DIE!)

It's not surprising that with this pressure to be thin or else eating disorders have risen.

As obesity in the United States rises, it is little wonder the overall perception about body image is going in the opposite direction. It is estimated that 10 percent of females between the ages of 10 and 20 struggles with bulimia, and 4 percent of women in college have the eating disorder, according to information released by Insight Behavioral Health Centers in Chicago.

A new anti-obesity program in Minnesota is putting pressure not only to become thin but to blame fat parents for encouraging their children to become fat. One of the ads features a fat woman shopping. As she puts food into her cart that looks like she's eating like a college freshman, her young daughter does the same. After all if you are fat, you obviously only eat junk food. And if you are thin you never eat junk food. (Of course in the real world, you fill your cart with healthy foods, while your kids fill their cart with junk food.)

I do not fucking eat chocolate cereal and buckets of ice cream. Here is what I actually do: Pretty much every morning before work I walk 1.1 miles uphill to a coffee shop, which is across the street from the organic co-op where I do all my grocery shopping. I eat normal, human amounts of unprocessed, fresh, largely local foods.

Once upon a time that cart looked like mine. "Really?" The fat haters might say "She's admitting it! She eats like that woman in the ad!" Actually that looked very much like my cart in my dieting/binge days. When on the diet, the cart would be filled with vegetables, fruits, diet soda and weight watchers meals. Off the diet, chips, ice cream, diet soda and weight watchers meals. 

Now my cart is of a person of normal eating, a mixture of all food groups, including OMFG, one bag of cookies. Your see Trader Joe's makes these awesome gluten free cookies. There are 14 in the bag. Which means I eat two cookies a day. OOOHHHHHH Every once in a while I buy ice cream (OMFG again).

I don't have a daughter who I can be a bad influence on with my bag of cookies but I have a niece who lives with me. If anything, none of my eating habits effect her. The whole local food thing my husband and I rant about so much bores her and she calls lectures on healthy eating a  "Narc fest". The one thing I'm grateful for is I was off dieting before my niece got to her self-conscious age and I got her to accept people of all sizes. I'm happy to say she sometimes got self-conscious but it never got bad AND she doesn't judge people on anything but their character. 

Had I still been dieting I worried that I might have made my niece self conscious or made her believed fat can be fixed with dieting. The ad talks about how fat parents are to blame, it doesn't talk about the encouragement of eating disorders. 

The tendency to undereat spins from a cycle that repeats itself in almost every female-to-female relationship, and everything from media to retail companies fuels the problem.

"You say, ‘I'm ugly, I'm fat,' and your friend says, ‘Oh no, you're pretty. I'm fat," McClanahan said. "You hear it from peers and from your parents, and the standard of beauty has gotten thinner and thinner. Now you see size double zero in stores. These negative standards have an effect on self-esteem.

This be thin at all costs is wreaking havoc on children who are being bullied not only by their peers but teachers and parents as well. 

Students report that weight is among the most common reasons that their peers are bullied. In one national study, 84 percent of adolescent students surveyed saw overweight students being called names, being teased in a mean way, and teased during physical activities. Over two-thirds reported observing overweight and obese peers being excluded, ignored, avoided, teased in the cafeteria, and targeted by negative rumors. The majority of students observed verbal threats and physical threats.

While peers are the most common perpetrators, teachers and parents also contribute to stigmatizing obese and overweight children. Teachers, including physical education teachers, report lower expectations for overweight students compared to thinner students, endorse negative stereotypes or believe that overweight and obese children have family problems. Even at home, children may face critical and negative comments, with significant numbers of overweight and obese children reporting weight-related teasing and criticism from their parents.

Pressure the parents that they are bad if they let their kids have junk food, pressure the children that they are bad for being fat and you will see an epidemic of kids with low self esteem, body and food hatred, eating disorders. Perhaps even easily influenced by the next new diet plan. 

There are better ways. First off we need to stop spreading the message fat=bad. When a fat kid does everything right but never gets into the thin ideal? What then? We need to accept that people, even children come in all shapes and sizes. We can encourage our children to be active, enjoy nutritious foods without worry and to accept their body.

Fat acceptance isn't delusions.

