HealthNotDiets Digest, Issue 33, 2018
August 12 - 16, 2018
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Articles and Blogs
Can Television Destroy Diet Culture?
by Sophie Gilbert
“If Dietland is symbolic of larger body-positivity movements outside the show, Insatiable...is a timely reminder of how popular culture has always treated larger bodies”
https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2018/08/dietland-insatiable-body-positivity-television/567116/
The benefits of banishing bad body talk
by Evelyn Lewin
“Every time you read or see something that makes you feel bad about your body, remove the source and replace it with one that makes you feel good. The more diverse images of bodies we see, the better equipped we are to love and accept our own bodies”
https://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/health-and-wellness/the-benefits-of-banishing-bad-body-talk-20180808-p4zwas.html
What is Diet Culture?
by Christy Harrison
“What exactly is diet culture? It's a term that gets thrown around in anti-diet spaces without a lot of unpacking, but it's incredibly important to understand so that we can recognize how it's showing up in our lives and fight back.”
https://christyharrison.com/blog/what-is-diet-culture
Comedian Hannah Gadsby Is Going To Make You A Better Leader
by Dolly Chugh
“One of the most supportive things we can do for someone is to bear witness to their pain, even when we can not take it away”
A Sociologist Examines The “White Fragility” That Prevents White Americans from Confronting Racism
by Katy Waldman
“White people cling to the notion of racial innocence, a form of weaponized denial that positions black people as the “havers” of race and the guardians of racial knowledge. Whiteness, on the other hand, scans as invisible, default, a form of racelessness”
Sen. Deborah O’Neill: ‘When it comes to body image, there’s something we need to address.’
by Deborah O'Neill
“It is imperative that we have people in power who know and understand these complex issues, and will fight to improve these environments so young people, and, indeed, all Australians can flourish and feel body-positive.”
https://www.mamamia.com.au/senator-deborah-oneill-on-body-image/
I Used to Be a Wellness Influencer. Now I'm an Alternative Medicine Skeptic
by Denby Royal
“My world crumbled like a piece of raw gluten-free paleo cheesecake. It started to sink in: Where there was a morsel of convincing medical info blended with enough compelling nonsense & communicated with enough conviction, I believed it, hook, line, & sinker.”
https://www.self.com/story/i-used-to-be-a-wellness-influencer
As a fat, pregnant woman, I refuse to panic about my baby’s health
by Nanna Árnadóttir
“It’s true that...there was an increased risk...The rate of birth defects in women who weren’t overweight was 3.4%. The rate for overweight pregnant women? It was 3.5%. So, we’re talking about an increased rate of 0.1%. I mean, come on.”
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jul/30/fat-pregnant-woman-i-refuse-panic-baby-health
Marketing ‘childhood obesity’ and ‘health’
by Darren Powell
“Academics & advocates need to continue to search for means to challenge taken-for-granted assumptions that ‘fat is bad’ & ‘healthy marketing is good’ for all children. We need to pay closer attention to how advertising–all advertising–may be ‘dangerous’”
https://ischp.info/2018/07/31/marketing-childhood-obesity-and-health/
My Journey to Becoming a Non-Diet Dietitian
by Alissa Rumsey
“Many of the concepts behind Intuitive Eating and HAES were the opposite of what I was taught in school and what I had spent nine years teaching people. After being a dietitian for almost 10 years, I felt like I was starting all over again.”
https://alissarumsey.com/nutrition/intuitive-eating-dietitian/
Worshiping the False Idols of Wellness
by Jen Gunter
“Wellness used to mean a blend of health and happiness. Something that made you feel good or brought joy and was not medically harmful — perhaps a massage or a walk along the beach. But it has become a false antidote to the fear of modern life and death.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/01/style/wellness-industrial-complex.html
Too many Australians have to choose between heating or eating this winter
by Rebecca Lindberg & Liza Barbour
“Food costs should, ideally, make up less than 20-25% of a household income. Yet low income households must spend between 30-48% of their income to access nutritious food.”
Virgie Tovar’s New Book, "You Have The Right To Remain Fat," Has Arrived To Blow Your Mind
by Joni Edelman
“This is not a book you want; it's a book you need.”
https://ravishly.com/virgie-tovar-s-new-book-you-have-right-remain-fat-has-arrived-blow-your-mind
How Much Should You Exercise To Manage Your Mental Health?
by Kimberly Truong
“While exercise isn't the "full solution" for any mental health problems, it's definitely an important tool for your health — and you don't have to do anything intensive like a bootcamp for it to "work."”
https://www.refinery29.com/exercise-mental-health-amount
A huge clinical trial collapses, and research on alcohol remains befuddling
by Joel Achenbach
“Many studies have shown that people who drink any kind of alcohol in moderation — wine, beer, spirits — have lower rates of heart disease than people who abstain or who drink heavily. But the evidence is stubbornly ambiguous.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/a-huge-clinical-trial-collapses...
Why the “gender data gap” means doctors don’t take women’s pain seriously enough
by Caroline Criado Perez
“Across the field of medicine, from heart disease to brain cancer, women are more likely to receive delayed & missed diagnoses than men.... “what we have is a health-care system that gaslights women – that doesn’t believe women & their reports of pain””
https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/health/2018/08/why-gender-data-gap...
Research &
Clinical Practice
Speaking of That: Terms to Avoid or Reconsider in the Eating Disorders Field
"Inspired by an article on 50 terms that, in the interest of clarity in scientific reasoning and communication in psychology, psychiatry, and allied fields, “should be avoided or at most be used sparingly and only with explicit caveats,” we propose a list of terms to avoid or think twice about before using when writing for the International Journal of Eating Disorders."
Weissman, Ruth S., et al. "Speaking of that: Terms to avoid or reconsider in the eating disorders field." International Journal of Eating Disorders 49.4 (2016): 349-353.
Full text link: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/eat.22528
Development of life-expectancy tables for people with type 2 diabetes
by Jose Leal, Alasteir Gray,
Philip Clarke
"Although the reduction of obesity is a major therapeutic aim in type 2 diabetes, other modifiable risk factors such as HBA1c, SBP, and cholesterol have a more significant impact on diabetes-related complications than BMI"
Leal, Jose, Alastair M. Gray, and Philip M. Clarke. "Development of life-expectancy tables for people with type 2 diabetes." European heart journal 30.7 (2008): 834-839.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2663724/
How and why weight stigma drives the obesity ‘epidemic’ and harms health
“There is a clear need to combat weight stigma, which is widespread worldwide...and throughout healthcare settings...to improve the health and quality of life of millions of people...[and] improve the health of all individuals, regardless of their size”
Tomiyama et al, How and why weight stigma drives the obesity ‘epidemic’ and harms health, BMC Medicine 2018 16:123 https://doi.org/10.1186/s12916-018-1116-5
https://bmcmedicine.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12916-018-1116-5
Soapbox & Shareables
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Want some training in the non-diet approach or unpacking weight science? Resources include books, courses, workshops and handouts: visit www.healthnotdiets.com
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