her name's really me-me? so appropriate.

[keryx]

Apparently heated debate between MeMe Roth, Joy Nash & Kelly Bliss. So, first off, I had no idea who MeMe Roth is (I thought the spelling was a joke when I first saw it, even) - she apparently runs a group called "National Action on Obesity", which is mostly known for doing that ridiculous (and sexist, and heterocentric) "wedding gown challenge" I vaguely remember. She talks as if she should know what she's saying, but it's clear she's not an expert by any measure now that I've seen her website (not to mention her repetitive references to Standard Obesity Crisis Factbits).

So it surprises me that the conversation is all about Love Yourself my way - no, Love Yourself MY way. I would've expected more refutation of Roth's "science" from Kelly Bliss. And Nash? Okay, I know, she's an actress who did a cool video - I shouldn't expect her to be able to take a particularly informed stance. Hell, I can't take a particularly informed stance, either. I was, nevertheless, frustrated to watch what had been touted as this "look how well we fought back against that chick" thing turn out to be... um, mostly a couple of fat chicks saying "obesity is really a problem, but we should love ourselves anyhow... and further EVERYONE HAS A RESPONSIBILITY TO EXERCISE".

Telling people they have the responsibility to exercise or eat "well" is the most self-absorbed crap. There's no press and political machine saying I have the responsibility to care for my environment, or my neighbors, or really much of anything that would actually constitute an obligation to someone else or the world. But it's possible to sustain a multi-year moral panic over waistlines in the name of "health" - not only possible, but you can get fat advocates to support it on television. I am so not down with this. It feels wrong to me, and I don't think it works, anyhow.

Hey, on the up side, at least it's probably a good sign that yayfat vs. nayfat "debate" gets press.

Comments

[volondoinyaface.livejournal.com]

Hmmm...I think that MeMe Roth woman is clearly a salesman. She is probably not even that emotionally invested in what she's touting; she seems like a super insecure lady that's gotten ragged on for being thin her whole life. Wierd dynamic. But she's just selling herself as a product, she probably has books or videotapes to shill.

I love Joy Nash, just because she's HOT AS HELL. I was a little irritated Kelly Bliss's part got cut off.

And although I hadn't thought about it in those terms, I think you're right about the self-absorption. That actually is pretty interesting to play with, a bit.

[keryx.livejournal.com]

There is something weird and defensive about that woman.

And yes, Joy Nash is hotness.

[anysia.livejournal.com]

I listen and look at Me-me and think that she is obsessed about size. She totally ignored Joy's comment about she eats right and exercises regularly, and is healthy.

Do you think she would get upset if someone pointed out to her that a BIM of 20 is very close (1.5) to being malnourished and underweight? She likes ragging on about Jordans' bmi in the same fashion on the other end of the spectrum.

[keryx.livejournal.com]

Isn't there research that people with BMI's on the low end of normal have higher risk of something? I want to say that it has to do with aging... (and see, this is why I'm no good at representing the data - I can't remember it).

[sarahmichigan.livejournal.com]

A BMI of 20 WAS underweight according to the old BMI standards, before they changed them. Before, the target was 22 to 27, but the lowered it to 20-25 as the "ideal."

Anyhow, yes people who are on the low end of normal or underweight, statistically speaking, die younger than people who are in the "overweight" BMI bracket.

[firecat]

Thanks for taking away any lingering guilt I felt about not having watched that video yet.

Health at every size is great. Healthism at every size sucks.

[keryx.livejournal.com]

Yep. I know a lot of people think that you have to buy into the moral imperative of food and exercise in order to win arguments. [Or they haven't thought about it - it's like gender assumptions; people may question convention on one thing but not do it on EVERY thing, after all.] I think that line of argument can work individually, but en masse it fails. For every healthily exercising fat person, there seem to be 30 studies that fat is just bad bad bad. If we want to win that battle, we need to do it with our own well-funded studies and press.

[sarahmichigan.livejournal.com]

I think it's good, at least, that Kelly pointed out that you can have a great diet and exercise five days a week and still end up "obese". I totally agree with you that eating "right" and exercising regularly isn't a moral imperative, but we're still trying to get the average Joe to believe that not all fat people are eating junk food sitting on the couch every day.

It's a tough thing to know where to even START with fighting the sort of all-encompassing wide-angle fat hatred Meme is spouting.

[keryx.livejournal.com]

Yes - I'm not by any means saying that Kelly and Joy didn't both make some decent points. But. You can have the conversation about how not all fat folk are eating crap & lazy without also beating people with the healthy stick. Hell, the average person is already eating junk and sitting on the sofa, maybe they'd connect with that idea.

Sure is

[anysia.livejournal.com]

People with very low BMIs tend to have more instances of osteoporosis, their skin ages faster due to less adipose tissue, fertility is affected, low blood pressure, muscle atrophy, irregular heartbeat, hair loss due to halt of hormone production, just to name a few things that can go wrong.