For 17 years I believed the hype that if I did a diet, a weight loss plan, a lifestyle change, I would become thin, healthy, pretty and outgoing. I did everything, sensible diet plans like Weight Watchers, fad diets like slim-fast, low calorie, low carb, low fat. I went to dull gyms, climbing the stairmaster and walking the treadmill. Nothing worked in the long run. They all ended in the same way, my body not getting enough calories (even the "sensible plans") overrode everything and I began binging. During my yo-yo dieting years, I watched my cholesterol rise and my self-esteem plummet. I developed GERD, and my eating become so erratic and disordered that even almost 10 years since my last diet, I still have food and eating issues. 

Since ending the yo-yo dieting, instead of focusing on weight loss, I began focusing on health. I cut down on foods that my body did not like and which aggravated my heartburn. I refuse to ever join a gym again unless they have a pool.

Yet some people think I am deluding myself. That being proud of myself, my accomplishments and my body is a fantasy. 

Recently there was a first ever fat studies conference in New Zealand. Coverage of the event has been positive and negative.

"One of the reasons we're so fearful and hateful of fat is that we believe we can read people's bodies," Pause told AFP.

"So when people look at a fat body like mine, it tells them I'm unhealthy and that this is a diseased body. It tells them I don't ever exercise and eat nothing but junk."Pause said the reality is that some people are just bigger than others and fat studies highlighted the need for society to accept the fact, rather than constantly judging fat people and pushing them to lose weight." 

This quote from an article from Agence France Presse and picked by Alternet has more positive words from the conference organizers and presenters. 

On the other hand is this article from the Punch which starts off making fun of a fat kids, then explains it's not okay to make fun of fat people but you shouldn't going around accepting your fat because you will die. That's right fat acceptance = death. 

I call bullshit. Being fat is different, because in general it is a precursor to a range of deadly diseases. Being overweight puts people at risk of heart disease and stroke, diabetes and some cancers.

If you read my post last week, I talked about another study that proves people who are fat and healthy don't have decreased mortality (unless they happened to have diabetes and/or hypertension. (I have neither). Of course both diabetes and hypertension is bad for anyone of any weight. 

But which is a delusion?

My past belief that somehow I would join the 5% of people who lose weight and kept it off? That I should subscribe to a system that fundamentally fails most people who try?  That I should make myself crazy going on weight loss schemes after schemes, losing and regaining until I died younger than I should (which I'm sure will be blamed on my fatness)  

Or the belief that I need to feed my body wholesome foods and movement it can handle and let my weight fall where it lies. 

 

The good, the bad and the nutty.

The good

This awesome billboard has gone up in Atlanta until the end of may. 

 

The California weight loss clinics I wrote about last September that push lapband surgery as an easy and simple way to lose weight are being investigated. 

The ubiquitous ad campaign and the surgeons affiliated with it are under intense scrutiny. At least three wrongful death lawsuits have been filed, and the Los Angeles County Coroner is investigating one of the deaths. And according to a spokesman at the California Department of Insurance, the agency has initiated an investigation into allegations of insurance fraud.

The Bad

The April issue of Vogue has a story about a mother, Dara-Lynn Weiss, who put her 7 year old daughter on a diet because *gasp* her daughter was fat. Her response wasn't to get her daughter to eat healthier and move more, but an actual diet that included skipping meals  (she didn't allow her daughter to have dinner because she had a big lunch), moralization of food (foods became 'good' and' bad'), and no attempts at moderation. (Her daughter is not allowed pizza at the weekly school pizza day because she ate a corn salad.) The mother herself clearly has issues with food.  Projection, anyone?

I'm not a fortune teller but I think I see anoxeria or bulimia in her future or she might actually be *gasp* fat.

Meanwhile in Melbourne, Australia, Amy Smith the CEO of Jenny Craig Australasia, will be speaking at the  conference for educators for girls. It is igniting a storm of protest. 

On May 25 Amy Smith, the CEO of Jenny Craig, will present to a conference of educators for the Alliance of Girls' Schools (AGSA). Described as a "champion of women's health" by Catherine Misson, Principal of Melbourne Girls Grammar School, Jenny Craig's CEO will be enlisted to "inspire" attendees: what they learn will impact on what they bring back to the classroom.

Already letters from health professionals have begun flooding in, with some voicing their protests from as far as the US and Middle East. They all agree on one thing: Global giant Jenny Craig, which profits from the billion-dollar diet industry, is not an appropriate 'leader' for educators of young girls.

Sign the petition here against it.

The nutty.

