In a nutshell, fat-acceptance is the idea that shaming people for the size or shape they are is Not Ok. And not going to make anyone any healthier or thinner. And also that size isn't the same as health. Fat-acceptance is closely connected to the idea of "Health At Every Size", which is the claim that health is best promoted not by pursuing a particular body size or shape, but rather by promoting healthy eating habits (not diets), regular exercise, etc, in a size-neutral manner. For more information on these ideas, check out the Shapely Prose Archive.
In this society we're brought up with massive pressures to be a certain size and shape, and for many people the psychological and medical consequences of that pressure are extremely serious. As well as shaming people for their bodies, it's not unreasonable to suggest that these pressures may contribute to eating disorders and other mental health issues and low self-esteem, as well as a number of physical health issues associated with dieting, or sudden weight gain/loss. As many people have remarked, this pressure is gendered. That's not to say that men do not experience body image issues -- of course they do. But rather that the standards to which women are held are often much more stringent, and more rigidly policed.
How to challenge these pressures is a difficult issue. But something I doubt very much will ever present an effective challenge is the practice of companies to who make a profit off of women's insecurities about their bodies. They may claim to care about self-esteem, but present no real challenge to the dominant narrative that causes those insecurities.
Don't get me wrong, I think it is important that companies have a sense of corporate responsibility. But The Body Shop's well-being campaign video explicitly holds that self esteem well-being is about "looking good" (sorry, no transcript because I can't work out how to replay bits of the video while transcribing). The Dove Campaign for Real Beauty shows a bunch of women in bras and underpants, because, um, apparently real beauty means being able to be objectified in order to sell more soap? Or something.
Feminist blogger Hugo Schwyzer has recently been promoting the Healthy is the New Skinny project, in which he is a participant. It's a project that aims to change the fashion industry to promote better self esteem and healthier body image in young women. Which sounds great, right? ...At least until you read the posts about why you should try eyelash extensions, some diet tips, and how fat is inherently bad. What part of telling women their bodies need improvement, need to be skinnier and prettier, is promoting healthy body image? What part of this is challenging the dominant pressures on women to be a particular size and shape?
There's a lot of room for feminists to disagree about what our response should be to these projects. Should we be involved in them, as Hugo Schwyzer is, trying to change them for the better? Should we condemn the projects and have nothing to do with them? Should we try to work on genuinely new projects that really do promote health at every size and fat-acceptance? Are there other options? Maybe it's not so straightforward -- I still remember Ruby, the "rubenesque" Barbie, made by The Body Shop, and how much people talked about the effect of Barbie on girls' body image when presented with Ruby's image.
But still, my own view is that as long as "body acceptance" campaigns are driven by the message that women should want to make themselves thinner, prettier, sexier, what we'll get is not self-esteem, but the same harmful messages that tell women that they are not good enough. That their bodies are not good enough. When those approaches are tied to commercial interests -- specifically, encouraging women to buy more fashion products in order to become skinnier, prettier, etc, then we run the risk of exploiting body image worries for profit. That's no revolution. A strong campaign for health at every size and fat-acceptance, though, I would like to see.
Thoughts?
--IP
Showing posts with label health. Show all posts
Showing posts with label health. Show all posts
Wednesday, 26 January 2011
Monday, 3 January 2011
Let them eat mahimahi fillets
Further to my last post on food and intersectionality, I did some googling for cookbooks, just to double check if I had to eat my words. Alas, no, although Kate's recipes will definitely go into my recipe notebook. Here's what I found in cookbook searches.
The overwhelming majority of cookbooks aimed at people with a specific named long-term condition (eg, arthritis, fatigue, fibromyalgia, autism) are not books that explain how to make cooking a simpler task, nor are they intended to expand your cooking repertoire in an easy no-fuss kind of way, but rather are intended to promote a particular kind of diet. They have titles with the word "cure" in them.
Look, I know that some elimination diets help some people manage their conditions. That's great, and I'm happy for you. What's much less cool is promoting the diet that helps you as a "cure" for everyone, unless you have a bunch of thorough double-blind studies to back you up. Plus, if we could actually cure autism, etc, with goji berries, I'm pretty sure there would be, you know, science about that.
So to the authors of these books let me say the following: thanks for playing, and I'm glad your diet helps you, but it's actually hard enough to feed myself already what with the whole frequently-feeling-too-shit-to-cook thing, without trying to cut whole food groups out of the equation.
