Time To Call B.S. On the New Year Diets

Careful as I have been to unfollow so-called “health” promoters and diet “lifestyle” influencers on social media, my feeds are currently filled with advertisements for the latest diets (claiming to not be diets). From Noom to Intermittent Fasting to the Whole 30, to local gyms and wellness coaches, I simply cannot escape the barrage of proclamations that my body needs to change, and that the secret to changing my body lies within a specific diet and exercise program.

But… 

What if the pursuit of weight loss is not as healthy as we’ve always thought it is?

What if the pursuit of weight loss does more damage to your physical, mental, and emotional health than it does good?

What if that chronic anxiety about your health and inflammatory foods is causing more inflammation than the foods themselves?

What if that constant attention to wellness blogs and Instagram influencers is taking you so far outside your own body’s experience, making you feel as though you really need to change something about yourself and the way you look and eat, that you’ve become fearful of your own body’s hunger and desires?  

It’s commonly accepted by the vast majority of our culture (medical professionals included) that there is such a thing as a “healthy weight.” Anyone outside that weight is “unhealthy” and should change something about their diet, and exercise more. Anyone inside that weight is “healthy” but they should definitely avoid allowing their weight creeping up.  

Diet culture and fatphobia are so embedded in our culture that it has become an informal class system. Moral value is ascribed to certain foods, “lifestyles,” exercising, and weight. Without ever naming it aloud, our culture values folks who are into “wellness” diets (i.e. Paleo, Keto, insertyourplanhere) which maintain their thin, typically-abled social standing. If your “lifestyle” is deemed “healthy,” you have a higher social standing. The longer you’re able to maintain the “lifestyle,” the more willpower you must have, the more disciplined you must be, and therefore the more moral superiority you are ascribed.  

There is a good body of research out there demonstrating that these beliefs about weight as an indicator of health are just not true. And, in fact, these lies about weight do actual harm to the health of people living in larger bodies. The chronic stress of living with stigma and discrimination because of the size of their bodies (fatphobia) actually causes the health problems that so often get blamed on the weight itself. Furthermore, 95% of people who intentionally lose weight will gain it back within 5 years. They’ll blame themselves, try another diet or wellness program, and restart the cycle. This weight cycling causes enormous strain on one’s physical health, and is actually to blame for many of the health concerns that get blamed on “obesity.” 

People, if 95% of our students were failing a test, wouldn’t we go after the merits of the test itself rather than blame the students and hold them to the standard of the 5% who passed? The truth is that the body has biological mechanisms that kick into place when it has lost weight to ensure the weight will be regained, regardless of willpower or self-control. That 5% who keep weight off long-term is a statistical anomaly, and people within that anomaly cannot possibly spout the virtues of their superior willpower. They do only because they don’t know the truth of how this system really works, and because diet culture holds them up as the example of superior virtue. The truth is, our bodies have a set weight range that they will work extremely hard to maintain over time, regardless of willpower or self-control.

Before you start in on the “but it’s not healthy”s and the “higher weight causes diseases”s, I’d ask you to get real curious about those claims. Start to ask questions about what you’ve always assumed to be true (what we all assume to be true, until we start asking critical questions). Start reading more into Health At Every Size, and get to know what it really means.  

So what’s the point? Why is this so important?

It’s important because regardless of the arguments that dieting is a personal choice, this is much bigger than an individual choice - this is about social justice. An entire group of people continue to be discriminated against because of the size of their bodies (remember: body size is genetically determined and it’s unhealthy to try to change it). The health of people is being compromised - being attacked - and it continues to be accepted. Fatphobia is one of the last forms of discrimination that is still socially acceptable, overlooked even by those who seek to be inclusive.

It’s important because whether you live in a larger body or a thin body, diet culture steals from all of us. It steals trust in our own bodies that we were born with, and puts us at war with our bodies. Diet culture and fatphobia shows up everywhere; it’s become part of the air we breathe.

As I have worked to untangle myself from diet culture and uproot the fatphobia that lived within me, I’ve seen first hand how much changes when I release the fear of certain foods and the fear of gaining weight. When I finally gave up the fight to wrestle my body into a size and form she didn’t want to be, a whole new facet of life unfolded before me. One in which I am not obsessed with how my belly looks or what people think of the foods I take pleasure in. One in which my body is free to stretch out on the couch or to go for a long walk, and to choose foods that sound good to eat without any moral judgment. 

I want this freedom for you. As activist Lilla Watson says, “If you have come here to help me, you are wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together.” My own body's liberation is tied up in the liberation of all bodies. My body has found freedom, but it cannot be completely free until all bodies are free. As long as larger bodies continue to face discrimination, lack of access in public spaces, lack of evidence-based healthcare treatment, my body cannot be fully free.