Media and Research Roundup - July 2023
Image description: A large book is open, with various colored tabs along the edge of the pages and highlighting on some of the text.
By Bill and Terri Weitze
CONTENT WARNING: Some articles featured in the Media & Research Roundup may refer to stigmatizing events or use stigmatizing language.
May 26, 2023: New York City Mayor Eric Adams signs bill INT-0209, making weight and height protected classifications regarding employment, housing, and public accommodation opportunities.
June 12, 2023: A small study looks at how the brain responds to post-ingestion nutrient signals after dieting and finds that fat people experience an impaired neuronal response that is not restored after diet-induced weight loss.
June 13, 2023: Thick Thrift, a plus-size flea market, is the brainchild of Rachael Frank. Frank and her friends Aya Kajikawa and Mia Fernandez were able to put on the pop-up event with the help of 20 vendors.
June 14, 2023: An AMA Council on Science and Public Health report presented at the 2023 AMA Annual Meeting discusses that the BMI classification system is misleading about the effects of body fat mass on mortality rates due to other variables such as gender, ethnicity, lifestyle, etc. Researcher and Board Certified Patient Advocate, Ragen Chastain, wrote a piece explaining the good, the bad, and the ugly about this new policy.
June 23, 2023: Skeptical Inquirer’s article on Ozempic and Wegovy points out problems with these drugs but also perpetuates the idea that fat people just need to eat healthy to achieve sustainable weight loss, which has been widely debunked.
June 26, 2023: In a Washington Post op-ed, Danielle Pinnock (star on TV show Ghosts) tries to explain how hurtful and pointless fatphobic trolls are when they attack Lizzo because Lizzo wants to lift every body up.
June 27, 2023: Various size-inclusive travel businesses are highlighted in this New York Times article. We look forward to seeing more businesses that cater to fat travelers, expanding from the mostly all-female identifying groups in the article to fat male identifying and mixed gender couples.
June 27, 2023: Dr. Lisa Erlanger is training doctors-to-be on how to look past a patient’s weight to identify their health needs; hoping to teach her students to recognize the harm caused by fat bias and yo-yo-dieting. Also featured is Dr. Tess Moore, a Seattle based doctor who practices weight-neutral care and encourages her patients to do so as well.
Pic is of Terri and Bill Weitze, a Caucasian couple, both wearing glasses
Terri and Bill Weitze have been active within NAAFA for years, and they currently coauthor the Media and Research Roundup in the NAAFA Newsletter. They both live and work in Michigan, and met through a fat-positive bulletin board system before the days of the World Wide Web.