What does Time change?

Overcoming Obesity in America (Time Magazine Cover page)

I was linked by Boing Boing to an interesting piece this morning listing the Top 10 Most Absurd Time Covers done by ReasonOnline.  I wanted to share because the commentary for the cover pictured to your right is rather refreshing.

Here’s a bit of an intro snippet to the concept behind making the list:

“[S]ince the British sociologist Stanley Cohen defined the moral panic phenomenon in the early 1970s as hysterical overreactions to imagined threats to social order, no publication has done a better (by which we mean worse) job of scaring the crap out of post-baby boomer America than Time, the top-selling newsweekly that’s dropping subscribers like the mythical meth mouth drops teeth.

On the Obesity panic cover Time offers up Radley Balko offers a few bits of “Settle Down” logic and science to combat those scare tactic statistics the media loves to throw around; including the 400,000 Deaths By Fat per year and Fatties Costing More for Health care bits that appear all the time when folks are trying to convince their readers of just how AWFUL fat is for each person AND THE WORLD!

I think that this one line in the critique “Moreover, while Americans have been getting fatter for 25 years” needs to take the same care in wording used for the rest of the scare tactics Time presents that teh author works on deconstructing.  After all, the media just seems to love to throw in this “Common sense” phrase without acknowledging that it too is often just used to increase the sense of panic about Expanding Waistlines OMG without putting a bit of context in there.

“Over the time period that you’ve heard that the obesity rates have quote “doubled” or gone up by 70 percent, the average weight gain is 7 to 10 pounds” “Going back forty years, by the way, we’ve also gained an inch in height”

But that is just a tiny quibble. I feel that overall it was a nice little piece to see this morning.

Science: kinda refreshing once in a while y’all. You might enjoy some of the other covers shown too.  Some interesting things to reflect upon on what is, here in Massachusetts, the third or fourth very gray and misty spring day in a row!

It’s all about the frame of mind

Commercials this month ramming diets/pills/CHANGE down our resolution-y geared minds are trying to capitalize on negative self-image  tendencies with a high-pitched fervor; reminding me why I don’t watch so much TV unless it is taped and therefore I am able to fast forward past commercials desperate to remind me how much I am not a perfect model of perfect-mac-perfectson.

So, in an effort to maintain the happy mental high of the holiday season I guess you could say I HAVE made a resolution; but it is a simple one and more a reminder of what I already knew and practiced: Don’t watch TV commercials.  Simple.  Easy.  Saves so many Sanity Watcher points so that I can instead read scathing articles and blogs about the disgrace of fat around the world instead of ads purporting to be my friend by finding flaw with all of my attributes.  Hmmm….maybe I’ll avoid those articles too and save ALL of my sanity, instead of whittling it away point by point.

Who needs to read that they are never going to be good enough/thin enough/well enough? And has anyone else noticed that more and more often any weight-loss scheme/diet/”lifestyle change” is not proposing a specific “healthy” weight to attain, merely that no matter WHO you are or what weight your body might rest at; losing 10% of your weight is going to be beneficial?

Any ad or negative anti-fat or anti-self acceptance article/blog seems to flourish best when spouting just how inadequate we are at managing our own lives and bodies.  What about appreciating how good/well we already ARE?  How about switching that focus from “NOT enough” to “Look at just HOW much!”  Perhaps this is just an innocent idea stemming from someone who has spent life always having to find that silver lining in the financially strained lull between pay-checks; always having to smile at what WAS going right in between all that was going wrong; but I don’t think that starting the new year by focusing on what is WRONG with your life or your body is a good mentality with which to ring in the year.

Don’t start this year with a negative frame of mind, thinking that focusing on what is BAD will somehow encourage any of the positive changes you seek.  That is only setting yourself up for further disappointment down the road; especially if any resolution you HAVE made falls through.

I’ve always been a “Glass half-full” woman myself and that is likely where this advice comes from but I say that as this year gets back into its usual swing, take a moment to reflect on what is going WELL in life and work on finding ways to CONTINUE those trends.  Perhaps it would even lead to the same sorts of behaviors or activities that focusing on the bad would lead you to adopt/continue; but the difference will be in how mentally happy you are while approaching them.

