thinking about health

[keryx]

Tish said something today about the prejudices/isms implied in our idea of "health" that I need to think about.

Is the way our culture beats people with the healthy stick really about [an entirely demented concept of] what's good for you? Or is it about conformity?

Comments

[kitty-pitchfork.livejournal.com]

That's a good question.

elektro_c and I watched an edition of Frontline recently that was about fad diets and weight loss, and I came away from it wondering these very things, as well as with some anger over the fact that we cannot have a conversation about the weight/health relationship in this country without making people feel like shit about themselves. You know, it's just all this THE FATTENING OF AMERICA!!! crap, with endless camera angles highlighting people's asses and stomachs, and very little discussion of what it actually means to be healthy independent of a person's total body mass. Healthy weight varies by individual; as long as you're eating well and getting some exercise, I see no reason why we need to hold ourselves to some crazy-ass super-skinny standard that most people can only achieve by depriving themselves constantly, regarding the consumption of foods that they love as some sort of moral failing.

ARGH! *&%!@$!@#$ I could go on, but I'll stop now. ;)

[firecat]

It's definitely about conformity, but even more than that, it's about control, and moral judgement of others.

Even though this is supposedly a scientific information age, people still feel on some level that being not healthy means you did something wrong and you're being punished for it.

Health is in fact mostly a matter of luck. One can influence one's health conditions but not control them or pick which ones one is going to have. But people desperately want to believe that their health is entirely in their control, and part of sustaining that myth is to look down on people who are farther away from the health norm than they are, and believe "they did it to themselves."

People do the same sort of thing with poverty. Even though there are enormous social and economic forces keeping poor people poor and rich people rich, people look at poor people and want to believe "They're there because they're lazy."

[keryx.livejournal.com]

Yes. As Tish points out, the anti-fat thing ties into ableism with the same sort of rhetoric used to isolate any minority group. They're less "fit" somehow. And "fit" is a word with at least 3 meanings in this context.

[firecat]

Oh, excellent point about "fit".

By the way, I re-posted my comment, slightly edited, in my own journal, and linked to your post.