Fat Pride

[penultimatestraw 473]

It's not right to discriminate against CBF, of course, but should we deny obesity's health effects? My link

Cat Pause proudly describes herself as "fat", can live with euphemisms like "curvy", "chunky" or "chubby", but baulks at what she believes are value-laden labels such as "overweight" or "obese".

 

The US-born academic is a pioneer in the emerging field of fat studies, organising New Zealand's first conference on the topic at Massey University's Wellington campus on Thursday and Friday.

 

Fat studies, she explains, is an academic discipline just like history, English or political science, but it examines attitudes towards fat people and challenges the assumption that anyone with a bulging waistline is unhealthy.

 

At the conference, scholars from as far afield as the United States and Australia discussed papers such as "Fat hatred and the Left in the time of 'the obesity epidemic'" and

"The role of diagnosis in marginalising corpulence".

 

"One of the reasons we're so fearful and hateful of fat is that we believe we can read people's bodies," Pause told AFP.

 

"So when people look at a fat body like mine, it tells them I'm unhealthy and that this is a diseased body. It tells them I don't ever exercise and eat nothing but junk."

 

Pause said the reality is that some people are just bigger than others and fat studies highlighted the need for society to accept the fact, rather than constantly judging fat people and pushing them to lose weight.

 

One of its first tasks, she said, was to reclaim the word "fat" so it was not used solely as an insult, in much the same way the gay community adopted the term "queer".

 

People now call themselves fat activists and speak of fat pride, refusing to accept what they say is pressure from the multi-billion weight loss industry to strive for a skinny ideal.

 

This explains Pause's aversion to "overweight", which she says implies she is above her perfect weight. She says she has not weighed herself for years and last time she did she tipped the scales at about 130 kilograms (237 pounds).

 

Similarly, she says "obesity" is a term "used by the medical community to pathologise fat bodies, making it a disease".

 

Massey University lecturer Andrew Dickson said the weight-loss industry was built around exploiting the insecurities of fat people.

 

"We know 95 percent of people who attempt to lose weight will fail to do so, therefore, there is not a weight-loss industry, what they do is sell solutions to weight anxiety," he said.

 

"We're getting this horrible, obsessive anxiety about weight issues."

 

Dickson himself said he had never been as stressed as when he reduced his weight from 130 kilograms to 86, obsessively completing endurance runs, dieting constantly and taking prescription medicines to slim down.

 

Now weighing 100 kilograms, Dickson says he is healthy even though conventional weight charts would classify him as obese, still running about 60 kilometres (37 miles) a week and referring to himself as "the fat athlete".

 

"I don't do them fast and I'm never going to win... (but) it's not all about looking like Usain Bolt," he said.

 

Critics say asserting that obesity is not necessarily a major health problem flies in the face of medical evidence about diseases such as diabetes and other issues, a claim disputed by fat activists.

 

"It's not just how much you weigh for your height, it's where it (fat) is in the liver, pancreas, and places that you can't see," Auckland University of Technology nutritionist

Elaine Rush told TVNZ this week.

 

The fat issues movement, while addressing serious issues, is not without a strain of self-deprecating humour.

 

Dickson lobbies running clubs to introduce a "Clydesdale class" for hefty athletes, while Pause has a set of bathroom scales from the US where the numbers have been replaced with words like "hot", "perfect" and "sexy".

 

In the Australian city of Melbourne, a synchronised swimming club for fat women has been set up called Aquaporko.

 

"If you didn't laugh, you'd cry, we'd all go crazy," said Pause.

 

Australian activist Kath Read, who blogs as "Fat Heffalump", said many of the jibes directed her way were far from good natured.

 

"I barely go through a day where I'm not called something nasty on the street by a stranger," she said.

 

"It's not the kind of people, like teenagers, that you'd expect to be (doing the) abusing. It's by people in business suits, by women my own age -- I'm almost 40 -- by people you'd expect, on the face of it, to be respectable human beings."

 

Pause said there were laws against racism and sexism but discrimination against fat people was just as commonplace and was not just tolerated but, in a sense promoted, by governments running anti-obesity campaigns.

 

"It's not illegal to discriminate against someone based on their size, whereas it's illegal in most countries to discriminate based on someone's sex or race, sexual orientation is becoming more protected too," she said.

 

"I'd like size to become a protected class."

