Big Fat Blog Comment -- I'll comment on it later - but want it in my blog so I can find it.

This is a post from "big fat blog" which I will comment on later.

k.

statistic: >20 yo: women 25% of women obese; while men it's ~19%

http://www.wrongdiagnosis.com/o/obesity/prevalence.htm


Afraid To Be Fat
I was struck by the wonderful George Carlin quote that Marla posted in the lexicon thread and went searching for it online. I found this page, which has a lot of good quotes, but I was especially struck by this one from Our Bodies, Ourselves:Many of us are convinced that making women afraid to be fat is a form of social control. Fear of fat keeps women preoccupied, robs us of our pride and energy, keeps us from taking up space.There's a certain amount of energy that each of us has to spend in making sure we are healthy, making the best choices, and feeling good about ourselves. But this quote still gave me a chill. Because not a single one of my male friends obsesses about weight or has ever obsessed about weight to the extent that women do. And here I mean most women, not just women who have legitimate health issues. We obsess about weight to the exclusion of what? Equality? Is it possible?Maybe men do feel the same preoccupation, except without the societal permission to talk about it. Or maybe we, women, are allowing ourselves to be controlled by this fear, as the quote above suggests. Maybe we are wasting our energy on something that ultimately isn't that important, and is in fact even more insidious than we imagine.
posted by mo @ 8:46 AM 13 comments
Thursday, July 29, 2004