Marilyn Wann Working On A Yay! Scale, photo by Stephen Morrison

by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

Listen to the podcast of our interview here:

I’ll never forget meeting Marilyn Wann at the NAAFA Convention last year.  Actually, I’ve completely forgotten what we talked about, but I remember what it felt like to talk to her.  It was kind of like meeting an indie rockstar of which you’re a part of her small but devoted following, and that rockstar turns out to be just as cool and awesome as you had always imagined.  Indeed, I had more than one conversation that weekend with people who had just met Marilyn and were blown away by her combination of humor, friendliness and genius.

Okay, yes, I’m a Marilyn Wann megafan.  I bought the album, the poster, the tee-shirt, and the deluxe, Japanese import double CD of never-released, spoken-word, B-sides.  (Speaking of which, if you don’t have her book, Fat!So?, you have my leave to purchase same immediately, and preferably, per Marilyn, keep it in your bathroom for intermittent reading.)

But Marilyn wasn’t always the outspoken advocate and fat pride warrior that we know and love today.  When I interviewed her this week (you can listen to the full interview here), she told me about her journey into activism:  “In my mid-twenties, I had come across the book Shadow On A Tight Rope which is an anthology of writings by radical, feminist fat activists from the . . . 60′s and 70′s, and I think that book . . . is still really powerful.  I had gotten the concept of size acceptance, but I hadn’t really started living it yet.”  But then she had what she calls her “Really Bad Day,” where a guy she liked told her he was embarrassed to introduce her to his friends because she was fat, and then she got home and got a letter saying she was being denied health insurance because she was morbidly obese.  “I’m really glad I had that really bad day, because it meant that there was no turning back for me.  I was not going to waiver.”

Since that day, Marilyn has been a consistently strong voice in the movement against fat oppression.  At the same time, her activism always seems to have a sense of humor and fun.  She told me, “We have to use humor and we have to use performance.  . . I’m really inspired by other movements where people have resisted oppression.  All of these movements have got the feeling of being more fabulous than the oppressive way of thinking.”   To Wann, this level of fabulousness helps people out of the quandary of both internalized and external fat oppression and shifts the power dynamic.  “If you hold a pom pom, and you get a whole bunch of your friends of all sizes who are rad about weight issues to hold a pom pom with you, and you all shout, ‘Give me an F!,’ people will give you an F.  That’s a kind of a power.”

I was curious to find out Marilyn’s take on depictions of fat people in new shows like Huge.  Though she admits to not having watched them, she’s not all that pleased.  “My fat gut impression is that I don’t trust them.  I don’t think they’re radical or rebellious.  At the very best, they have the intention of making fat people feel better about the awful, fat-hating world we live in, but I don’t think they’re taking on the system of fat hatred.”  She was particularly annoyed with the way the television show Hung missed the point when copying a protest that she had organized against 24 Hour Fitness in San Francisco, “the inaccuracies of the TV representation are pretty maddening to me,” she said.

The original protest actually led San Francisco government officials to investigate the issue of weight discrimination and pass legislation preventing discrimination on the basis of height and weight in San Francisco.  To date, only a few cities and the state of Michigan have passed a similar law.  So I asked Wann if she had any recommendations for people who wanted to change their local laws.  “Try to connect with [or create] your own local body liberation or fat pride community.  . . . Build some community.  Do fun things.  Connect with other communities and try to get them to be conscious of fat oppression.”  She believes that this process of community and connecting around these issues is key.

Marilyn also noted how powerful it is to “come out” to others as a fat person who doesn’t diet and believes in body liberation.  “What we anticipate people’s reactions to be is really negative [and] isolating, [but] the near total majority of the reaction is that people say, ‘Wow, I can really see your pain, I can really see my own pain.  Wouldn’t it be great if we could get rid of this painful thing?’  Or they say, ‘Yeah, but what about heart disease?’ And then you can say, well, weight isn’t a very good predictor of health and even if it were, what we should all do is eat our veggies, play outdoors, and have friends.”

Right on!

If you want more Marilyn Wann, listen to the recording of our interview here, get Fat!So? here, and check out her mega amazing Yay! Scales here at Voluptuart!

And for this week’s tip, try “coming out” as a self-loving fat person to someone you know!  Share your experience in the comments section below.

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

Want to get your own Free Body Love Breakthrough Session?  Just click here: http://www.bodylovewellness.com/bodylovebreakthrough/.

Golda Poretsky, H.H.C. is a certified holistic health counselor who specializes in transforming your relationship with food and your body. Go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/stay-in-touch/ to sign up for her newsletter and get your free download — Golda’s Top Ten Tips For Divine Dining!

© 2010 Golda Poretsky All rights reserved.

