“How is prejudice being less publicly acceptable a “downside”? ”

“And what am I missing here?”

I think the answer to both is that it makes it harder to prove.

If you KNOW you have a cause of action, but as an injured party you have to rise to a certain evidentiary standard in order to convince a judge and jury of the same,
1) it’s probably going to cost you more money;
2) it’s probably going to cause you more stress;
3) as with everything, just because you have justice on your side and you sue, that doesn’t mean you’re going to win. That’s yet more stress — as a a result of the lost time and energy in pursuit of justice that you didn’t get, in addition to the stress from the other party’s/organization’s actions that caused you to sue in the first place.

In addition, you’ve got that constant low-level stress from being under constant scrutiny because you’re never sure that you’re not being accepted/not being denied the money/the job/the whatever not because you really can’t do /perform whatever the other party is asking you to do, but because they just don’t like the way you look — and are in a position to influence your life and withhold whatever it is you need, as a result.

No thanks. If I get to have a preference, I like my prejudice right out front in my face where I can see it.

It’s like the difference between staring down the barrel of a P-9 and knowing that there are landmines somewhere in the field where you’re about to step, and have to step, because there’s no other way to get where you’re going, but you’re not sure where those landmines are.

Anna Kirkland, the awesome professor quoted in the article, just highlighted something via our Fat Studies group that I missed when I skimmed the article. Of the 8 people quoted, 7 are male and one female. Of the 8, only one person – the female – is identified by her body weight (in this case, as not overweight).

I find that a little disturbing that newspapers are still writing and thinking in this kind of gendered manner.

Losing weight isn’t an indicator of self worth problems. As a size activist who it losing weight, I find that assumption offensive.

I mean, anti-gay-discrimination laws didn’t stop my friend’s crazy right-wing brother from telling him he’d never see his niece and nephews again if he brought his boyfriend home.

Even so no larger person is going to expect a job as a super model or other industry where the prime qualification is your appearance.

To have a law for each possibility will leave more laws than we can count.

We’ve taken for granted how much we expect scientific knowledge to be pursued without fear or favour, what’s surprising is when it isn’t, or doesn’t appear to be, there doesn’t seem to be a whole lot we can do about it, which doesn’t seem right as it affects us the most.

Whereas in other areas of life we can go to law and have the case argued, properly.
People can be predjudiced if they want, but they will have to account for it, as opposed to the unlucky recepient. It’s about consequences, how much do you want your hate to cost you?

In this case it’s as if the law has become a better cleaner pair of hands than science/medicine, I find that the most unnerving in a way.