From my neck of the woods, New York City Mayor Bloomberg has decided that certain foods can't be donated to the poor and homeless because *gasp* they can't tell if the how much salt, fat and fiber the food has.

Glenn Richter arrived at a West Side synagogue on Monday to collect surplus bagels — fresh nutritious bagels — to donate to the poor. However, under a new edict from Bloomberg’s food police he can no longer donate the food to city homeless shelters. 

So if you're homeless, hungry and poor in New York, make sure you dumpster dive for some carrots instead of getting some fresh bagels. The bagels might make you fat and we can't have that happening. 

Stigma is not the new black

Lately it seems that despite studies that say weight stigma can cause health issues, it is still acceptable to use. As of now, no study has prove stigma works in long term weight loss. If anything stigma probably causes weight gain and "obesity" related diseases. I wrote a few months ago how being fat can be a symptom of stress. 

It seems that there are two methods of fat stigma and three ways to carry it out. The first method is victimization which we see in the CHOA's Strong for Life campaign that I and several other bloggers have been covering the last few weeks. In the CHOA's ads, fat children are victimized. Their lifes are pathetic. They are overeaters, suffer deadly diseases, will die at any moment, and are forced to be adults not children. A new video now shows a fat kid dying at 32 after a long life of drinking soda, beer, or urine. Now if only their stupid parents would realize their kids were tubs of lard and put them on diets they wouldn't die so young. (I'm sure CHOA's doesn't want the kids to diet, merely embrace lifestyle changes and when those lifestyle changes don't make those children thin, what's next? I'm thinking eating disorders.) 

The second method is vilification. And this comes in two forms, the first is the vilification of fat on your body. i.e. Being fat is bad, but fat people are okay. The Rudd center is a perfect example of this. They are against obesity AND weight based-stigma. I see this as an oxymoron, they don't.  You can't hate fat and love fat people. (One reader compared this to hating cancer but loving someone with cancer. I call BS.)

New York City has ads that stigmatize fat by making it gross. They have an ad where a person is drinking fat. Fat is automatically assumed to be bad. You want to stop drinking soda because ew look at all that gross fat. 

The other way fat people are portrayed as villains is through dubious moral reasoning. Fatties are immoral because they are delibrately lazy and don't eat right. 

And then there is Disney who just made fat people villains and I'm not talking about Ursula or the Queen of Hearts. I'm talking about their new interactive childhood obesity exibit at Epcot Center and it is horrifying. I had planned to go into details about this disturbing attraction, but I found out on Saturday that the site is down and rumor has it so is the attraction. The blog Red No 3 does a good job explaining the details. Please sign this petition to let Disney know that if they retool this attraction, it should be free of fat hatred (There is absolutely nothing wrong with an attraction that encourages healthy eating and movement). 

Think about bullying. Does bullying improve quality of life.

What do you do with Bullies?

You stand up to them.

Lying to create an epidemic

As of now, there has never been a diet drug that has worked in the long run. Many have dangerous side effects (including death). That being said, apparently the drug industry feels that they may give up on obesity drugs if the FDA would stop being so rigid on them.

They point to obesity drugs, where Arena Pharmaceuticals, Orexigen Therapeutics and Vivus have hit roadblocks in gaining approval for their diet pills because of potential safety concerns.

I say the FDA isn't rigid enough. Diet pills don't work, and have dangerous side effects. This is something the drug industry needs to give up on. Diabetes is slightly different. A pill that would cure diabetes would be wonderful, but according to Consumer reports, current diabetes medications are no better or safer than the ones they replaced. 

On to (or should I say back to) other liars, my favorite topic of the last three posts, namely fat hating Children's Health Care of Atlanta (CHOA). They are under more fire this week for using healthy fat actors to portray poor disease ridden obese children.  (There is also a story about NYC diabetes ad that photoshopped off a healthy person's leg.) Perhaps because they couldn't find any fat actors who had these diseases. 

Bioethicists and health communicators say untruthful testimonials in public health campaigns are wrong, even if their messages are, in a broad sense, advertisements. Falseness in these ads loses the public's trust, which is critical in public health initiatives, experts say.

Even pro-weight loss groups such as the Rudd Center disapproves of the ads.

Georgia’s “Strong4Life” campaign to address childhood obesity is a well-meaning but likely counterproductive attempt to address one of the most important public health priorities in our country. It is critical to address childhood obesity, but the Strong4Life campaign takes a misguided approach that may inadvertently worsen obesity and harm the very people who are most in need of help.