Last week, I told you guys that my book, Stop Dieting Now: 25 Reasons To Stop, 25 Ways To Heal is now available at online retailers in the U.S. and Canada (and now in the U.K.)!

I know! Yay!

So here’s where I need a bit of your help.  As you know, the popularity on the Interwebs is all about rankings and page views and links and all that.  And I know that most of you reading this right now are fans of Body Love Wellness, the blog, the podcast, and the work that we’re doing to revolutionize the way that people feel about their bodies.

How You Can Help With Just A Few Clicks:

• Add It To Your List — If you have a list of books in certain categories on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Goodreads or wherever, add it to your lists.
• Share The Link — Share Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Goodreads and other links on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, etc.
• Write Reviews On Book Seller Web Sites — Even if you haven’t read the book yet, if you read the blog you have a good sense of my writing style, so feel free to comment and give lots of stars!
• Tag It — Agree with tags or add your own on bookseller web sites.
• Buy The Book — If you feel so inclined. :)
• Have Me Speak – If you have a book club or other group that you’d like me to talk to or do a reading for, shoot me an email!  Blog interviews are great too.

Where to find it:

• Goodreads
• Amazon US
• Amazon Canada
• Amazon UK
• Barnes & Noble
• More Of Me To Love
• AbeBooks
• IndieBound

Thanks, dudes!

And stay tuned for info on my upcoming book signing at Re/Dress NYC!

Happy Bastille Day!

by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

Recently, this blog has gotten a lot of new readers who may be new to Fat Acceptance & Health At Every Size.

As a consequence, I’ve been fielding lots of comments of the “how can you be promoting fat?!” and “haven’t you heard of type II diabetes?!” variety.  So, rather than trying to respond to these commenters individually (and as a way to provide support to people who want to respond to these comments in their own lives and blogs), I’ve decided to write this post.  I’ve outlined 9 typical statements by commenters, together with an explanation of why each statement is wrong, wrong, wrong.

1) Fat is unhealthy. Fat is not inherently unhealthy.  In fact, being underweight, in many ways, is more dangerous than being overweight, obese, or morbidly obese.  Furthermore, a great deal of evidence suggests that health problems linked to fat are actually a result of dieting, and the incredible strain that dieting puts on the body.  A recent study found that people who lost 15% or more of their body weight had an increased risk of death compared to people of the same size who didn’t lose weight. In addition, fat people live longer than thin people and are more likely to survive cardiac events and not suffer as much blood loss due to treatments such as angioplasty.  Fat has even been shown to protect against a variety of problems, including “infections, cancer, lung disease, heart disease, osteoporosis, anemia, high blood pressure, rheumatoid arthritis and type 2 diabetes.” Fat people also have lower rates of emphysema, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, hip fracture, tuberculosis, anemia, peptic ulcer and chronic bronchitis.

If you’re wondering why you’ve never heard any of this before, that’s because this information doesn’t make anyone money.  It doesn’t support the $60 billion a year diet industry nor the multi-billion dollar weight loss surgery industry nor the multi-bajillion dollar pharmaceutical industry.

2) Fat people all have eating disorders, eat poorly, and don’t exercise. No study has ever supported this conclusion.  And let’s just get clear on something.  You cannot tell anything about a person’s eating habits or fitness level or relative health from their size.  I have clients who are 300-pound clients who eat all organic, whole foods and train for triathalons, and I have 120-pound clients who are generally sedentary and have binge eating disorder.  People of all different sizes have all different habits, and a quick survey of your friends and relatives will show just that.

3) If fat people would eat properly and exercise, they wouldn’t be fat. Contrary to popular opinion, people come in all shapes and sizes.  Just like people are short and tall and in between, people are fat and thin and in between. It’s called diversity.  It’s called genetics. It’s called, in some instances, the result of constant dieting.

4) Weight loss is a healthy goal, deserving of promotion. Not true at all.  First of all, diets don’t work.  They really don’t.  The one or two people that you know that lost weight on a diet and kept it off for more than 5 years are statistical freaks.  Dieting wreaks havoc on the body, affecting everything from your immune system, to your cardiovascular system, to your stamina and mental health, to your body image.  Oh, and don’t get me started on the incredible dangerousness of weight loss surgeries.  If anyone tells you that their plan promises long term weight loss, they are lying to you.  If they promise weight loss and fail to mention whether it will be long term or not, they are deceiving you.

5) Promoting fat acceptance makes people fat. I haven’t seen a study that shows that approving and loving your body causes one to gain weight.  In fact, Health At Every Size practices, which include body acceptance, actually make people healthier.  When you can show me that shaming people about their bodies improves health, then we can talk.  And by the way, the way we shame fat people has led to an exponential rise in discrimination against people in the workplace, healthcare and education.

