Fat shaming, explained in one terrible tweet
This week, North America’s leading obesity researchers gathered in New Orleans for Obesity Week, their most important conference of the year.
I was there, and one of the topics that permeated the meeting was how our biases against people with obesity can be a real barrier to their health care.
It’s one reason why I was taken aback by this tweet about the conference, from a doctor who specializes in caring for patients who are overweight:
Obesity Week 2016 Keynote Speakers - genetics and CICO. Our obesity 'experts' lecturing physicians. We're in good hands. #OW2016 http://pic.twitter.com/r4hCuJG8Ni
— Dr. Jason Fung (@drjasonfung) November 2, 2016
Sadaf Farooqi, a neuroscientist at the University of Cambridge, and Kelly Brownell, dean of the public policy school at Duke University, are two of the world’s most prestigious obesity researchers. Their science has furthered our understanding of how our genetics and our environments can encourage this disease.
By showing their pictures and using scare quotes around the word experts, Jason Fung is suggesting that their weight discredits their scholarly contributions to the field. With the sarcastic "we’re in good hands," he’s suggesting we shouldn’t trust people who may struggle with their weight as experts on obesity.
Wait — what? We know obesity is a complex condition, that develops through a combination of factors — from genes to brains, hormones, and the abundant food around us. It is not borne out of moral failure or lack of willpower. Fung’s tweet feels a bit like knocking a prominent oncologist for not curing his own cancer.
I asked Fung for comment, and he began with this, "Would you take financial advice from a homeless man?"
He went on:"I think that these 'experts' have the wrong paradigm of obesity — that is, genetics and calories. I think both are irrelevant to obesity. My problem is not with them personally. My problem is that they are keynote speakers and set the agenda for the entire medical profession. … Lots of people are saying that I'm fat shaming. I'm not. I'm pointing out that our current understanding of obesity is totally wrong. And I see it every day in my practice and it kills me." (Farooqi is a clinician.)
His outrageous tweet triggered a tweet storm from another obesity doctor, Yoni Freedhoff, who used Fung’s comment as an opportunity to note how pervasive weight bias and fat shaming is:
1. Yesterday a semi-prominent, internet-popular, obesity clinician fat shamed two speakers at #OW2016
— Yoni Freedhoff, MD (@YoniFreedhoff) November 3, 2016
2. He posted their pictures for his >14K followers w/the caption, "our 'obesity experts' lecturing physicians. We're in good hands" #OW2016
— Yoni Freedhoff, MD (@YoniFreedhoff) November 3, 2016
3. His scare-quoted inference of course is that because these two experts were fat, their words weren't worth hearing #OW2016
— Yoni Freedhoff, MD (@YoniFreedhoff) November 3, 2016
4. That their weights somehow erased their intellects and their quite frankly staggering contributions to the field of obesity #OW2016
— Yoni Freedhoff, MD (@YoniFreedhoff) November 3, 2016
5. That their fat was the measure of their intellects, their eloquence, & their worths. Sadly, this ugly attitude is all too common #OW2016
— Yoni Freedhoff, MD (@YoniFreedhoff) November 3, 2016
6. Weight-bias as a social justice issue is real having proven medical and psychological consequences #OW2016
— Yoni Freedhoff, MD (@YoniFreedhoff) November 3, 2016
7. Weight hate has been shown to reduce earning potentials, affect their hiring and advancement and restricts academic advancement #OW2016
— Yoni Freedhoff, MD (@YoniFreedhoff) November 3, 2016
8. It’s also been shown, when coming from healthcare providers, to reduce the quality of their medical care https://t.co/ejMkt9BnKo #OW2016
— Yoni Freedhoff, MD (@YoniFreedhoff) November 3, 2016
9. The irony here is that while the speakers’ weights don’t allow for judgment as to any aspect of their lives or knowledge #OW2016
— Yoni Freedhoff, MD (@YoniFreedhoff) November 3, 2016
10. this fat-shaming MD’s public attempt to discredit & humiliate them for it, speaks to his expertise and understanding of obesity #OW2016
— Yoni Freedhoff, MD (@YoniFreedhoff) November 3, 2016
11. It also allows judgment of his skills and insight as a clinician, and perhaps, as a human being. #OW2016
— Yoni Freedhoff, MD (@YoniFreedhoff) November 3, 2016
A survey from the American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery showed 60 percent of Americans are currently trying to lose weight, primarily through diet and exercise, and that four in five consider diet and exercise to be the most effective method of weight loss.
And the fat shaming and weight bias that are rife in our culture have serious costs. The patients I met at Obesity Week told me time and time again about the shame and pain of doctors’ appointments because of the way their health-care providers responded to their bodies, turning an appointment for the flu into a weigh-in and obesity intervention. "Going to the doctor’s office always ended in tears," one patient told me. She’d go in feeling ill, get put on a scale, and told to lose weight. This caused her to avoid going into the doctor all together.
And this kind of discrimination didn’t just happen in medical appointments — people with obesity and overweight say it’s everywhere, from the playground to their workplaces to the federal election campaign.
Fung’s comment demonstrates that even obesity doctors themselves haven’t fully absorbed that obesity is not a personal responsibility issue. But neither have politicians, nor the American public. If we’re going to tackle this vexing health problem, we have to start seeing obesity for what it is: a medical condition, caused by a complexity of factors, and not people’s laziness, failure, or sloth.
Source: http://ift.tt/2fh50O4
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