Being happy and kind to the parts of your life and body that you love already is an fantastic step towards getting closer to self-acceptance at any size or shape.  Just my few pennies of “wisdom” on this first day back to the full swing of the daily grind.

Feeling your age, looking your weight

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about age-ism and size-ism and physical appearances and all of their intersections; and just the entire concepts of age and fat and “being pretty” in general.  Some of it has been triggered by great posts around the sphere, others just from reading articles, seeing ads and, most recently, from an experience I had at a shoe store.  Let me share the experience first and let you know where my thoughts on these topics have traveled and just a warning that you should bring some snacks for this road trip; it is long, winding and stops at some fairly odd attractions along the way.  It is kinda like a family road trip…but without the leg cramps and your brother won’t be able to wipe snot on you across the seat divider.

This past weekend I was browsing the clearance racks at the local DSW shoe store.  I have a couple of coupons and was hoping to get something for next to nothing if possible.  Since shoes tend to vary in fit I have found that my size will range from anything to a 9 to an 11; so at that moment I was poking around in the 11s. Bear in mind I’m paraphrasing but this is the pretty close to accurate conversation I had.

A woman approached the aisle and said in a sorta shocked but happy voice, “Oh I can’t believe they have 11s here!”

I looked up and grinned and said, “I know, isn’t it great?  I love this place.”

She went on to look at some shoes and kept chatting “Yeah, my 13-year old daughter just got measured as 10 and a half !”

Trying to be polite and come up with some platitude or sympathetic something to say I just said, “Don’t worry, she’ll grow into them, getting taller and such”

Then the woman kinda cocked her head at me and asked, “Why, how tall are you??”

I thought for a minute and said, “5 foot 6.”

She shook her head, “No, you’re taller than that”

I looked at the shoes I had on and conceded, “Okay, maybe a bit but only because of the shoes.  Why?”

Then she just asked, “How OLD are you?”

I kinda baffled as to why this was relevant and also because I always have to do a mental calculation in order to get my age (Okay so born in 1980 in November, so the age’s last number will always match the year’s last digit unless it is before my birthday).  I just had my birthday so I answered, “I’m 28.  Why??”

“NO you’re not.  Get out of here!”

“No, really truly”

“I thought you were like 17 or 18.” and then, in a slightly embarrassed tone and laughing voice, “I was gonna ask if you drove yourself here!”

“Well, thanks for the compliment.”

We laughed and went about our shopping business.  But I couldn’t help thinking about how odd it was. First, why did I feel the need to remark that calling me a teenager, 10 years my junior, was a compliment? Is it really a great thing to be seen as a younger version of what you are?  And how did this sudden shift in my ages from perceived to real affect the other woman? Did this woman’s perception of me change all that much when she went from believing I was closer to her daughter’s age to knowing that I was 10 years older??  Did I somehow become wiser in her judgment? Less immature or naive perhaps?  What sort of preconceived notions had to suddenly shift when I underwent this sudden age jump?

Then I started wondering about age and ageism in this culture.  The prevailing message sent to women in this day or modern advancements across the board, is that you’re still only as young as you look.  Makeup marketers thrill to tell us that only by using their products can we remove “unsightly” lines and wrinkles and any slight demarcation of the passage of time that might appear on our faces, our tummies, our thighs. Every moment of our lives we’re supposed to be these amazing working moms with high-paced careers, well-behaved children and flawless complexions.  Acne is a problem to cure, to prevent any possible marring of your smooth appearance.  Fine lines and winkles need to be masked.  Crows feet and smile lines need to be smoothed.  Foundation needs to be applied to give a smooth overall color tone.  Cover up to blot out any signs of facial humanity.  Makeup to return the color to your face that all this foundation and cover-up has..covered up.  And above all, a slight smile should always appear on our faces, our teeth whitened if need be to further enhance this vibrant and youthful mask.  All in the effort to appear still in our prime, still pretty, still youthful and full of vibrant potential.  As if we never age past this 18 or 21 year old “prime-time” of beauty and grace.  As though our years on this planet should never show their passage on our faces or in our bodies.  If anything they should only make our eyes appear more knowing and maternal and our unconscious grace have more years of living to fall back on.