6) There’s an obesity crisis going on and obesity is on the rise. Actually, it’s not.  Also, see item 1, above.

7) Childhood obesity is a serious problem. Actually, it’s not. Childhood life expectancy continues to rise.  And every attempt to make kids thinner have failed.  And, you might want to follow the money behind Michelle Obama’s obesity initiative to see how corporations are benefiting from the b.s.  The real danger for fat children is the threat of bullying, and the toll that that takes.  Finally, access to healthy, organic food and safe places to play are important for all children, not just fat ones.

8) BMI is an appropriate and scientific way of determining health. If you consider the way BMI works for more than a minute, you realize that it so flawed as to be completely useless.

9) But all of this goes against the conventional wisdom that fat is bad and deadly! Your “conventional wisdom” has been paid for by the diet industry and pharmaceutical companies for decades and decades.  It’s time to get over it and start thinking critically.  I encourage you to read this blog and other fantastic fat acceptance blogs and begin the process of unraveling your internalized and externalized hatred.

Additional Recommended Reading:

• The Diet Myth: Why America’s Obsession With Weight Is Hazardous To Your Health, by Paul Campos
• Losing It: False Hopes & Fat Profits In The Diet Industry, by Laura Fraser
• Fat!So?: Because You Don’t Have To Apologize For Your Size, by Marilyn Wann
• Lessons From The Fat-O-Sphere:  Quit Dieting And Declare A Truce With Your Body, by Kate Harding & Marianne Kirby
• Health At Every Size: The Surprising Truth About Your Weight, by Linda Bacon, PhD
• Stop Dieting Now: 25 Reasons To Stop, 25 Ways To Heal, by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
  

P.S.  This post was inspired by Kate Harding‘s excellent post “But Don’t You Realize Fat Is Unhealthy?”

Want more size positive info?  Stay up to date with the Body Love Wellness blog by joining our newsletter.

© 2010 Golda Poretsky.  All rights reserved.

Every time I see the a reference to the weight loss drug Alli, I always pronounce it (usually in my head) as if it were a Spanish word, basically, like “ai!”

Apparently, Alli is supposed to be pronounced like “ally,” as if this drug, sometimes known as orlistat, sometimes known as xenical, is your friend, your trusted helper in the fight against fat.

But Alli is definitely not your friend, unless you like your friends to cause you severe liver injury and oily stools.

The Alli web site notes that Alli is the only FDA approved weight loss drug currently on the market.  Uh, yeah, that’s because every other weight loss drug ever produced was found to create serious health problems, from heart arrhythmia to um, you know, death.  Once the law suits start piling up, I have no doubt that Alli will be next on this illustrious list.

Until then, I’m going to keep my allies close and my alli really, really far away.

Full Figured Fashion Week Presents The State of the Curvy Community Panel Discussion

Listening to the news, articles circulating through the internet, the media would have you believe that the plus size woman is a burden to society, with no fashionable options, a second-class citizen, and one who should be ashamed to exist.  If you were to buy into the news, all the progress we have made in the last ten years in fashion, community pride, and confidence would all be in vain.  As society would try to regain control of the plus sized confidence and community built, shaming us out of existence or into a “healthy” lifestyle, what does a full figured curvy, confident, and chic woman do?

We talk about it.

This year, in conjunction with the Second Annual Full Figured Fashion Week™, The Curvy Collective hosts a panel discussion, “The State of the Curvy Community.”  Perfectly timed, in the midst of current news in the media, this panel discussion addresses the current state of the plus-size community and the significance of Full Figured Fashion Week, through the eyes of the industry’s leaders, bringing different perspectives from various experiences and points of view.

Hosted by the Curvy Collective, Sharon Quinn, “The Original Runway Diva,” will moderate the panel discussion .  Joining her and sharing a valuable perspective are:

Yulia Raquel- Founder/Designer for Igigi

Marianne Kirby- Blogger from The Rotund and co-author of Notes from the Fatosphere

Erica Watson- Plus Size comedienne

Golda Poretsky- Founder of Body Love Wellness

Mad Fashionista- Plus size fashion blogger and personality from Diary of a Mad Fashionista

Sponsored by the Fuller Woman Expo and Life Size Radio, the “State of the Curvy Community” panel discussion will take place:

• Date: Thursday, June 18^th
• Location: Hotel Pennsylvania, 401 7th Avenue, NYC
• Time: 4-6pm

This panel discussion is your chance to engage the community and some of its pioneers who consistently challenge the status quo.  You can get your tickets to this panel discussion for only $11!  Seats are on a first come, first serve basis and you can reserve your spot here!

Will we see you there?