Customer Reviews

Fat and Proud: The Politics of Size

5 star:		(3)
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1 star:		(3)

 

 

Cooper's book is a must-have for readers interested in the workings of fat oppression and, more interestingly, struggles to undermine such oppression. Her writing is accessible and her scope is wide. I especially liked her treatment of the state of the fat rights movement today; her decision to focus on a wide range of fun-oriented activist practices works well.

I found this book to be engaging and empowering! I disagree strongly with those reviewers who claim that Cooper is irresponsible by celelbrating an "unhealthy life choice." Fat in of itself is not necessarily unhealthy. A fat person who excercises if far healthier than a thin person who does not. In addition, it has been proven that dieting and other dangerous weight loss methods (such as intestinal and gastric bypass surgeries) are far less healthy than simply trying to maintain one's normal body weight, even if it by definition "overweight."

In response to the earlier reviewer who asked why shame is such a bad thing, I am reminded of researcher Susan Wooley's statement a couple of decades ago that "If shame could cure obesity, there wouldn't be a fat woman in the world." Thank goodness for activists and authors like Charlotte Cooper who are helping liberate body, mind and spirit from unhealthy, shaming fat stigma and prejudice.

"Fat And Proud" truly made me angry. By using the most worst case scenarios which overweight people could face, the author has done nothing but vent anger against sound medical judgement concerning obesity. From reading this book I couldn't help but think of a wounded tiger who'd fallen into an open pit, growling at its family members who'd been more careful. This not a helpful read, but an angry one.

As a somewhat overweight adult (slightly below the US average for my age/height/sex), I can testify that the only thing that keeps me from becoming truly fat is my self-respect--or looked at from the other end, the shame I'd feel being fat. Shame motivates me to keep my eating under at least some degree of control and to get my body moving when it would be very easy to keep still. In the same way, shame keeps me from scratching my private areas in public, stealing candy from children, and frightening the elderly. Size is only one part of a person, and someone who is fat shouldn't be ashamed of themselves, only of that one part of themselves, and they shouldn't be harassed because of that one part because other more important parts might be quite admirable. And shame over that one part shouldn't make anyone want to call it quits on life. But it certainly makes me try to keep that one part of who I am under control, and that control makes my life better in many important ways. Claims that I'd be just as happy and healthy 50 or 100 lbs. heavier read like UFO conspiracy books that debunk modern physics. Someone wanting it to be so and writing a book to say it's so don't make it so.

As one who was once overweight and who knows the humiliation of biased notions of beauty, I was interested by the title of this book. Now while the author makes some adequate observations about society's prejustices against the overweight, this book left me with the feeling the author is simply attempting to make these flawed concepts a scapegoat for poor choices. Any act of discrimination is unforgivable and should not be tolerated, and I am only too familiar with cruelty vented toward the overweight. Yet, an attempt to promote pride for an unhealthy life choice is not only self-serving but also irresponsible.