Newsweek has an article out on Thanksgiving’s forgotten and forlorn: vegetarians. Even if you’re not vegetarian, you might identify with the mixture of unease, paranoia and defensive kinds of feelings that comes from having others watch and scrutinize your food choices at the family feast.
Another great read is an open letter opined by a college junior and published in Southern Illinois University’s student newspaper. The letter is written in response to an earlier article penned here by a well-meaning nutritionist representing the school’s wellness center in which she cautions students on how to avoid a dread holiday weight gain of one pound! The absolute horrors! Ironically, Gill also published an article just last month on the dangers of eating disorders and the need for body acceptance. It seems that “every ‘body’ is perfect,” so long as you meet some arbitrary definition of thinness.
The letter-writer, credited only as “Packard,” fires back:
For all the science and research that we have at our fingertips these days, it is an utter tragedy that our society is still mired desperately in this notion that thin means healthy and healthy means thin. You see it ad nauseam, and yet to so many, it’s hardly noticeable.
…While Gill’s column was, I’m sure, written with nothing but the best intentions, the entire thing was based around the concern that most people gain “at least 1 pound each season.” Really? One pound? That’s it? Though I’m no licensed dietitian, as Gill is, I could easily think up a veritable laundry list of health concerns that are as important, if not more important, than gaining a few pounds over Christmas. Several of these health concerns are a direct consequence of a culture which maintains, and reminds us around every corner, that to be thin is the ideal standard in our society, that losing weight is equivalent to gaining health and that eating is bad for you.
The rightfully cheeky anthropology and biology major offers up this advice for readers — and for Gill:
My suggestion to readers is this: enjoy yourself. Eat, drink and be merry. It’s the holidays. Just try to get some salad in the mix, and don’t sit on your butt all day.
My suggestion to Lynn Gill: Your focus should be on health and wellness. This includes far, far more than weight loss and certainly should not invoke a “thin equals healthy” mentality. In the end, this mentality promotes neither health nor wellness and too often detracts from both.
I couldn’t put it better myself.
Newsweek has an article out on Thanksgiving’s forgotten and forlorn: vegetarians. Even if you’re not vegetarian, you might identify with the mixture of unease, paranoia and defensive kinds of feelings that comes from having others watch and scrutinize your food choices at the family feast.
Another great read is an open letter opined by a college junior and published in Southern Illinois University’s student newspaper. The letter is written in response to an earlier article penned here by a well-meaning nutritionist representing the school’s wellness center in which she cautions students on how to avoid a dread holiday weight gain of one pound! The absolute horrors! Ironically, Gill also published an article just last month on the dangers of eating disorders and the need for body acceptance. It seems that “every ‘body’ is perfect,” so long as you meet some arbitrary definition of thinness.
The letter-writer, credited only as “Packard,” fires back:
The rightfully cheeky anthropology and biology major offers up this advice for readers — and for Gill:
I couldn’t put it better myself.