Obesity Prejudice in the News

Recently, colleagues on an eating-disorder message board were discussing the value of using weight-loss drugs to help reduce people's weight. (The consensus: There is very little evidence that the drugs lead to meaningful, sustainable weight loss.)

The discussion raised the question of how we see weight. Is being overweight and having a high body-mass index immediately indicative of health problems? Or is a high BMI one of several indicators of poor health? Not everyone who is overweight is unhealthy, and not everyone who is of normal weight is healthy. As one person on the mailing list put it, when we automatically consider someone with a high BMI to be unhealthy, it's as if we are saying that tall people are at a greater risk of medical problems—and then jumping to the conclusion that tallness itself is the disease we need to treat.

Soon after this discussion, I came across the following article on The Daily Beast [http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-05-04/fat-judges-need-not-apply/] about the candidates for the Supreme Court replacement for David Souter. The article suggests that some Democrats—who want Obama's appointments to be on the court for as long as possible—are using weight and thinness as a proxy for health and longevity. In this case, they prefer thinner candidates, such as Diane Wood and Kim McLane Wardlaw over the heavier ones, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor. Their belief is that because Kagan and Sotomayor are heavier, they are less healthy and likely to die younger. (Although not slim, neither woman is obese.)

This is a widely held view—that thin equals good and healthy and that fat equals bad, unhealthy and likely to die an early death. Yes, it is true that, on average, obesity is associated with a higher risk of death. But that doesn't mean that any given thin person will outlive someone who is heavier.

What I actually see in this particular Supreme Court debate is a weight prejudice doctored up as a health concern. Underneath the seeming concern about longevity is the dismissal of two women who do not completely fit social expectations for appearance.