This highly visible and well-financed campaign ($50 million) intends to motivate parents and children to take action on childhood obesity by using images and testimonials of obese youth (hired actors) who are portrayed with “warning” messages...

I also want to thank them for pointing out the 50 million dollar price tag. In 2009, it was estimated that 11 percent of Georgia's children had no health insurance. I'm pretty sure that 50 mil would help cover that gap. Of give the money to me and I'll start a non-for-profit insurance company called FatCo whose sole purpose would be to give health insurance to people deemed "not healthy enough for insurance".

They have also come under major fire by the  Size acceptance community who have taken them on with a campaign called "I stand" Stand4kids, which I mentioned it briefly last week when the Tumblr site was only a handful of photos. SInce then, it has grown by leaps and bounds to over a hundred photos and more are being added each day. 

And in other news about liars, fat hating Whole Foods who claims you can be thin, healthy, and beautiful if you only eat from their store has said the mean nasty government (and yes the USDA needs to be more forceful on GMO crops) is forcing them to carry GMO foods. 

And I stand for my fat! Because fat is part of my body, it is a part of me. To hate it is to hate myself.

*Disclaimer the b/w image and background were photoshopped. However the fat people in the ads are fat and the thin people are thin. Quotes underneath are 100% truth. 

 

Paula Deen, the fear of food and CHOA's lies.

I happen to like Paula Deen ever since I heard her on Wait Wait Don't Tell me (She nailed all three of her questions about Tofu). Where she had some good advice about her Krispie Creme burger. Only one serving per lifetime. (I have yet to do my one time.) I am saddened to hear that she has diabetes and even more saddened to hear about attacks on her by another chef (Anthony Bourdain) for her high fat diet (Bourdain's only qualification toward being "healthy" is that he is thin; this former drug addict is also  an unapologetic drinker and smoker, also Bourdain's recipes are filled with fat as well. Both chefs make their foods from scratch.)

She was vilified in Salon that her own cooking caused her diabetes. Paul Campos has written a good essay why that probably isn't true. 

What also saddens me is the increased fear of food. Comfort food, soul food, celebratory food, all food considered bad for us has become of limits, even in moderation. If you eat comfort food, you are psychologically damaged. Kids can't touch any cupcakes at school party because if they are fat they are bad for eating it, if they thin they might become fat.  Even cheese has been vilified (warning on the link, it's filled with fat hatred.) We have made food the enemy. Unless you have a food allergy, food is nothing to fear. Food can be amazing, even the stuff that you can only have once per lifetime, even the stuff no one in their right mind should be eating. Learning to enjoy food takes away any sinful associations, allows your body and your mind the freedom to analyze what they need.

Dieting takes that decision away. 10 years after my last diet, I still haven't fully returned to eating normally, I still can't enjoy good food the way I want. I still can't savor it without guilt, and I still have trouble slowing my eating out of fear the food will be gone.

Now to the people that hate fat children about who I wrote previously.  First off, every single child in the ad campaign are actors. Surprised? I'm not. (It's an advert, people!)

One of the children, an articulate, sixth-grader named Chloe McSwain, from Sandy Springs, Ga., is portrayed as “Maritza.” At the beginning of a black-and-white 30-second spot, she stares right into the camera.

“My doctor says I have something called hypertension,” she says. “I’m really scared.” In white block letters, “SOME DISEASES AREN’T JUST FOR ADULTS ANYMORE,” flashes across a black screen.  In real life, Chloe, 11, actually doesn’t have hypertension, according to her mother.

 Meanwhile Doug Hertz a trustee (Not a doctor or medical profession but the local beer guy) of Children's health care of Atlanta. (CHOA) has defending their ads claiming that everyone is ignoring the issue. Except I've been reporting stories since this blog's inception how weight loss is constantly pushed on children. Hertz claimed It is not about a child’s weight; it is about increased risk of illnesses once seen only in adults. These include hypertension, Type 2 diabetes, heart disease and liver problems, to name a few.

If it isn't about weight, why are the ads filled with fat kids, disturbed that they are fat?

Oh and CHOA, take note, Georgia has to two biggest polluters in the Country, the worst one is 60 miles from Atlanta. Maybe CHOA would like to focus on other health issues, say Asthma? But I suppose it's easier to pick on fat kids that take on a dirty plant.

I leave you with a far more beautiful and positive image