raveller reviewed Fat Talk by Virginia Sole-Smith
Good if you want a lot of studies to deprogram anti-fat bias
4 stars
This book is doing crucial work and does it well combining piles of studies with people's stories and interviews. The core thesis is around Health at Every Size, that we mainly have correlative studies to demonstrate fat=unhealthy, not studies showing being fat causes someone to be unhealthy, and we do have studies showing anti-fat bias to be incredibly damaging to mental and physical health, raising stress levels and easily triggering eating disorders. The most frightening thing is how often eating disorders get missed in fat people, and how anti-fat biased doctors are. There are some great suggestions for talking with kids.
It's a bit of a slog to read the whole thing. The blog/substack "Burnt Toast" by Virginia Sole-Smith has more easily digested articles for the general public. The book is worth checking out especially for the conversation starters or if you feel yourself waffling about your own commitment to …
This book is doing crucial work and does it well combining piles of studies with people's stories and interviews. The core thesis is around Health at Every Size, that we mainly have correlative studies to demonstrate fat=unhealthy, not studies showing being fat causes someone to be unhealthy, and we do have studies showing anti-fat bias to be incredibly damaging to mental and physical health, raising stress levels and easily triggering eating disorders. The most frightening thing is how often eating disorders get missed in fat people, and how anti-fat biased doctors are. There are some great suggestions for talking with kids.
It's a bit of a slog to read the whole thing. The blog/substack "Burnt Toast" by Virginia Sole-Smith has more easily digested articles for the general public. The book is worth checking out especially for the conversation starters or if you feel yourself waffling about your own commitment to health>weight loss.