Wow!

I’m not exactly used to feeling “good” (see Depression).

I normally self treat with aromatherapy, but my normal blend hasn’t been doing much for me recently (I’ve been going through a rough patch with the D), so I decided to play around and make myself a new spritz:

Australians are fatter than ever & (oh no!) they think it’s OK!

Just in time for Australia Day, an Australian Bureau of Statistics study has found that Australians are getting fatter and that we are becoming more likely to see that as acceptable. This is, of course, A BAD THING.

Fatty Drive-bys

We’ve all heard of Mommy* Drive-bys**, right? You know, perfect strangers who feel compelled to comment on your parenting skills (or lack of them) or offer unsolicited parenting advice.

There has been an abundance of trollitude flying around the Fatosphere in the wake of the NYT and ABC articles (and no doubt we are seeing only a small fraction of the tromments thanks to well managed moderation at the affected sites). But the predictable sledging and fat-hate bingo got me thinking.

What about Fatty Drive-bys? Whether it comes from Aunty Fran who weighs 50kg soaking wet or from the concerned citizen peering disapprovingly into your trolley at the supermarket, we’ve all had them; unsolicited comments on your body, your diet, your health or your clothing.

So I want to know who has done it to you and how? And what are some great comebacks that you’ve delivered (or wish you had delivered in hindsight).

Recent Aussie stuff that somehow passed me by

I’ve apparently missed a few fat and body image stories in the Australian media recently, like the ones below:

Fat Lot of Good reports on a 100kg (220kg) who was told she was “too fat” to give birth in her local hospital!

As reported today in the Herald-Sun, a pregnant Melbourne woman has been told she is “too fat” to give birth in a suburban hospital. Casey Hospital is located in Berwick, an outer suburb of the capital of the state of Victoria. Casey Hospital’s web page boasts the facility has “state of the art fittings” and “modern equipment”, however apparently they are unable to take on the exceedingly complicated case of a pregnant woman weighing 100kg (22olb).

Incidentally, one of the commenters on that post says that:

Ms Graves has been told she can “pay’ to attend Casey – presumably to cover indemnity insurance. Apparently it’s okay to be fat if you have $10,000 to cover a hospital’s ass.

. If that is true, then the hospitals claim that it is not discrimination but merely “safe medical practice” flies out the window faster than a thing that flies fast.

Rachel at the F-Word posts about two (independent?) magazines that have recently been published in Australia, Real and Indigo, both targeted to the teen.

The increasingly strident anti-obesity rhetoric I see regurgitated in news out of Australia has been disturbing, but it appears not all Aussies have bought into the party line that thin is in. Two newly published magazines aimed at young girls and teens are challenging the ethos of what is beauty – and it’s not a pretty face and a slender waist.

Indigo MagazineSisters Jean and Erin Young founded Real magazine after seeing the high degree of eating disorders amongst their high school classmates, while concerned parent Leanne Koster founded Indigo, a glossy magazine for girls aged 10 to 14, with the catchline “Giving Girls a Voice.”

Me and My Scales – Part 2: The Spark of Fury

Scales are the work of the devil if you ask me. The best thing I ever did was throw the scales out and stop dieting.

Part 1, Part 3 and Part 4

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I stumbled across a copy of Shelley Bovey’s Being Fat Is Not A Sin (now republished as The Forbidden Body) while I was at Uni. I was floored, absolutely floored by the notion that being fat did not automatically mean I deserved to be treated with hatred and scorn. I mean, I knew I hated being treated like scum for my failure to be thin, but I felt like I somehow deserved that scorn. Hell, I heaped enough self-hatred and scorn on myself because I was fat, so why wouldn’t others do the same?