The world in weight: The weekly round-up

29th November 2007

The world in weight: The weekly round-up

posted in Eating Disorders, Fat Bias, Food News, Health/Nutrition |

The (intended) weekly round-up of related F-word topics in the news.

As reported in USA Today, consumer test trials are now being conducted on “smart carts” – electronics-equipped carts tricked out with computer screens barcode scanners – which customers can use to scan item packaging to view a display of nutritional information, means of production and environmental impact. The carts of the future are already being lauded as means of combating the so-called obesity epidemic.

What’s next? Shopping carts that taser fat consumers who try to buy “bad” foods?

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that more teenage boys are dieting and developing eating disorders than did previously. A study released this week compared dieting behaviors between 2000 an 2005, and found that all kinds of dieting behaviors, including taking diet pills, exercising and purging, were on the rise among boys. Hispanic boys were the most likely to diet, while white boys were the least likely. The study also found much more diet product use among girls, with white girls being the most likely and blacks the least likely to diet.

Fran Lyon, 22, suffered from borderline personality disorder and overcame self-harming and an eating disorder as a teenager; now British authorities say her past leaves her vulrenable to developing Munchausen’s by Proxy. The Hexham, Northumberland mother-to-be has fled the country in a bid to keep her baby and has volunteered to place herself in a supervised mother and baby unit in an undisclosed location. Read the full story here.

Leave it to Paul Campos to point out the apparent-to-everyone-but-Walter-Millett irrationality of the war against fat people. Campos once again takes on the Harvard School of Public Health in response to Katherine Flegal’s “inconvenient truth” that fat can actually be, shock, gasp, healthy. Read his column here in The New Republic.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, November 29th, 2007 at 7:00 pm and is filed under Eating Disorders, Fat Bias, Food News, Health/Nutrition. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

1 On November 29th, 2007, vesta44

said:

I saw that article about the shopping carts, and as far as I’m concerned, if my local grocery store had them, I wouldn’t use the scanner at all. After all, I’m perfectly capable of reading nutrition information off the package myself, I’m not blind or illiterate and neither are most shoppers.
As for Fran Lyon, I would say UK Social Services are going quite a bit overboard here. My best friend was a multiple personality who self-harmed (and had 2 sons who were never removed from her and her husband). She never hurt anyone but herself, and no one ever tried to take her kids away from her. So if past mental problems are an indication of developing Munchausen’s by Proxy, how many of us would be counted among that number? I would, as I dealt with depression and attempted suicide twice (and no one ever tried to take my son from me, either).

posted on November 29th, 2007 at 10:01 pm

2 On November 30th, 2007, Kathleen

The British government has gone permanently round the bend. What scares me is the respect our own elites still have for that government. George Orwell must be flipping in his grave: Britain has become everything he feared it would become at the time he wrote “1984.”.

posted on November 30th, 2007 at 12:17 am

3 On November 30th, 2007, Fillyjonk

Fran Lyon, 22, suffered from borderline personality disorder and overcame self-harming and an eating disorder as a teenager; now British authorities say her past leaves her vulrenable to developing Munchausen’s by Proxy.

WHAT

WHAT WHAT WHAT

WHAT THE FUCK

WHAT

Okay I don’t mean this to reflect on any English individuals but SERIOUSLY, ENGLAND, FUCK YOU RIGHT NOW

posted on November 30th, 2007 at 1:17 am

4 On November 30th, 2007, Rachel

I’ve been reading up on this case in other papers, and it appears as if Lyon was raped at 14, which may have contributed to her mental instability (gee, you think?). She sought out treatment and has since recovered, and most of the articles I’ve read all cite psychiatrists treating her who say there is no evidence to suggest that she will harm her child in any way.

Nanny state, indeed.

posted on November 30th, 2007 at 1:26 am

5 On November 30th, 2007, Rebecca

I feel that, as a Brit who watched the Tonight Special that Fran Lyon was featured on, I should add what I saw. The programme itself (broadcast Mon this week, 8pm. I watch it cos it’s between two doses of Coronation St) never ever mentioned the words ‘Munchausen by Proxy’ and from what was shown, no one ever threatened to physically take her baby away. Social Services merely want to put her baby on a register - lots of babies get put on this for all sorts of reasons. In practice very few are taken away/put into care - in reality it often means that someone is keeping a much closer eye on the mother ensuring that if she does develop problems - PND, etc - that help can come immediately and not too late for her or the baby. I had a friend who’s baby was on this register, even though she lived at home with her parents, so her child could have been looked after by grandparents. When she did develop PND it was immediately noticed and something immediately done - which is surely a good thing for all concerned. Maybe things have happened in the Fran Lyon case which weren’t shown in the programme: the Express certainly thinks so. I must point out that the Daily Express is very Conservative and is fond of complaining about the current government. This story vastly expands on what was shown in the programme.

I’m not saying that mistakes haven’t been made with Ms Lyon, and I think it’s horrible that due to teenage depression she is in this position, but the Express story in innacurate, I think. I hope Ms Lyon gets to keep her baby and can return to the UK.

What did annoy me the absolute most in the programme was the case of two methadone dependent heroin addicts who had twins via IVF, and who were also being thought of as ‘at-risk’ of harming their children. My local Primary Care Trust says that I’m not allowed fertility treatment (not even diagnostics) until I’m 30 years old, but two methadone dependent heroin addicts are allowed it? Now THAT is fucked.

posted on November 30th, 2007 at 5:34 am

6 On November 30th, 2007, Jackie

It’s interesting about the Munchausen by Proxy article. Seems people just can’t understand the difference between harming one’s self, and harming others. The two do not coincide, it’s ridiculous to suggest someone who already hates themselves, would have the narccisism to harm others. They’ve been saying lately it isn’t that bullies have low self-esteem, they have an over-abundance of it. It would be someone who thinks too much of themselves who would harm someone else, not someone who thinks too little of themselves.

That shopping cart doesn’t surprise me. It seems that now people feel the way to fight the obesity epidemic, is to gradually infantilize people when it comes to their choices in food. It’s like they’re saying, “Aww baby can’t read the nutritional info, baby can’t figure it out? Here baby, here’s the information, look look! Now you can read it! What a good baby!” Cause you know, apperantly obese people are no smarter than infants. Whatever.

posted on November 30th, 2007 at 6:23 am

7 On December 2nd, 2007, Brethren Priestess

Actually, the grocery cart scanners sounds like a good idea….. IF they would show, not ‘nutrition’ info like fat calories, but what the product does for the health of the planet - if a little screen would flash with a picture of the person who made or harvested the product - if the printout listed the proportion of the cost going to line the pockets of the company’s CEO versus the proportion paying the workers who actually handle the product - if the screen showed the landfill where the product’s excessive packaging could end up. Basically, if the grocery cart scanners showed the facts that should go into REAL ethical consumption decisions, then I would be all for them.

posted on December 2nd, 2007 at 6:36 pm