Doctors Are Being Trained to Ignore Obesity—What Could Go Wrong?

Doctors are being taught that calling out obesity is bad. Can you trust them to give you the best health advice? Welcome to America Uncovered. I'm Chris Chapel. We all know America has an obesity problem because while we're all fat, we're not also blind. And we're only getting fatter, which coincides with Oreos releasing more and more flavors. This is one of the few times correlation definitely equals causation. According to the CDC, about 40% of adults are obese. It's a problem that's even costing the US military a lot of money. Soon, people in the Navy are all going to be called SEALs solely for their shape. It's also affected Vice President JD Vance, if my memory of him is correct. US Secretary of Health RFK Jr. and his under secretary, his abs, must be going absolutely crazy over this. According to the WHO, obesity kills at least 2.8 8 million people worldwide every year. And the weight of the problem also strains an already overtaxed health care system. Not to mention the mental health problem it causes children who are constantly reminded that their mamas are so fat that when they heard it was chilly outside, they went and got a bowl. Since that's the case, why on earth are there so many people who are advocating in favor of obesity and saying we need to fund fat? This goes well beyond demands to respect others regardless of their appearance or saying that people shouldn't take extreme medications or go on extreme diets. There are outspoken fat activists like Christy Harrison and Aubrey Gordon who claim it is weight stigma that is dangerous. And that apparently includes doctors commenting on your weight at every visit, not being able to fit into airplane seats, restaurant booths, or other public spaces, feeling pressure to lose weight, and reports about the socalled obesity epidemic. So, uh, reality, does this mean I can sue my mirror if I don't like what it shows me? Not that I know what that's like. There's also Virginia Soul Smith, who's been featured in the mainstream media for promoting sizeincclusive healthc care. And just as a disclaimer, when I call her a fat activist, I'm not describing her physical appearance like I do when I call Alex Jones a sentient stub toe. Soul Smith is on a mission to warn the world of fat phobia. According to her, the problem isn't that people are getting fat. It's that people have anti-fat attitudes and biases. Those doctors are bigoted for trying to keep people from dying. That's what bigots do, right? If this sounds familiar to woke ideas of race and gender, that's because she and many like her borrow from the same intersectional oppressed versus oppressor framework, just with fat people as the oppressed. In fact, you should avoid using the word obese because it's like a curse word, even though you know it's a medical term. Is this going to wind up like how we aren't allowed to say mentally anymore? And naturally, if you want to be skinny, then you're clearly promoting white supremacy and patriarchy. Yes, anti-fatness is rooted in racism and misogyny, which is confusing because a lot of people got fat from eating too much dairy. And as we all know, milk is white supremacy. So, are they fighting white supremacy with white supremacy? On Taco Supreme, as another fat activist, again, not describing appearance like when I call Dan Bonino a Roblox vampire, points out, fear of fatness and the preference for thinness are principally and historically not about health, but rather they are a way to legitimize race, sex, and class hierarchies. So join the fat resistance, though I doubt there will be much marching. Now, it's one thing for fat activists to be telling people that the health care system should be more fat inclusive. Luckily, medical professionals are following the science and despite pressure, aren't what? What's that, Shel? A number of medical professionals are now advocating for it as well. For example, the group Medical Students for Size Inclusivity cited all the activists I mentioned earlier as resources. And that group is connected to the association for weight and size inclusive medicine or awesome. So what is awesome? It's an international medical organization of physicians who challenge the pathization of body size which continues to drive health care disparities and disproportionately harms largerbodied patients. Hey, you know what else disproportionately harms largerbodied patients? health issues from having larger bodies. But he can't say that anymore because Awesome basically wants to dismiss obesity as a health issue. One member of Awesome, who's also on the faculty of Rowan University's Cooper Medical School, told Soul Smith that she doesn't require her patients to get weighed. Another, Asher Li, a self-described transmasculine weight-incclusive GP, says the real problem isn't your body. It's a system that refuses to see past it. Though, it's hard to see anything when diabetes complications leave you blind. And just so you know, there's a bunch of fat jokes I could have made off the line, can't see past it. But America Uncovered is a classy show. They say doctors need to stop focusing on weight and describe weight loss because weight loss is unsustainable for the vast majority of people. There's no evidence it provides long-term health benefits and the pursuit of weight loss causes significant physical and psychological harm. Yeah. Because as everyone knows, anything worth doing should be extremely easy. And if it's not, then you're the problem, not me. These medical experts are saying we can't allow weight ccentric narratives to dictate how people handle their health. To be clear, weight isn't the only metric that determines