Ok, I hear you cry, surely you could make some of these recipes even without sticking to the diet? Well maybe I could, but why should I help people who write these books to profit from promoting these diets? And anyway, the books seem to contain a number of recipes that are completely impractical in the context of my life. Here are some of the things I will not be cooking:
Kaz and I spent an amused afternoon reading samples of these books out loud to each other. Kaz suggested that the SpoonFails may be caused by the assumption that everyone has someone to cook for them. If that's the case, it's a dramatic departure from the norms of cookbook-writing (which are general assumed to be helping you cook food yourself), but would be in keeping with the idea of disabled people as helpless and unable to do anything themselves. It would also be in keeping with the assumption that everyone is middle-class, and all middle-class people have A Woman to do stuff for them -- either in the form of a wife, or in the form of waged domestic help.
In other words, here's a memo someone didn't get: not everyone has personal servants, and some people might object to the keeping of women as personal servants. Disabled people are disproportionately poor and are disproportionately unable to do complicated cooking. Cooking is disproportionately allocated to women, who are also disproportionately poor.
Is the assumption that poor people with fatigue and mobility issues are going to be trailing round their local health food shops for mahimahi fillets and truffle oil? And since my local health food shop is not wheelchair accessible, am I supposed to believe that the truffle oil will cause me to throw my mobility scooter over one shoulder while I walk around the shop? Ahahahahahaha don't make me laugh so much, it hurts my costochondritic ribs.
Seriously though, why is eating food a luxury?
[Edited to add: Kaz has more on this topic.]
--IP
The overwhelming majority of cookbooks aimed at people with a specific named long-term condition (eg, arthritis, fatigue, fibromyalgia, autism) are not books that explain how to make cooking a simpler task, nor are they intended to expand your cooking repertoire in an easy no-fuss kind of way, but rather are intended to promote a particular kind of diet. They have titles with the word "cure" in them.
Look, I know that some elimination diets help some people manage their conditions. That's great, and I'm happy for you. What's much less cool is promoting the diet that helps you as a "cure" for everyone, unless you have a bunch of thorough double-blind studies to back you up. Plus, if we could actually cure autism, etc, with goji berries, I'm pretty sure there would be, you know, science about that.
So to the authors of these books let me say the following: thanks for playing, and I'm glad your diet helps you, but it's actually hard enough to feed myself already what with the whole frequently-feeling-too-shit-to-cook thing, without trying to cut whole food groups out of the equation.
Ok, I hear you cry, surely you could make some of these recipes even without sticking to the diet? Well maybe I could, but why should I help people who write these books to profit from promoting these diets? And anyway, the books seem to contain a number of recipes that are completely impractical in the context of my life. Here are some of the things I will not be cooking:
- Stuffed fennel. SpoonShortageFail. Life'sTooShortFail.
- Fresh salmon steaks. CostFail.
- Wild rice. CostFail.
- Escargot. CostFail.
- Fresh mahimahi fillets. CostFail. WhereDoPeopleEvenBuyThatFail.
- Shiitake mushrooms. CostFail.
- Flavoured oils. CostFail.
- Flounder. CostFail.
- Acai berries. IDon'tEvenKnowHowToPronounceItFail.
- Assorted SpoonsShortageFails caused by recipes that take ages and need multiple pots and lots of chopping.
Kaz and I spent an amused afternoon reading samples of these books out loud to each other. Kaz suggested that the SpoonFails may be caused by the assumption that everyone has someone to cook for them. If that's the case, it's a dramatic departure from the norms of cookbook-writing (which are general assumed to be helping you cook food yourself), but would be in keeping with the idea of disabled people as helpless and unable to do anything themselves. It would also be in keeping with the assumption that everyone is middle-class, and all middle-class people have A Woman to do stuff for them -- either in the form of a wife, or in the form of waged domestic help.
In other words, here's a memo someone didn't get: not everyone has personal servants, and some people might object to the keeping of women as personal servants. Disabled people are disproportionately poor and are disproportionately unable to do complicated cooking. Cooking is disproportionately allocated to women, who are also disproportionately poor.
Is the assumption that poor people with fatigue and mobility issues are going to be trailing round their local health food shops for mahimahi fillets and truffle oil? And since my local health food shop is not wheelchair accessible, am I supposed to believe that the truffle oil will cause me to throw my mobility scooter over one shoulder while I walk around the shop? Ahahahahahaha don't make me laugh so much, it hurts my costochondritic ribs.
Seriously though, why is eating food a luxury?
[Edited to add: Kaz has more on this topic.]
