I was going to post this in the main media forum, but then decided that it was probably best to post it here in the War Zone, as I expect that there are going to be some interesting and explosive replies! BTW, if you go to the actual site, you can also post your comments there.





You're vain and stupid

Women who fixate on their weight should relinquish their right to be taken seriously

Zoe Williams
Wednesday, 17 January, 2007
The Guardian
London, UK


It is a paradox remarkably often noted: why would otherwise intelligent women, educated to a high standard, interested in global politics, etc, etc, worry about something so meaningless as their weight? This curiosity is currently being interrogated by India Knight who, with her friend Neris Thomas, has written a diet book. It must be an intelligent book, since they are both manifestly intelligent, as attested by their high professional status (Knight is a writer and Thomas a film producer). And yet it is also, undeniably, about dieting. Riddle-me-ree.

Behaviours that are very different tend to cluster together where food is concerned: so, being fat, dieting successfully, attaining a more normal shape, this is a funny old thing for an intelligent woman to be concerned with. At the same time, being a normal shape already, fixating over the deficiencies of said shape, developing an abnormal relationship with and neurotic strategies around food, this is apparently the same "paradox". "We're intelligent," runs the mantra, "how extraordinary that in this area we should be so irrational."
It is not unthinkable that a neurosis will take hold of an intelligent individual. Fear of flying is no respecter of IQ - nor is a terror of walking under ladders, nor a horror of shagging someone who later turns out to be a Sagittarius. The point at which these things cease to be quirks and begin to interfere with your mental faculties, or the world's perception thereof, is not so much when you lose control of them as when you stop trying to control them. You would, conversely, think that a person who went on about star signs was quite stupid.

Few people are rational all the time. Irrationality remains concomitant with intelligence only for as long as it is self-aware, limited and doesn't make too much of a song and dance about itself. To return to the original paradox, then - no, it is not a paradox. Women who fixate on their weight, unless we're dealing with eating disorders, are not intelligent. Intelligence is not bestowed at birth, assessed through childhood and fixed until death. It is an aggregate of what you've got and what you do with it.

If you chuck it all away counting calories and wondering what size a Gap 2 really is in English, then that does not sit oddly atop your intelligence, like a monkey on a camel. The act of concentrating on trivia locks your mind like a bandsaw in one direction. It precludes the kind of inquiry that might make you extend yourself. It simply makes you less intelligent. Maybe this sounds needlessly aggressive, but it's very annoying - this is not a strange and unbidden concern, foisted upon us by society, as the size-zero debate tries to fashion it. It's just individual vanity. "Society" isn't leading this - society can't even keep up with the scale of it. I'm not preaching the total expulsion of vanity - few people are without it, and when people are it's slightly freakish, like being double-jointed - but the very least you can do in mitigation is acknowledge it for what it is.

The real mystery is how people get away with fixating on themselves like this without relinquishing their right to be taken seriously. First, I think the whole weight-loss industry has flourished in tandem with a wider, so-called ironic embrace of low culture. You can't be called on it, because you'll just turn around and say: "Oh, but I was just being silly! Can't you see?" (To pre-empt the charge that I'm always embracing/banging on about low culture, some of it is worth interrogating! Well, let's leave that for another day.) But, second, and more importantly, I think women get away with it by painting themselves as victims of society's objectification. As a strategy, this is an incredible betrayal of feminism: women still are victims of objectification, there still is a case to answer; but this feverish, industrial narcissism is a different matter altogether.

mszoewilliams~~ntlworld.com



http://lifeandhealth.guardian.co.uk...1992064,00.html

I'm curious as to whether Ms. Zoe has a weight problem. I don't think a person's weight should be a factor in our society, but the FACT remains that it is.

ETA: Just to clarify, I don't think being concerned with your weight is a strategy

I think people (men and women - men just pretend not to care - at least women are more honest) are concerned about being overweight because it is simply unhealthy. Making an effort to be fit and overweight is less unhealthy than slothful overweight, but it's still unhealthy. Note that I'm not talking stick model thin. That's probably just as unhealthy in a different way.

I'm amazed at how many different ways we dream up to feel okay about carrying an unhealthy amount of bodyfat.

The flipside of this is that being honest with yourself about your excess bodyfat seems to almost guarantee a loss of self esteem. Unfortunately just deciding that the problem is somebody else's problem ( eg. 'you're vain and stupid') seems pretty silly. Brave in an 'in your face' kind of way but silly nevertheless.