someone's health, but it's a metric. This would be like asking your mechanic to check your brakes and they say just because your car doesn't stop you automatically, think it's the brakes, you white supremacist. Because it's misguided to assume that higher body weight equals poor health or that long-term weight loss is widely achievable. We should reject the idealizing or pathizing of specific weights because we can improve health without weight loss. In fact, there's evidence that being overweight may even be good for you. That settles it. Chris Christie is peak physical fitness. Just another reason to love him and the fact there's more of him to love. So, let's exclude weight from policy goals and language and remove stigmatizing language like overweight and obesity as well as healthy weight or underweight because BMI is the construct of white Western European men. It's weight supremacy. if you must use larger body or person first language like person with obesity or people with morbid obesity. Basically downplay any negative consequences that come with obesity which remember kills millions of people every year. Death by chocolate isn't just a dessert, it's an autopsy result. Unfortunately, this kind of narrative has been pushed in medical schools nationwide, especially with those that promote DEI. According to a report by Speech First, under a social justice framework, students are trained to approach obesity through sensitivity guidelines that deny the link between weight and health. Physicians are pressured to prioritize affirming obese patients experiences over addressing underlying health concerns, which would be like seeing a kid running with scissors across a hockey rink and saying, "Keep living your truth, champ." Students at UCLA in the structural racism and health equity course were required to read from fat liberationist Marisa Mercedes, a fat activist who sees terms like obesity as tools of violence against fat bodies. So apparently sticks and stones won't break their bones because they have so many layers of fat protecting their bones, but calling that out is the real assault. Mercedes also says that weight loss is a useless, hopeless endeavor. They grow up with the right side of their TV broken and only ever saw before pictures. The University of Vermont created a weightincclusive nutrition research group says weight is not an important indicator of health and that weight is not seen as a health behavior. The basic premise is that inducing shame should be avoided at all costs because it's linked to mental health challenges, binge eating, and poor health. So they're saying weight isn't an indicator of health. So they don't bring it up or they may do something unhealthy like put on more weight. For not encouraging exercise, they sure do a lot of mental gymnastics. Proponents for this line of thinking emphasize that obesity is not a choice, nor is it necessarily bad for health. And it's important that people don't think of themselves as obese. They also emphasized that weight stigma can worsen high blood pressure, metabolic syndrome, diabetes, high cholesterol, and eating disorders. Ah yes, it's the stigma that's causing these things. It's like saying that shaming causes pregnancy. According to them, we shouldn't focus on exercise just for weight loss. In fact, diet and exercise really aren't that great for weight loss. The motivation should be becoming more healthy. Even though more exercise and better nutrition often leads to weight loss, which they say isn't an indicator of health, even though exercise and nutrition, oh boy, I'm out of breath. I guess I'm not in shape enough to do this kind of mental gymnastics. Now, if all that sounds strange to you, you're not alone. Not every doctor buys into this. Jeffrey Flyer, the former dean of Harvard Medical School and one of the world's top experts on obesity, calls these kinds of ideas nothing less than pedagogical malpractice that promotes extensive and dangerous misinformation. That's a mouthful, but at least it's not a mouthful of empty calories. Just for fun, say doctors are wrong and everything fat activists say is true. What does life as a fat activist look like? Well, Soul Smith says she had to put exercise down for a few years in order to not do it compulsively. She also lets her kids eat everything. In Soul Smith's house, there are neither good or bad foods, nor healthy or unhealthy ones. Donuts and kale hold equivalent moral value, and no one polices portion size. The line between a fun parent and a neglectful one is the only thing that's thin in that household. Other fat activists say the same thing, saying categorizing foods as healthy and unhealthy or good and bad leaves out important nuances. What nuances? That Skittles should be considered a fruit. It's all about body autonomy, which is why you should let kids eat as many sweets as they want for the holidays. That'll help their health in the long run. It's good for them. If that doesn't sound healthy, don't worry. Soul Smith, mind you, is a recipient of a Health magazine award, so you can definitely trust her to give you sound health advice. She has more definitely medically accurate knowledge than Oreo has flavors. But what do you think? Should we stop using weight as an indicator of health? Don't worry, we're not going to call out your fat mama for posting your opinions. Leave your comments below. And episodes like this require a lot of time and effort. Please support more episodes by subscribing to our new premium website, americanaunovered.tv. TV. You'll also get exclusive content, live streams, and more. Just click on this button that's been on screen. Once again, I'm Chris Chapel. Thank you for watching America Uncovered.