Fact and Fiction

Courtney E. Martin has a nice survey of fat, diets, and our dysfunctional relationship with food in "Separating Fact from Fiction in the Age of Obesity".

Martin comes out swinging.

The pathetic success rate of diets isn't news, but what is groundbreaking is the growing awareness of just how unethical the $34 billion-a-year (some estimate as high as $50 billion) diet industry is. Organizations like the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance and books like Laura Fraser's "Losing It: America's Obsession with Weight and the Industry That Feeds It" and the just published "Rethinking Thin: The New Science of Weight Loss -- and the Myths and Realities of Dieting" by New York Times health writer Gina Kolata, reinforce that it is not a lack of willpower that is standing between the average American dieter and her perfect body but a corrupt industry that keeps so many of us -- women in particular -- unsatisfied, obsessed and misinformed.

There's a lot of talk about one's set point, the dangers of diets and diet drugs, and how feminism views the diet industry. Nice read, for sure.