It seems like every time people talk about trying to eat healthier, or eat less, or exercise more, the topic of diet culture comes up. The term diet culture used to be associated with things sold by popular Instagrammers that I’m not even going to mention specifically, because I don’t want my website associated with those dangerous products in any way.
Diet culture—as I’d always thought of it, anyway—is super dangerous. Think gorgeous women (it’s almost always women) with supermodel bodies in bikinis telling followers that they, too, can have that kind of body if they just buy this thing that the bikini woman happens to profit from. And the thing they are selling is usually a tea, or a shake, or a pill.
And diet culture is not always that direct. Sometimes it’s an entire industry deciding that a certain body type is the only one worth having, and projecting that image everywhere. Or a clothing chain deciding to only sell clothes in tiny sizes, and if you don’t fit them, oh well, you’re just not cool enough. Or every fat character on TV having to struggle because of their weight, instead of just being allowed to be interesting for the reasons that the other characters are interesting.
You can see how all of these things could easily lead to anorexia, fatphobia, discrimination, public shaming, and tons of other problems. It’s terrible. I remember someone tweeting that she was treated much better in public when she was a 90-pound anorexic near death than when she was 250 pounds and feeling much healthier. We’re just awful to fat people, even though something like one-third of Americans are overweight and another third are obese.
But…BUT…
“Diet culture” now seems to be applied to ANY attempt at losing weight. No matter what your method, no matter what your motivation, if you talk about losing weight, you will probably get smacked around online by the anti-diet-culture mafia. Many people simply equate any attempt at losing weight with hating yourself the way you are and buckling to diet culture.
Making someone feel bad because they’re fat is awful. But making someone feel bad because they want to lose weight is becoming just as common, and I’m not going to let that happen here, in my space, in this little corner of the internet that I control.
I am not here to tell anyone that they should lose weight. That’s an intensely personal decision with so many factors and considerations. If anyone told me I should lose weight I would tell them exactly where to go.
I am not here to tell anyone the healthiest way to lose weight. I’m not a doctor, or nurse, or nutritionist, or anything else that would qualify me to give health advice to someone else.
What I am here to do is support anyone who has decided that they want to lose weight (or lose fat or eat healthier or eat better food or stop overeating or however they want to define it). I can tell them what my motivations are, and the things that have worked for me (and the things that haven’t). I can tell them what I eat, how much I exercise, what I like and don’t like, how I’m feeling, and post recipes with options that I think are delicious and filling while also being healthier for my body.
And yes, I’ve written a LOT about the methods that I’ve used (or tried to use) to lose weight, and sometimes I profit from that writing. But I also talk about how I try to eat more vegetables and whole grains, and try to eat more reasonable portions, and how I don’t want to feel physically or emotionally terrible after I eat. These are all positive things, and I hope you’ll consider them as much as whatever method I’m talking about.
If you’re not interested in any of that, that’s fine. Just move along. I hear there are other websites out there on the internet, so you might want to find one that suits you better.
What isn’t fine is criticizing anyone in my comments who wants to lose weight. They came here for help and information, not to be attacked. And that includes criticizing anyone’s attempt to lose weight, including mine. I personally don’t get hurt when random people I don’t know criticize me, but I don’t want the people who came here for help to see someone else attacked, either.
So, if your comment got removed and I sent you to this post, that’s why.
You are, of course, free to shout about me from the rooftops, write a book about how wrong I am, or attack me in other places online (you can find me on all social channels, but I’ll probably block you if you just want to yell at me—you can yell about me to other people though). You can even start a website about just how wrong I am (not AmyOztanIsWrong.com, though, that one’s taken).
So don’t talk to me about censorship. You are not being prevented from saying anything, you’re just being prevented from saying it on my website. I have absolutely no responsibility to let you say whatever you want in a space provided by me, and you sound silly for even suggesting it. If you bring up first amendment rights, you sound downright idiotic, because I am not the government, and you should go back to school and try to pay attention this time.
Be healthy. Be happy. Be safe. And probably be somewhere other than here.