--IP
Friday, 31 December 2010
'Tis the season
Of food. If you're celebrating something this time of year, you're probably eating.
Chronic pain and fatigue mean that I struggle with energy for preparing square meal. Increasingly this means I make use of one-pot recipes, but sometimes the desire to eat/serve something a little bit different can mean that I spend dramatic amounts of energy and can be tired for days. So I need a new repertoire, and gradually I'm finding new dishes and combinations that work well.
I occasionally browse cookbook sections in bookshops, but generally find these are not as helpful as one might think. See, I know how to cook. The problem is not learning to cook, but thinking up dishes that meet the necessary restrictions. Moreover, most cookbooks seems to have a dramatically different idea from me of what constitutes an "easy" recipe. For example, Nigella Lawson's version of "easy" cooking, that often takes half an hour and uses several pots I'll then have to wash up, is the sort of dish I might consider on a day I was feeling particularly well, not on a day I was feeling tired and in lots of pain.
So what I need are recipes that meet the following restrictions:
So why is this a social justice issue? Well, as I've written before, the cheapest foods tend either to be low in the nutritional content I need or very high in spoon-cost. Foods that are really easy to prepare tend to be more expensive (because they include the cost of processing, chopping, skinning/boning, etc), and are often less healthy. If they are both easier to prepare and high in the nutritional content that I need, they are high in financial cost; we're talking nice cuts of lean meat and fish, whole grains, fresh fruit and vegetables -- all of these are dramatically more expensive than the less healthy options of tinned baked beans, tinned meat, etc.
And as a feminist, I also note that domestic work -- including the purchasing and preparation of food -- is disproportionately allocated to women. And when the women in question are disabled, these are the issues that arise. Oh, and did I mention? Disabled people and women are disproportionately poor.
Anyway I keep looking for new recipes that meet all of these, but the hope that I will find them in one of the cookbooks all the cool kids seem to be using is beginning to fade. As Kaz and I have often remarked, we may just need to write the book(s) ourselves.
Anyway, happy whatever-you-celebrate, or general happiness, if you do not celebrate anything this time of year. May your spoons be plentiful.
--IP
Chronic pain and fatigue mean that I struggle with energy for preparing square meal. Increasingly this means I make use of one-pot recipes, but sometimes the desire to eat/serve something a little bit different can mean that I spend dramatic amounts of energy and can be tired for days. So I need a new repertoire, and gradually I'm finding new dishes and combinations that work well.
I occasionally browse cookbook sections in bookshops, but generally find these are not as helpful as one might think. See, I know how to cook. The problem is not learning to cook, but thinking up dishes that meet the necessary restrictions. Moreover, most cookbooks seems to have a dramatically different idea from me of what constitutes an "easy" recipe. For example, Nigella Lawson's version of "easy" cooking, that often takes half an hour and uses several pots I'll then have to wash up, is the sort of dish I might consider on a day I was feeling particularly well, not on a day I was feeling tired and in lots of pain.
So what I need are recipes that meet the following restrictions:
- Low financial cost: No posh imported ingredients, no boneless skinless nonsense.
- Nutritional value: It's important to me that I eat a balanced range of vitamins and other nutrients because this helps in the management of my symptoms.
- Low on mental spoon-cost: This will vary from person to person, but for me it means working with foods I'm likely to have already in my kitchen (since I can't usually run out at the last minute to pick up a few ingredients). And while I do buy fresh foods regularly, recipes that rely on ingredients with a longer shelf-life are preferred (since I'm more likely to have those things on any given day). Brownie points if you can make a good meal entirely out of non-perishables. Also: if I can minimise the planning-ahead time, that's good too (so foods that have to be prepared a day in advance are right out).
- Low on physical spoon-cost: This will also vary from person to person, but for me it means minimal chopping, minimal washing up, minimal time I have to spend standing up.
So why is this a social justice issue? Well, as I've written before, the cheapest foods tend either to be low in the nutritional content I need or very high in spoon-cost. Foods that are really easy to prepare tend to be more expensive (because they include the cost of processing, chopping, skinning/boning, etc), and are often less healthy. If they are both easier to prepare and high in the nutritional content that I need, they are high in financial cost; we're talking nice cuts of lean meat and fish, whole grains, fresh fruit and vegetables -- all of these are dramatically more expensive than the less healthy options of tinned baked beans, tinned meat, etc.
And as a feminist, I also note that domestic work -- including the purchasing and preparation of food -- is disproportionately allocated to women. And when the women in question are disabled, these are the issues that arise. Oh, and did I mention? Disabled people and women are disproportionately poor.