[TimmySmith 2,782]

It's a tip that 130 kilo = 287, not 237. That's not curvy, it's round. This girl wants to have her cake and eat it too. And also yours.

[Phurfur 70]

I always wondered why I paid the same price for my airline ticket as the 300 pounder sittting in front to me.

[penultimatestraw 473]

I always wondered why I paid the same price for my airline ticket as the 300 pounder sittting in front to me.

Better than next to you. FYI, some airlines make them pay extra, or keep them off the plane altogether: My link

FLYING in coach is never comfortable, but it’s getting downright awkward for bigger passengers as airlines increasingly single out customers they deem too fat to fly.

 

The issue made headlines in early February when the director Kevin Smith, best known for “Clerks” and “Chasing Amy,” was thrown off a Southwest Airlines flight from Oakland to Burbank, Calif., because the crew determined he was too big. Mr. Smith turned to his Twitter account to vent: “I broke no regulation, offered no ‘safety risk’ (what, was I gonna roll on a fellow passenger?). I was wrongly ejected from the flight.”

 

Southwest, like most of the major United States carriers, has had a formal policy in place for years requiring that passengers who can’t physically fit into a single airline seat must buy two. Though such rules have long been denounced as discriminatory by advocates for the obese, they have gained the support of fliers who believe charging passengers who take up more room than the average person is only fair. Regardless of which side of the debate you are on, shrinking airline capacity has aggravated the issue with passengers of all sizes facing more tightly packed flights and cramped seating.

 

“I fly coast to coast several times a year, and I cannot tell you how many times I have been pinned in by a morbidly obese human,” said Mark Sweeting, a frequent flier from Portland, Ore., who says he used to request an exit row seat for the extra legroom, but that he now avoids that row having noticed that large passengers often request those seats for the same reason. “I don’t know what the correct solution is,” he said, “But it is a real problem.”

 

Some airlines have responded by tweaking their policies to encourage large passengers to buy more space. On Feb. 1 Air France, which for the last five years has offered “passengers with a high body mass” the option of buying a second seat in economy at a 25 percent discount, said it would reimburse the cost of the second seat if the plane wasn’t full. Last year, United set a formal policy to get large passengers to buy an upgrade or extra seat after it received 700 complaints in 2008 from customers whose seatmates did not fit into a single seat. Since then, said Robin Urbanski, a United spokeswoman, that number has dropped to about 100.

 

Airlines are generally clear about how they determine when a customer must purchase an additional seat or upgrade. Southwest uses the armrest test, requiring customers who cannot lower both armrests to buy an extra seat. Continental says customers must be able to wear the seatbelt, with one extension if necessary, remain seated with the armrests down for the entire flight and “not significantly encroach upon the adjacent seating space.”

 

But the enforcement of such rules can result in humiliation when large customers are singled out in front of a plane full of passengers. Mr. Smith, who was put on a subsequent Southwest flight and offered a $100 voucher, summed it up in one sarcastic tweet: “The @SouthwestAir Diet. How it works: you’re publicly shamed into a slimmer figure. Crying the weight right off has never been easier!”

 

Mr. Smith had initially paid for two seats, but tried to fly standby for an earlier flight that had only one open seat left. After he had taken that seat, Mr. Smith was told he was deemed a safety risk. Southwest stated in a blog post on its Web site soon after the incident that “a timely exit from the aircraft in the event of an emergency might be compromised if we allow a cramped, restricted seating arrangement.”

 

Advocates for the obese say charging bigger passengers for an extra seat is simply not a solution. Such policies “add yet another way to discriminate against already marginalized fat people,” said Peggy Howell, public relations director at the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance, a nonprofit civil rights organization. She added, “We see this as more of an attempt at getting more money out of the consumer’s pocket than any concern for our well-being as some have claimed.”

 

But fliers who have been encroached on by a large passenger say not addressing the issue is not fair, either. When I wrote about the photo of an obese airline passenger making its way around the Internet in December, 200 readers posted comments to the blog post at nytimes.com/intransit. Many said charging customers who take up two seats for both of them is reasonable. They recounted flights where an obese passenger infringed on their space. “While I understand it’s not easy for anyone involved, including the obese passenger, I once was unable to move for about three hours during a flight because I was literally sandwiched between the obese passenger next to me and the window,” posted Bridget Jesionowski, of Claremont, Calif. “I was uncomfortable and I know she was as well, as she kept apologizing to me."

