Take some time and cruise through their blogs here on WordPress.

Take some time and cruise through their blogs here on WordPress.

I do think that it is possible to stigmatize a behaviour or a condition without targeting individuals. Smoking bans seem to be an interesting case, although the critical difference is that it was once acceptable to be a smoker.

I don’t think the teen pregnancy example could be a good example for other reasons. The United States has double the teen pregnancy rate of all other developing nations combined! This is largely attributed to the focus on abstinence focused sex education when compared with other developed countries that provide sex education on a wide range of birth control and also make birth control available to teenagers without parental consent.

There is significant evidence that were the United States to adopt a more progressive sex education program the rates of teen pregnancy would significantly degrease. In which case it is likely that if we had food education and nutrition education similar to Europe we may also see declining obesity rates.

It is well documented that people above 6 foot tall receive preference in hiring and other areas. Obviously, there is very little you can do to change your height- aside from ridiculous looking platform shoes. As someone who is 5′9″ I simply accept that and move on. The societal cost of changing that would simply be too great.

“A fat person can in most cases change their body size. The question becomes should they have to?”

That would get you in trouble with the fatophiles. Many profess that there is nothing a person can do about their weight. If you read the comments on fatophiles blogs you will often hear about how their weight is almost entirely determined by their genetics.

“Fearing fat people as individuals is not helpful, but fearing fat as a society and it’s impacts on our social infrastructure could be socially beneficial.”

Is one possible without incurring the other? For example, we try to discourage teenage pregnancy , but this often leads to people looking down their noses at highschoolers who get pregnant. Then again, maybe we should ask if it is a bad thing that people who engage in these kinds of activities should some sort of stigma attached. Of course for some who don’t deserve it (the few who are fat due to an illness, meds, etc) this will be unfair, but for the overwhelming majority one would think it might provide an impetus for change. I am not suggesting this, I am merely stating that this is a good question to ask.

“We can embrace different body types, sizes and shapes, value a diversity of colours, races, genders, heights and yes… weights without promoting obesity as a valid lifestyle choice or minimizing the risks therein.”

I think there is a middle ground as well that focuses on fitness instead of weight. Unfortunately it is hard to get the fat acceptance folks to even agree to the fact that it is harmful to the individual to be obese (or even more than obese). there are many in the fat acceptance movement who insist that all the medical journals and doctors who talk about the unhealthiness of being grossly overweight are in the pocket of the weight loss industry. It is truly sad. People can and will rationalize almost anything to feel better and avoid real and uncomfortable change in their lives.