The recent increase in the number of support groups and advocacy organizations aimed at boosting the self-image of obese people have some experts worrying that such groups distract from the tangible physical dangers of obesity.
Peggy Howell, spokeswoman for the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance, said support groups like hers, which focuses on raising obese people’s self-esteem rather than lowering their weight, are important because physical health is worthless without having a positive self-image.
“Do you think that self-hatred and denial are healthy?” she said in an email.
Howell said people cannot focus on changing their bodies if they do not first “accept [themselves] and face who [they] really are.”
“Many fat people don’t want to accept or face the fact that they are fat,” she said. “What does this do for their well-being?”
Howell noted there are several recent studies showing that health risks associated with size are greatly exaggerated.
NAAFA also works for legal action on behalf of victims of “fat discrimination” through its new FLARE program — the Fat Legal Advocacy, Rights and Education Project, formed by attorney Sondra Solovay.
“Many lawyers want to help fat people fight for their rights, but with little legal precedent, they need guidance, community and someone who can ‘talk law,'” Howell said.
NAAFA publicly challenged Wal-Mart last year to change employment policies that allegedly discriminate on the basis of weight. A Nov. 3, 2005 NAAHA press release cited an internal Wal-Mart memo suggesting the chain avoid hiring obese people “in an attempt to reduce the cost of health benefits.”
NAAFA denounced what it called Wal-Mart’s “assumption that being fat, in and of itself, causes illness” and said the policy would be unfairly based on “prejudicial assumptions about the health status of an entire demographic group.”
Joan Salge Blake, Clinical Assistant Professor and Dietetic Internship Director at Boston University’s Sargent College of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences, argued that obesity is dangerous and should be treated like any other health problem.
“Obesity should not be ignored by any stretch of the imagination,” Blake said. “There are incredible risk factors for cardiovascular disease, stroke [and] type two diabetes, and there is just a great burden put on the hips and joints.”
Blake said although genetics often play a role in determining weight, the fact that 65 percent of Americans are overweight or obese should raise alarm.
“That’s the majority of Americans,” she said, and noted that she would be “hard-pressed” to blame the large percentage solely on genetics. “It’s now about lifestyle. Any discrimination against the overweight is now shockingly by the minority.”
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee professor Margaret Duncan, who last year started teaching a course titled “The Social Construction of Obesity,” said after conducting an in-depth study of the issue she decided the nation is in a sort of “moral panic,” unsure of whether to label obesity in Americans as a serious problem or the new norm.
Duncan stressed that people who will never “approximate the body ideal” can still benefit from healthy eating practices like eating well and exercising often.
She said her class is ideal for undergraduate students planning to study human movement and those who will eventually work with clients for whom weight is a “real issue.”
Danielle Humbert, a spokeswoman for Smith College, where the obesity group Size Does Matter was chartered in 2004, said no matter the opinion, students benefit by getting involved with and being outspoken on issues like this one.
“I truly believe that this is the year for activism on campus,” she said. “Students have been responding to everything — whether it be race, class, sex or gender.”
