Despite a mountain of evidence linking physical and mental health to social discrimination, the conversation about fat and health stubbornly refuses to acknowledge the possible influence of stigma in determining fat people’s health. And I’d venture to guess you even hear it in your head, when your pants are suddenly fitting a little differently. There are two entry points in: if you’ve never thought about this before, if you’ve never thought about fatness and fat people in this dignity- and justice-centered way, there will be plenty of user friendly entry points for you. She’s written essays about living as a fat person, as well as informative pieces about the harms of diet talk, how to examine your anti-fat bias, and the public health risks of fat-shaming.

What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat by Aubrey What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat by Aubrey

Studies show that fat survivors of sexual assault are less likely to be believed and less likely than their thin counterparts to report various crimes; 27% of very fat women and 13% of very fat men attempt suicide; over 50% of doctors describe their fat patients as “awkward, unattractive, ugly and noncompliant”; and in 48 states, it’s legal—even routine—to deny employment because of an applicant’s size.

Gordon describes them as people who “position themselves as sympathetic supporters,” when they’re really just well-intentioned bullies. You see it on TV, like when Miranda from Sex and the City joins Weight Watchers right after having a baby.

What We Dont Talk about When We Talk about Fat | TikTok What We Dont Talk about When We Talk about Fat | TikTok

She recommends some easy policy changes, like including body size as a protected class in schools where states have banned bullying. People are MAYBE allowed to be fat, but they have to be healthy, or actively trying to become healthy. Unlike the recent wave of memoirs and quasi self-help books that encourage readers to love and accept themselves, Gordon pushes the discussion further towards authentic fat activism, which includes ending legal weight discrimination, giving equal access to health care for large people, increased access to public spaces, and ending anti-fat violence. You hear it from your co-worker who won’t stop talking about how they simply cannot eat another cookie at the holiday party. More importantly than this, I’ve been raised in a society that seems to think that fat people don’t deserve kind or even humane treatment.

Her voice felt familiar even though we had never met, and I soon realized that her online moniker is accurate: I felt like I was talking to a friend, one who understood the pain of living in a body that society is constantly trying to shrink. This quote: “We deserve a paradigm of personhood that does not make size or health a prerequisite for dignity and respect,” has stuck with me.

Fat Friend Wants You to Start Having Conversations With Your Fat Friend Wants You to Start Having Conversations With

where she edits stories in the health and wellness beat, in addition to specializing in gender and body politics. A concern troll might ask a fat person what diets they’ve tried before asking them if they even want to lose weight, or even ask for their consent to engage in what might be a sensitive topic. By sharing her experiences as well as those of others—from smaller fat to very fat people—she concludes that to be fat in our society is to be seen as an undeniable failure, unlovable, unforgivable, and morally condemnable. In a world where thinness reigns supreme and diet talk is as normal as talking about the weather, fat folks rarely have the opportunity to share their stories without fear of being bullied or berated. What we have long considered the health conditions associated with being fat in actuality may be the effects of long-term dieting, which very fat people are pressured heavily to do.The ways that we treat fat people are kind of terrible, and they don’t actually make fat people thinner, or healthier, or happier. In her new book, What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat, Gordon seamlessly threads a personal narrative with data and history. We have managed to normalize something that is by almost every measure harmful to pretty much every person.

What We Talk About When We Talk About Fat - ScienceDirect What We Talk About When We Talk About Fat - ScienceDirect

Reading about this, my heart broke for fat kids everywhere who bear the burden of our obsession with thinness. Because of fatphobia’s history as a structural means of body policing, Gordon says, “all of the ways that we level our bad behaviors at fat people are absolutely entrenched in oppressive systems, in violent forms of communication.As a full-time organizer with 12 years of experience, Gordon wanted her book to be accessible to folks who may not know much about anti-fatness, as well as being validating for other fat folks. All of the policy changes she proposes are pretty light lifts, but they would be strides toward dignity for fat people. Leaving the religion of diet culture 🙌🏼 It’s a wild ride ✌🏼 Sources pictured: Anti-diet by Christy Harrison and What we don’t talk about when we talk about fat by Aubrey Gordon. Gordon opens her book with a story about being put in a middle seat on a plane as a size 28, and the anger she received from the man sitting next to her. A world where the words ‘obesity epidemic’ are shared everywhere as fact without really anything to back up the reality that, even if there is an increase in obesity, there’s literally no proven way for the vast majority of people to lose weight and keep it off.