 

Because the rules aren’t consistently enforced, passengers crowded by a seatmate often find themselves making the difficult choice between confronting that seatmate about his or her size or enduring the discomfort for the entire flight.

 

On a cross-country flight from Philadelphia to San Diego in October, Matt G. Sampson, a doctor from Bala Cynwyd, Pa., who was traveling to a conference, said he was forced to give up his window seat when a “morbidly obese woman” took the seat next to him. “Upon sitting down, there were large portions of her right side physically touching my body,” said Mr. Sampson, 5-foot-8 and 160 pounds.

 

Southwest didn’t get involved in any way, he said. And since Mr. Sampson said he didn’t want to complain about his neighbor’s mass, he forfeited his window seat and switched to a middle one three rows up between two smaller passengers. Mr. Sampson stressed that he didn’t think his seatmate was doing anything wrong. “She was within the rules at hand,” he said. But he said he felt he’d lost out nonetheless. “She ended up having a more comfortable seat than I ended up with.”

 

In response to Mr. Sampson’s predicament, Chris Mainz, a spokesman for Southwest, said: “We strive to be consistent enforcing our policy to avoid this very situation, and all indications tell us its working. That said, we apologize for Mr. Sampson’s inconvenience.”

 

Airlines need to acknowledge that the current policies aren’t solving a problem but are rather turning one passenger’s comfort into another passenger’s embarrassment. Another solution must be found. (How about some wider seats in coach?)

 

Southwest, for one, seems to be considering a different approach after the public relations fiasco following the incident with Mr. Smith. Forty-eight hours after the news of his removal from a Southwest plane blasted through the blogosphere and celebrity news channels, the airline refunded his airfare, admitted it was “a mistake in trying to board him as a standby passenger and then remove him,” and said it would be reviewing “how and when this delicate policy is implemented.”

[Phurfur 70]

Better than next to you. FYI, some airlines make them pay extra, or keep them off the plane altogether: My link

 

OK, the 200 pounder.

 

"I'd like size to become a protected class."

[DankNuggs 305]

Another example of bullzhit in academia. Pay the toll fatty.

 

You have the right to be fat, you also have the responsibility for those choices

[Patriotsfatboy1 1,432]

[penultimatestraw 473]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

*extra space - enjoy it fatty!

[parrot 789]

Denial ain't just a river.

[IGotWorms 3,315]

I wonder what it would cost to do the catering for a Fat Pride convention.

[Mookz 1,287]

I wonder what it would cost to do the catering for a Fat Pride convention.

This year's Fat Pride Parade will begin at 6th & Main (near the Arby's) and continue half a block north, ending in the Dairy Queen parking lot.

[IGotWorms 3,315]

This year's Fat Pride Parade will begin at 6th & Main (near the Arby's) and continue half a block north, ending in the Dairy Queen parking lot.

 

Half a block?! There had better be refreshments along the way.

[parrot 789]

This year's Fat Pride Parade will begin at 6th & Main (near the Arby's) and continue half a block north, ending in the Dairy Queen parking lot.

 

That's all downhill, right?

[Mookz 1,287]

That's all downhill, right?

On reinforced Segways.

[Phurfur 70]

This year's Fat Pride Parade will begin at 6th & Main (near the Arby's) and continue half a block north, ending in the Dairy Queen parking lot.

 

Wouldn't it be nice if we could make fun of any group we wanted? I still don't know who makes the rules.

[MDC 5,892]

Wouldn't it be nice if we could make fun of any group we wanted?

 

You can. Stop being a whiny little b1tch.

[Greedo 13]

Another example of bullzhit in academia. Pay the toll fatty.

 

You have the right to be fat, you also have the responsibility for those choices

 

+1.

[TAS 2]

Half a block?! There had better be refreshments along the way.

 

And sweat towels.

[Phurfur 70]

You have the right to be fat, you also have the responsibility for those choices

 

Not under ACA. It becomes your problem so in an attempt to help you out the government will control everyone's activities in the name of ACA.

[Cruzer 1,992]

Another example of bullzhit in academia. Pay the toll fatty.

 

You have the right to be fat, you also have the responsibility for those choices

 

[RLLD 3,455]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttDymUdNxjY&feature=related