And through all the disguise, NO ONE IS SUPPOSED TO KNOW.  The key marketing feature of any make-up product is that using it will somehow fool the world; trick everyone into thinking you’re younger.  Well so what?? What is the benefit of looking younger, if EVERYONE looks younger then they should?  Soon you have people asking 28-year-olds if they are 18 and I guess the marketing and product usage has worked in effect; now no one DOES have a true means by which they can guess a woman’s age.  Any tell-tale marks have been chipped away, filled and smoothed by the mortar of time-reversal make-ups and age-reducing techniques so that we all resemble some sort of marble face statues, lips parted slightly in the vulnerable poise of innocence, slightly sexual and porcelain pure.  Unaltered.  All the same.  Smooth and without a defining characteristic aside from youth. Fresh from puberty, virginal and pure; barely woman and “holding” is this elusive age-appearance goal and all I can do is ask: why?

Why?  I mean, I’m not even to the “dreaded” 40 year old time-mark that seems to haunt men and especially women and I can’t help but puzzle about this over-riding need, this overwhelming strive for keeping some sort of youthful beyond our years appearance. This need for 30 somethings to look like teenagers, for 40 year olds to appear barely in their twenties.  Heck, even for 60 year old men with greying hair to now look like they are back in their 40s.  Why are we as a culture so obsessed with looking younger.  Why is it that no matter what you may have accomplished in life, looking young and thin and conventionally pretty is what will award you the most accolades? Why do we thrill at a compliment by a stranger commenting that we look 10 years younger than our actual age (especially when it is likely no one REALLY knows what true ages look like anymore under our “masks”)?

Is it just the media?  Or is the media just reinforcing a cultural standard already in place?  Is this another chicken v. egg type of question?  Does the onslaught of youth-as-best images we see everyday create this society-wide desire not to age or does our society’s irreverence of old-age create a fear of losing this prized youth; becoming a fear upon which the media can then prey?  Is this the exact sort of fear upon which the media draws for it’s drugs and diet schemes to shrink waistlines and double-chins? Is it a fear of aging (which inevitably brings on weight according to studies and any diet pill every marketed) that spurs all of these tricks and products that are aimed at making us look younger, seem thinner (or for a temporary span of time BE thinner), appear more conventionally “pretty”?

I think it is.  Somehow the fear of aging, and all the baggage it brings with it (aside from that wisdom part, no one seems to want to take a brain-wrinkle smoothing serum for that anticipated side-affect of the passage of time), is something we try to pacify, try to alleviate with little creams and exercises and devices and all manner of attention diverting techniques (Spanx to hide fat, Creams to hide age).

When it is all boiled down, the fear of getting less pretty, the aversion to growing old, the hatred of being or becoming fat(ter); doesn’t it all come down to a petrifying awareness and paralyzing fear of one and only one thing?  We as humans are loathe to admit to our mortality.  We don’t want to show signs of aging; that proves we are mortal and will some day die.  We don’t want to be fat because that too is a sign of aging for some, and some hyped up harbinger of death for the sheeple masses.  And heaven help those of us who fall from the graces of “pretty” or “making an effort at least” and admit that youth and smooth complexions fade.  Woe betide those who refuse to submit to the dominant beliefs and instead choose to understand that not all waistlines remain (or start for that matter) thin and “trim”.

I guess the most ironic part of this wandering path my thoughts have taken (thanks for joining in the voyage) is that my thoughts tended to center on media images of youth and products used to retain such youth; even though I was called 18 at the age of 28 and I don’t USE any make-up or products to retain my skin’s glow or moisture or aerodynamic nature or whatever the marketing gist is these days.  Mostly I avoid make-up because it is annoying and I rub my eyes a lot.  Getting make-up in your eyes sucks.  And I don’t use anti-aging products because well, I don’t FEEL old.  Maybe that will change if I start seeing wrinkles or something but I don’t think so; mostly because I’m too lazy to want to spend time applying lather and cream and gunk to my face and body in a vain attempt to stem the effects of the passage of time.  Though, again, I can’t make any promises since I do still color and enjoy having dyed hair; and will probably still color my hair when my eyebrows have gone all stock white.  So who knows.