Anyway I keep looking for new recipes that meet all of these, but the hope that I will find them in one of the cookbooks all the cool kids seem to be using is beginning to fade. As Kaz and I have often remarked, we may just need to write the book(s) ourselves.
Anyway, happy whatever-you-celebrate, or general happiness, if you do not celebrate anything this time of year. May your spoons be plentiful.
--IP
Monday, 22 February 2010
I put my boobs on AssessMyBreasts.com
Assess My Breasts is a website run by Nuts magazine which someone told me about a while ago. It’s fairly horrendous: women post beheaded photos of themselves displaying their mammaries to be rated by Nuts readers.
The average Nuts reader, judging by the website, is a fan of boobs so large they look like they would cause serious lower back pain, accompanied by waists so small that lower back pain would be fucking excruciating. This is not to criticise them at all, but it is a worrying body preference trend in terms of one’s health. I have large boobs and a small waist. I’m a 30E. (Small back measurement, large cup size.) Yet compared to some of the women on the site I felt positively fat and flat chested.
When I uploaded my breasts I was hopeful I would get a good score. I’ve had a lot of compliments from ex-boyfriends and girlfriends about them, and if no one else does, I absolutely love them. They’re soft and round and comfortable and they balance out my huge hips.
At first, it was looking good. I was at 7.9. I could deal with that. That was good. But my score seemed to keep getting lower until I was only at 6.7. Still above average I suppose but that wasn’t good enough for me. I’m pretty arrogant and when recently some scumbag guy told me he thought I was a 6 and a half I assumed he was a gross twit who had read that disgusting ‘dating’ book ‘The Game’ and had picked up tips on ‘negging’ – making good-looking women feel insecure by giving them half-compliments and insults dressed up as compliments. Like a friend of mine who was told she had a nice overbite. ‘Bugs bunny is my favourite TV character’ he apparently said. Swine. So I tend to think I’m pretty fit, not that itt really matters.
Anyway, yes I got 6.7. I was not happy.
And then I realised I was a queer feminist who had put my breasts on there to see what happened, how it was processed and how the website worked; not because I required confirmation from dickheads.
So I remembered, I’m intelligent, confident, and I have a personality and a brain as well as a body. I have strong convictions and friends and family who love me. Why the hell did I care?
A mainstream magazine such as Nuts should not be putting women through this. It’s sick that I, a confident queer feminist, actually gave a shit. And it’s horrible to think that some of the women on that website will give more of a shit than I do. It’s actually rank.
Three words: Fuck. That. Shit.
Who’s with me?
The average Nuts reader, judging by the website, is a fan of boobs so large they look like they would cause serious lower back pain, accompanied by waists so small that lower back pain would be fucking excruciating. This is not to criticise them at all, but it is a worrying body preference trend in terms of one’s health. I have large boobs and a small waist. I’m a 30E. (Small back measurement, large cup size.) Yet compared to some of the women on the site I felt positively fat and flat chested.
When I uploaded my breasts I was hopeful I would get a good score. I’ve had a lot of compliments from ex-boyfriends and girlfriends about them, and if no one else does, I absolutely love them. They’re soft and round and comfortable and they balance out my huge hips.
At first, it was looking good. I was at 7.9. I could deal with that. That was good. But my score seemed to keep getting lower until I was only at 6.7. Still above average I suppose but that wasn’t good enough for me. I’m pretty arrogant and when recently some scumbag guy told me he thought I was a 6 and a half I assumed he was a gross twit who had read that disgusting ‘dating’ book ‘The Game’ and had picked up tips on ‘negging’ – making good-looking women feel insecure by giving them half-compliments and insults dressed up as compliments. Like a friend of mine who was told she had a nice overbite. ‘Bugs bunny is my favourite TV character’ he apparently said. Swine. So I tend to think I’m pretty fit, not that itt really matters.
Anyway, yes I got 6.7. I was not happy.
And then I realised I was a queer feminist who had put my breasts on there to see what happened, how it was processed and how the website worked; not because I required confirmation from dickheads.
So I remembered, I’m intelligent, confident, and I have a personality and a brain as well as a body. I have strong convictions and friends and family who love me. Why the hell did I care?
A mainstream magazine such as Nuts should not be putting women through this. It’s sick that I, a confident queer feminist, actually gave a shit. And it’s horrible to think that some of the women on that website will give more of a shit than I do. It’s actually rank.
Three words: Fuck. That. Shit.
Who’s with me?
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