(Body) Love In The Time Of "Globesity"

So, this happened.


I would be lucky if I were able to have only two reactions to this release, and if those two reactions were the following:

1)  LOL, "Globesity."  I would have LOVED to've been in the room when the marketing team came up with that one, LOL.

2)  LOL, Bank of America Merrill Lynch still wants people to take its advice, LOL.


Sadly, I am not that lucky.  (Is anyone?)  Instead, my reactions included the following:

1)  >_<  cringing

2)  ಠ_ಠ  disapproval

3)  \(-_-)/ tossing my hands in the air and giving up

The cringing comes from an overwhelming feeling of Here We Go Again-ness.  It's a little hyperbolic, since I expect this press release won't exactly take over the Internet tubes.

The disapproval comes from immediately calling to my knowledge that something like 5% of weight loss tactics prove successful in the long-term, and that often they prove harmful. (Aminorex, Mediator, Fen-Phen, Redux, Meridia, Acomplia, etc.)

(Which is to say nothing of the anorectics still on the market that carry significant side effects such as pulmonary hypertension, acute glaucoma, etc.)

(Which is also to say nothing of the hilarious meta information you can pull up about these drugs if you google their names.  Example: "An experimental wonder drug, Rimonabant, helps you lose weight, quit smoking and it also helps protect your heart."  Except it did the opposite, in that it greatly exacerbated suicide risk.  Whoops.)

But the third thing?  The tossing my hands in the air and giving up?  That comes solidly from trying to exist in a weight-loss-obsessed culture while trying simultaneously to gain weight and to keep sanity.  (And I do not say that colloquially.)

It's quite an experience, trying to go against most of the food- and body-related messages that are everywhere - just everywhere.  I would like you to imagine being online, watching TV, walking down a street with ads, waiting in line next to magazines at the drug store, going down aisles at the grocery store.  Now take note of how many words and images bombard you with just two basic messages:  LOSE WEIGHT.  LIMIT WHAT YOU EAT.  This is not hard for you to imagine: if you live in a Westernized society, you probably live this most days.

Now, please imagine that instead of losing weight, you are actually supposed to be gaining weight.  Please imagine that instead of limiting what you eat, you are actually supposed to be giving up your hyper-control of food.  Please imagine that doing this with your food is actually changing your body and changing its shape, its weight, and its size.  Now, please imagine that in the most twisty chunk of your grey matter, you are really, truly terrified by these changes.  Panicked.  Horrified.

Now please tell me how all the LOSE WEIGHT, LIMIT WHAT YOU EAT messaging is healthy for you.

Weight can be a factor in health - high or low.   But the diet industry, the obesity panic, and now apparently the investment banks... They are not adding to the health of the human population.  They replace self-love with torture, and sanity with knee-jerk madness.   I am trying to love my body as it changes... er, or at least to not hate it... but this crap isn't only hurting people like me.

(via Marianne, via s.e. )