I’m just fascinated and compelled to comment on an obsession with the lost an unattainable (youth, beauty, smaller pants) that is so much of our everyday lives.  Maybe these gimmicky attempts to halt the flow of time is all just a natural response to the fear that losing one will mean losing all and cashing in those final chips. Perhaps it is just a last-ditch attempt to push away the thoughts of our mortality and cling to what we think of as the age of innocence and longevity.  And maybe the media and marketing advertisers are just capitalizing on a fear already in place.  But I don’t think their reinforcement of these ideals helps to do anything but to further ingrain what they know is a very lucrative fear upon which to prey.

This is why no one can tell how old you are or how much you weigh with just a glance.  If you are exposed often enough to 50 year old women with complexions to rival that of a 20 year old; if you are shown pictures of a large woman in an awkward and flesh distorting-picture and left to read an article about the “slightly overweight” it is no wonder that we have such a huge disconnect between perception and reality.

We don’t know what “real” is anymore.  We don’t even know how we SHOULD look at any particular age or weight (well, weights above the “normal” BMI ranges are sorta swept under the carpet until an article needs them for more obesity booga booga stuff anyways).

The message we receive is pervasive and constant. We all need to strive for some unattainable and flawless us: thin so we’re “healthy”, smoothly complected so we’re “youthful”, perfectly made up so we’re “beautiful”.  It just seems an awfully long laundry-list of “must-be”s for us to strive for in order to be “happy”.  No wonder the markets for such things as diets, pills, botox, anti-aging creams, beauty-products will never be a dying market:  we will always be reaching for some unknown goal, never quite getting there and always being told that if we stretched (our wallets) just a bit more, we just might grab that golden ring of perfection; and thus happiness.

Why can’t we just accept the happiness we might already HAVE instead of focusing all energies and monies into striving for some imagined happiness that might arrive once the right combination of weight, size, shape, age and beauty coalesce around us?  Should we always spend our lives thinking we’ll never quite be as happy as we COULD be if only we could be “something just a bit better”?

Maybe it is all in the lingo.  I notice that in English we say “I AM xx years old” and “I AM a size xx” and even “I AM beautiful” (though not many people honestly feel they can say this last and that is sad to me). In some other languages they phrasing is more how I think it should be “I HAVE xx years”, etc. Perhaps a turn of phrase is need; putting less emphasis on components of our physical bodies as BEING us and focusing on them more as attributes of the whole.  Like a huge tasty fruit salad, our size, age, appearance, imperfections, each is just one berry, one fruit in the whole that is our body’s lovable pot-luck desert.  The whole IS greater than the sum of it’s parts and each little piece of our lives and bodies shapes how we live and experience the world around us.

I suggest owning up to all these many pieces that make up the real “you”.  Own up to the parts of your life and your body that you’re able to change and the parts you’re unwilling or unable to change.  Maybe you’re not ready to let go and face the world as “nature intended”.  That’s okay. Wear makeup if you want, heck try all the anti-wrinkle creams you want to spend money on.  As an adult with disposable income that is your right to choose how to spend it.  But at the end of the day, I think we need to be unafraid to look mortality in the eye and boldly declare the real physical us:

I have lived 28 years

I wear a size 22

My butt and breasts and waist are all large parts of my body

I have a chicken-pox scar on my nose

I have cellulite on my thighs

My cheeks flush when I’m hot, and sometimes even when I’m not

I have acne around my face sometimes

I have murky brown hair under my dyed red tones

I look just how I’m meant to look; just how I want to look

I am alive and I am happy

Fake Foods: No Thanks!

nataliedee.com

I saw this comic today and nearly “splurfed” my green tea with the snort-laugh that bubbled up.  This laughter comes from remembering from some of the many different diets I’ve worked through over the years of my life and the “fake foods” they “allow” you to eat.

I remember eating turkey bacon while on Weight Watchers.  Fewer calories! “Similar” Taste! Fake yourself into thinking it is REAL bacon and think that you’re giving yourself a treat!  It’s Fake-on!  Whee!  Yeah.  Not so much.  Anyone who has EVER tried turkey bacon will assure you that it is NOTHING like regular, good old, slightly fattier, slightly higher in calorie pork bacon.  It doesn’t cook the same either.  I mean come on; nothing says “This is NOT bacon” better than the fact that turkey bacon will never get that wonderful crisp bacon snap when you cook it.  It just always remains the same too-bright pinkish strip of slurried meat product.  Blech!  And for the record, you aren’t fooling your body into thinking that dessicated piece of reconstituted turkey pressed into a bacon shape is actual bacon either.  It knows.  You know.  Stop lying to yourself and admit it.  That ISN’T bacon.  It never will BE bacon.

