Category: News
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Things to Read
1 comment on Things to ReadSome links I thought worth sharing: Lara Frater on the word “fat”. Grief moves at its own pace, despite the “rush to normal” common in our society. You know how kids will bulk up a little before a growth spurt? That’s now a strange thing to be studied, not a normal thing. Swimming laps & […]
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Genetics Affect Weight
This New York Times article by Gina Kolata isn’t totally news to me. At least not this summary of a study published in a 1990 issue of The New England Journal of Medicine (bolding added): The work fascinates Claude Bouchard, a genetics researcher at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, La., because it might offer […]
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People Get Ready
73-year-old Lester Chambers dedicates “People Get Ready” in memory of Trayvon Martin. A white woman jumps on stage and assaults him. If you aren’t familiar with the song, here’s a recording of Aretha Franklin singing it: Imagine how folks would’ve reacted if Lester had sung Springsteen’s “American Skin (41 Shots)”.
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Quote of the Day
Mr. de la Rionda hammered away at the chain of events Mr. Zimmerman set off, he said, when he profiled Mr. Martin, got out of his car with a gun and followed him, despite the advice of the police dispatcher. “The law doesn’t allow people to take the law into their own hands,” he said. […]
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Why I Think Declaring Obesity A Disease is Harmful
It’s inaccurate: A fit fat person is usually healthier than a sedentary thin person. Obese people (BMI of 30 to 34.9) have no greater risk of early death than those of “normal” body size (BMI 18.5 to 24.9). Most people who fit the clinical definition of obese are in the smaller categories. “Normal-weight” people who think […]
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In The News
The AMA has endorsed the idea that “obesity” is a disease, not a “condition”. (Personally I consider it a characteristic.) Forbes states that this is “a move member physicians hope will spur better reimbursement for treating overweight Americans and create better health outcomes.” Exactly how it’s supposed to “create better health outcomes” when commonly prescribed treatments do […]
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Job requirements
“Put this all together and it means the IRS needs tens of thousands of people who are (a) smart, (b) willing to do really tedious work, (c) for moderate wages, (d) while working for a soul-crushing bureaucracy, and (e) being loathed by all right-thinking people. Does this sound to you like a recipe for disaster? […]
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Things to Read
By way of Slacktivist comes a piece on recognizing silencing techniques. Some are definitely too familiar. Security guards do not always improve the learning environment. Art teachers might be better. Petition to drop the charges against Keira Wilmot for a science experiment gone wrong and re-enroll her in school has over 36000 signatures — does it […]
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Fat Bias Isn’t Just About Rapport
As noted on Twitter, the article Tara Parker-Pope wrote for the New York Times about a study in Obesity looking at how fat patients aren’t always welcomed by doctors. Not news, though I suppose it’s good to have quantitative research supporting it. Really, though, this is just the tip of the iceberg. Here’s some more. For patient stories on […]
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Sadly Fitting
Despair Drives Guantánamo Detainees to Revolt Obama Joins 4 Predecessors as Bush Library Opens It’s sadly fitting that these two stories are together on The New York Times homepage.
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Things to Read
A clear explanation of why New York’s fat hatred is much more harmful than the soda ban from Melissa McEwan: People do not die of “obesity.” Some fat people die from complications of what are commonly known as “obesity-related diseases,” like heart disease and diabetes, but those diseases have only been shown to be correlated with fat, not caused by fat. […]
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Exercise Takes Time? Really?
Reading yet another piece on an exercise study, this one with older (60-74 years) sedentary women, I giggled at this observation: “They complained to us that working out six times a week took too much time,” Dr. Hunter says. They did not report feeling fatigued or physically droopy. Their bodies were not producing excessive levels […]
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Five Things Make A Post
1) I am sooo looking forward to tomorrow morning, when Mark Reads will post the second-to-last chapter of Deadline. Mark Reads reviews books a chapter at a time, progressing through books every other weekday, and it’s been building to this OMG HUGE second-to-last chapter for weeks. (Need I say “spoilers”?) Some of the books he’s […]
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QotD: Inauguration
“It is now our generation’s task to carry on what those pioneers began. For our journey is not complete until our wives, our mothers and daughters can earn a living equal to their efforts. Our journey is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law for if […]
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Today in Don’t Read The Comments
Marilyn Wann takes on weight bias in healthcare in “Big deal: You can be fat and fit” on CNN.COM: …People are telling their stories of weight bias in medical care on websites like First, Do No Harm, This Is Thin Privilege and Obesity Surgery Gone Wrong. The National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance has been speaking out […]
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Happy New Year!
Hello and welcome! I’m back at work with my new cartoon-a-day calendar (New Yorker cartoons) and new wall calendar (Pacific Northwest landscapes). I even cut off some of the photos from last year’s wall calendar to decorate my cube. Ready to work! (Yes, I know it’s Wednesday, but today feels like Monday to me. Yay four-day weekends! […]
Living ~400lbs 