I have no idea what this writer is trying to say.

It looks to me like it's "Health and fitness is good, unless your weight becomes a fixation that crowds out most other thoughts and activities and turns you into a stifling bore who only cares about the size of her butt."

Your version is much better, potatofree. Much less--what shall I say?--self-absorbed?

Apparently neither does the writer...I think she was dropped on her head as an infant....

I disagree with the writer. I think it is perfectly logical why intelligent women would be preoccupied with weight. Our whole society and culture is built to support this obsession. An abundance of processed junk food, food at every event (special event or not), food is addictive, food is a reward, food equals love and comfort. Food is everywhere. On the other side, the media and marketers push images of thinness being equal to love, happiness, success, beauty, and self-worth. It is no wonder many women struggle with their weight. Who doesn't want to be "loved" and "accepted" and "beautiful"? Mixes messages everywhere. Food is at once something I want so bad but yet I must stay away from.

So to me, it is very logical why intelligent women would have an obsession with food and weight.

When I first started writing for the paper ( a small-town weekly, nothing impressive) I learned that confusing a lot of WORDS for a lot of thoughts and information is a pretty common trap. Some things just never change.

I do agree with the notion that no matter how smart or influential a woman may be, it seems the preoccupation with weight trumps any other accomplishments. Not that I was ever a huge fan, but Star Jones used to be interesting. She spoke of legal matters and being a woman in a man's world, of being a successful woman.... until she started losing weight. It started to be all about THAT, the "wedding of the century" and her boob lift.

To be fair, anybody with a new toy has the potential to get reeeeeaaalllllyyyy annoying.

But Serrelind... but WHY is it built around the obsession? We can't change it until we figure out where it comes from and why women buy into it.

I agree with that. Unfortunately society does not agree with that, as my experience as a severely obese person can testify times nine. Since apparently everybody ELSE in my culture is totally obsessed with the size of my butt, to the degree of social exclusion, serious limits on employment, limits on community (eg booths/chairs that don't fit) etc., it sort of forces me to be concerned with butt-size as a result. If I pretended not to be, I still would be, I'd just be living in that state of not trying to fix it (or think about it) and failing on the latter, and mental health professionals would suggest that this was depressive and dysfunctional. If I am trying to fix it, I'm obsessed. Sounds like a lose-lose equation to me.

Maybe people obsessed with what other people choose to be obsessed with are the ones with the problem. After all, if Jane shouldn't worry about her size, how much stupider is it for Sally to be worried about what Jane is worrying about??

PJ

IMO, there's a line between fixing a health problem which causes difficulty in your daily life and obsessing about whether or not you can get tinier than your co-worker or just a LITTLE smaller so you can see that size 0 on the tag.

PJ, you have my attention as someone who knows what an overwhelming social obstacle the very obese face every waking moment. The courage, energy, and time it takes to address this complicated condition equals the conquest of cancer, IMHO, with no equivalent compassion. I don't think this is what the above writer is talking about.

Hanging out now at a "normal" weight, I still spend countless hours "obsessing" about food, exercise, supplements, etc. The only way I can manage my continuing challenge with weight management is by making it a full-time hobby of sorts. It isn't the only thing I talk about--God knows, nobody wants to hear about it! Except the people here. I'm grateful for that. But it's a real problem, a real issue, and not a stupid preoccupation with appearance.

Why do women fall for it? I think deep inside, women have a need for love and acceptance from other people. We lack true love and connection with other people. We don't have enough love. So we go to other sources. Also part of this dilemma is we live in a rushed lifestyle. We don't have time to sit down and reflect on things. We push aside problems. It's easier to concentrate on weight issue than to deal with inner demons. That is just my opinion.

I have noticed if something is scarce, it is more valued. Because it's harder to be thin and healthy in a society where food is plentiful, being thin is more valued. In some Asian cultures, whiter skin is more valued because it's harder to achieve white skin when you're toiling under the sun all the time. So white skin = success and money. Even in this county, my mom keeps scolding me for having a tan. To her, it's incomprehensible why you would want darker skin or why a tan would been seen as nice.

I understand the scarcity/value concept, and I do agree with that, to a point.

It's harder for a woman to achieve a position of power in our culture as well, though, so why is it that weight seems more valued?

IMO, weight (and looks in general) is a great weapon to put a woman in her place. Listen to what is said about a woman when every other attempt at tearing her down has failed... it usually comes down to playground taunts about "Fat and ugly".