Then there was South Beach, or just the “Low/No Carb” diet for those not subscribing to any particular brand-name diet.  After 2 weeks of “induction”, by the end of which a piece of half-rotted pear sounded like freaking heaven, you’re willing to try anything even remotely resembling a bread product.  And then you try to fake-out your body, trick it again into thinking it is getting something that you really aren’t going to feed it, by mashing up cauliflower into “Mashed Potatoes”.  Come on folks.  We’re adults.  If you want to eat mashed up cauliflower with some butter and spices and enjoy that awesome tasty, go for it.  But stop acting like you’ve somehow managed to convince your body that it is really “Just Like” eating mashed potatoes.  Your body isn’t a 3 year old that can’t figure out you’ve hidden peas inside their food (which, for the record, I’m not sure fools even 3-year-olds).

And from the days of calorie-counting in the generic “I can just stop eating so much, because obviously if I’m overweight I just must be eating more than my body needs” diet phase comes another of those “ooo this is just like eating ____, but fewer calories and none of the taste” items:  Any sort of “fat free”, “diet” or otherwise “low-cal, low-fat, low-sugar, low-something” product out there waiting to take your money.  Your body knows it isn’t the real thing; why are you still trying to convince yourself that it will never know that difference?  And frankly, every food stuff that feels the need to market some sort of “diet” version of itself knows that it isn’t supposed to be eaten as a sole nutrient-providing part of a balanced human eating regime.  I feel if marketing groups just used their funds to focus on intelligent commercials like “Hey!  This soda/snack-food/treat/sugar-filled tasty thing is delicious but shouldn’t be the only thing you eat (which honestly, if people just stopped following diet marketing scams in the first place we’d all realize we KNOW anyways)” instead of trying to put all their mental energy into crafting these “tricky”, slightly less calorie but far less tasty (and likely full of even more junk additives you might NOT want), products that they just know people will try to eat more of in an attempt to trick and appease their body into accepting it as the original fun food item; then perhaps we could move away from this overwhelming belief that we humans have no idea how to choose foods that are good for us; in amounts that are right for us as individuals; and start to revamp the whole idea one person actually being able to make good decisions for their own eating habits.

Basically, my thought on these fakey foods is: If you want to eat it, fine, but stop trying to convince me and you and everyone around you that you love it more than the real thing because it is something that dieting introduced you to and it is a Wonderful Non-Food to “enjoy”. This diet-induced self-delusion has to stop.

If you like Turkey Bacon, fine.  I’m still not going to eat it.  You can have my share even.  If, like me, you enjoy cauliflower mashed up as a tasty veggie, fine.  Just stop calling them “Fake Mashed Potatoes” though, as if that somehow makes them quasi-carbs that will appease your carb-starved inner-body gods demanding potato-sacrifices be made to them.  And if you love the taste of diet soda, have a blast; drink it up.  But that 0-calorie sip is by no means “tricking” your body into losing weight, or into believing that you’re really drinking the real thing.  Both of you know the truth.  So stop lying to yourself.  Stop lying to your poor body and own up to the fact that these are what they are: Fake Foods.  Denying it doesn’t make it any less true.

So if you ARE only eating those things in the vain hope that somehow your body will one day love them as much as the original; join me in the D.A.R.E to Eat Real Foods challenge; whereby you acknowledge exactly what it is you’re eating for what it actually is, and not for what it is supposedly replacing.  Join in the fun chant and just say “Fake Foods: No Thanks!”

Happy Day!

I super excited that for once everything I voted for ended up passing or not passing just as I was hoping.  Not only that but after about a week we can finally see lawns without political signs again and television without political slander ads.  That’s my favorite part.  It is like getting through Thanksgiving with the stress of having dozens of people all in one house trying to be cordial to each other, which gets increasingly more difficult as the night and flow of booze, if applicable, progresses and coming out on the other side with that “Phew!” feeling.  It is over.  Now the really tough part starts.  It is great to spend 2 years spouting about changes but now we need to see those changes start to slowly happen and I’m excited to be a part of it in any way that I can.

