Roundness Roundup: Links!
You can click the “Links” category for our previous links roundups, which so far have a different name each time. Maybe one of these days I’ll do a poll! Okay, let’s not go crazy. But anyway, here are some links!
1. Celebrity gossip and internet drama, two of my favorite things! But seriously, an interesting discussion going on about Sandra Bullock and Jesse James at Jezebel and at Shapely Prose. The comments (at SP, anyway) make for some fascinating reading and contain plenty of thoughtful debate. (Also, Jesse James is gross. But you knew that.)
Look, I truly don’t have an opinion on what’s in Sandra Bullock’s heart. But I have an opinion on that photo: Appalling and inexcusable. And an opinion on Jesse James: Racist fuckwit. And an opinion on attempts to somehow justify that photo and steer the conversation away from words like “racism” and “anti-Semitism” and “white supremacy” at all costs: Bullshit. And all of that brought me to the opinion that if Bullock wants to keep the stink off her, she’d best issue a statement denouncing her husband’s racist behavior in no uncertain terms. As fast as possible. Which means, basically, yesterday.
2. If you follow the @bigfatdeal Twitter feed and you aren’t a spammer, I’ll follow you back! Which means you can message me if you have a link or a suggestion for a post. The next two links come via Twitter.
First, @pastaqueen sends a link to the Mad Men Barbie dolls, in which the “Betty Draper” doll and the “Joan Holloway” doll have the same Barbie bodies. From the comments:
How do the Betty and Joan dolls have the exact same body? FAIL, Mattel, this was your chance to make a Barbie who could walk upright (were she human).
Yeah, those identical proportions on the Betty and Joan dolls are disappointing, and actually disgraceful in light of what the show is meant to celebrate.
I still want a Joan doll, though. I can’t help it.
3. Next, @erinty has a question that I thought I’d throw out there for the BFD readership to try and answer:
Hi – do you know an active HAES message board or community? I haven’t found one that’s really active myself. can’t find 1. having hard time with the act of losing weight while on HAES, very conflicting!
So if you know of an active HAES forum or you have any thoughts on Erin’s dilemma, please give a shout in the comments.
4. From Nonk: Jennifer Hudson is shilling for Weight Watchers. But it might not be as bad as it could be? Yet, ugh.
What’s different about Hudson’s new commercials is that she’s removed the fat-shaming element. In her other Weight Watcher’s ad below, we see a silhouette of her slimmer thighs, but for the most part her body is obscured as she emphasizes that losing makes her feel — not look — better, and, “It makes me love myself that much more.”
5. And finally, Bay Area BFDivas who are interested in a trip to Igigi on Monday afternoon to try on some clothes, a group of us are going, including Weetabix, who will be in town. Shoot me an e-mail if you’re interested! We need to coordinate with Igigi within the next couple of days, so don’t delay.
Happy Thursday!
Posted by mo pie
Filed under: Celebrities, Christina Hendricks, Fashion, Health, Jennifer Hudson, Links, Mad Men, Meta, Race & Ethnicity, TV
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@erinty I’m No expert (not by a long shot) but my from my understanding of HAES, it’s not really about weight loss. The philosophy is; movement (or exersize) and eating healthier (a more balanced diet w/out negative bias for any foods) with the emphasis on improving HEALTH not losing weight. It incoorporates a few concepts that can be very subtle and sometimes not at all easy to understand such as Intuitive Eating. Not so much something you can just DO, but more of a habit or instinct you should try to develop over time. A lot of people feel (meself included) that if you pay close attention to how you feel after eating certain foods or a certain way you can refine or customize a diet for YOU that might not result in weight lose but could make you FEEL a lot better (more energy, better digestion, yes even happier). Side effect? Maybe food becomes less of a dilema fraught with peril and more of a process by which you fuel your body AND you get to enjoy it. Maybe you learn how to eat what you need most of the time and eat what you want some of the time while engaging in regular movement to keep your body healthy. And MAYBE you lose some weight. Maybe you don’t. HEALTH At Every Size. HAES is about improving health without feeling guilty if that improvement does NOT cause any lose of weight.
Honestly? I’m glad for a reduced element of fat-shaming, whatever the source, but I find the WW campaign to be an insidious way of slipping diet culture somewhat under the radar. It is also more evidence of their attempting to co-opt the HAES message, which irks, because that is CLEARLY not their business. Their name is WEIGHT Watchers, you know?
It’s a form of disingenuous doublespeak on their part to pretend that they are the “anti-diet diet.” It’s intentional irony on the level of the Bush administration, and the fact that it’s going to further drive diet culture into a hard-to-retrieve-and-fully-analyze place just pisses me off.
If they want to do HAES? Then do fucking HAES. Don’t wrap up the same old weight loss schtick in a HAES wrapper. That’s dishonest and, frankly, sleazy on a fundamental level.
Michelle, I think you hit this nail right on the head for me. I mean, your name is “Weight Watchers.” No matter what your commercials do or don’t say, you’re selling weight loss, and it’s disingenuous at best to pretend otherwise.
I agree with Michelle. Why would I love myself more just because my thighs got (temporarily, no doubt) smaller?
For some reason I like this title best so far. :D
I’m not entirely sure what @erinty means, exactly – how to deal with the conflicting emotions that occur when you’re following HAES and find that it has caused you to lose weight, perhaps? Is that it?
I wonder whether my local Weight Watchers chapter is highly unusual. I read about fat shaming, embracing hunger, “bad” foods, etc., in connection with Weight Watchers, but I have never experienced this at my local chapter. I joined on the recommendation of someone I respected, because she said that it had given her the tools to forge a healthier relationship with her own body, and that has also been my experience. Weight Watchers has helped me get over a lifetime of harmful messages about food, eating, exercise, and, yes, weight. I used to experience my own body as something to endure and shove around, my hunger as an instant trigger for shame–you know, the usual. My Weight Watchers chapter taught me to:
*Look forward to the enjoyment of spending my daily budget of “points” instead of dreading the mounting total of calories.
*Take care of myself. Eat a nutritious diet because I deserve a strong immune system, good digestion, and the other benefits. Try exercises until I found something I could do because I deserve the refreshment that comes with increased activity. Stay hydrated because it feels good. Refuse to “clean up” the family leftovers because I am not the trash compactor, dammit, and throwing away half a serving of leftover casserole that nobody actually wants is not waste.
*Enjoy eating without the uneasy thrill of the forbidden or the lurking anticipation of shame to follow. Wipe the idea of “bad foods” right out of my mind. If I want one of my old guilty pleasures and I have the “points” in my budget, I eat it. And it’s nobody else’s business what I have in my grocery cart.
*Eat for satisfaction; avoid getting ravenous as well as feeling uncomfortably stuffed.
*Exorcise the idea that I should be skinny (but with big tits and fresh young skin). The women in the success stories in their magazine are, by and large, solidly built, with average figures, not model-thin. They look like people I know. In fact, most of them are overweight according to the current obesity epidemic nonsense.
*Quit feeling embarrassed for being fat in public. I know I’m taking care of myself and nobody has the right to judge me. When I’m at my goal weight, I will still be fat. And it’s nobody else’s business if I am.
*Quit focusing on the scale as the marker of success. I’ve been applauded for running up a flight of stairs for the first time in my life–without thinking about it, just because I was in a hurry. Choosing the long-term benefits of chicken soup and a nice cold orange when I was ill instead of reaching for the quick high of ice cream and soda pop, which wouldn’t have helped me for more than a few minutes. That kind of thing.
Do I just belong to a chapter with a very different local flavor?