Following my Sunday Herald Sun column critical of ‘The Biggest Loser’ last week , I heard from a number of women in recovery from eating disorders, who wrote about the negative impact the series had on them – including Melbourne woman Belinda Davis, 38, who was happy for me to share her story here. It […]
Tacky show is not worth the weight REALITY weight-loss show The Biggest Loser claims to be all about health – leading a new “social movement” against the “obesity crisis”. But many authorities – and those suffering from disordered eating – say it actually contributes to bad health. Parading and humiliating obese people, dangerously rapid weight […]
Yesterday dietitian Susie Burrell made the extraordinary claim that obesity is socially contagious in an opinion piece titled ‘Wanna get skinny? Might be time to ditch your fat friends’. Burrell cited the Framingham Heart Study as evidence that people who have fat friends are more likely to become fat themselves. She called for readers to […]
Who is really benefitting from this show? I’ve watched a couple of episodes of The Biggest Loser Families and find myself cringing at the extent of degradation and shaming. To see Sarah-Jayne begging through tears not to have to stand on the scales the first time, was harrowing. It was as though she was being led […]
How can you nourish something you hate? Collective Shout colleague and Managing Director of BodyMatters Australasia Lydia Turner has written an important piece for Healthy Weight Week highlighting the conflicts of interest in anti-obesity research. She urges a health-based, not weight based approach to health. This week marks the start of ‘Healthy Weight Week,’ brought to […]
I’m very pleased to have Sarah McMahon, a Sydney psychologist specialising in eating disorders, write another guest blog, this time on the way the radical treatment of gastric banding is being pitched to teens, with very little attention given to the potential risks. Promoting gastric banding to 14-year-olds: malnutrition and maintenance on the menu I […]