So rather than focusing on some of the crazy diet ads I’ve seen lately that I’ve been thinking about slaying in a post or talking about something else negative I am posting this morning with a light and hopeful heart.  Change is never easy and there will be tough times ahead.  While nothing voted on yesterday is going to have an instant impact in our lives (except maybe to raise or lower our spirits depending on your political leanings) it will have a lasting affect on us and on our country and to that I say, “Cheers!”  Here’s to ringing out the old with dignity and turning towards huge possibilities.  I’m eager to see how we progress as a nation in regards to national issues such as health care, as well as how we grow our reputation again on the world stage with international dealings.

Anyways, one of my few political posts here at “I am in Shape, ROUND is a Shape”.  I’ll be back to the regular ranting and dissection of language and actions now with renewed interest in being a part of this shifting world!

Juxtaposition and misleading/mixed messages

I just read this great piece over at No Cheese, Please about the trend of marketing departments to capitalize not only on the huge levels of guilt-ridden discontent we are socialized into accepting into our daily lives but also to seize upon the insecurities taught and instilled into women throughout their lives regarding their (our) lack of self-control.  To quote the author of the post:

This circular’s cover [for Bed Bath & Beyond] reminds me of magazines like Woman’s Day: a picture of a beautiful cake on the front, with the headline, “LOSE 23 POUNDS WITH POWER WALKING!” Translation: make a cake for your family while you eat celery and work out every day. It’s sickening how often women around food is correlated with some kind of lack of control.

I wanted to highlight not only this thought-provoking post but also I want to elaborate on the point I emphasized in the quote above.  How often have you ever idly glanced at the magazines waiting in a grocery store line and noticed this same thing?  Any magazine geared towards women (which are what are found in grocery store Last Minute purchase display racks since of course only women do food shopping, natch) seems to LOVE to find new and fun ways to display amazingly decadent looking desert images, while highlighting text to the effect of “Lose weight now!”  This juxtaposition of indulgent foods with dieting messages is trying to make, I think, two pulls upon the women for which they are artfully crafted.

1. You are meant to look at this beautifully colored and laid out display of “naughty” foods and immediate imagine yourself making and or at least eating it.  By adding the large font text pertaining to diets just next to this “naughty” desire provoking image you are then immediately supposed to feel the guilt and shame of even mentally giving in to your wild female impulses, for your lack of self-control, and are drawn to the snake-oil salesman pitch for the latest and greatest food-restriction tips.

2. By placing a luscious food item in full color right next to a tip for dieting, you also get the simultaneous (and confusing) impression that whatever hew “diet tips” or “weight loss magic secrets” are shared within the glossy pages of the magazine will somehow allow you to EAT the pictured item.  Sorry honey, but the misleading message is not to be believed, despite the mixed signals it gives to your brain, believe your gut instincts which say that no matter WHAT those diet tips or tricks are going to be, no where in them will there be a mention of making and eating that delectable treat on the front cover.

I have always scoffed at such women’s mags with “Lose weight NOW!” poised above a lovely image of some fiddly to make but fantastic looking (and in our imaginations at least, wonderful smelling and tasting) chocolate desert. Even when in our hearts (and at the back at least of our minds too) we KNOW that the magazine cover is playing to our senses and triggering the advertisers desired results; even KNOWING that they are just using tricks of juxtaposition to guide our hand to purchasing the magazine; the urge is still there to give in to both the guilty desire for that tasty-looking desert recipe and the self-loathing inspired demand to read the diet tips in retribution for even THINKING about eating something “naughty” and once again being feminine and “losing control” over that battle against our body.

I’ve always felt (and feel more so now after my exposure to concepts here in FA and elsewhere regarding the tricky methods of marketing in general) that these sorts of covers  which should have to have, even if only in small print, the same disclaimers that Weight Watchers and the like are forced to add to commercials which states explicitly to the viewer that: “No, our methods for forcing your body to change its size does not include allowing you to actually EAT anything seen on this delicious looking cover”.

At least that would be a bit more honesty in advertising than we’re used to seeing.