Narrator: In 2018, a woman named Ellen Maud Bennett was dying of inoperable cancer. In her final days, she wrote her own obituary, but it contained a message that was anything but a peaceful farewell. She wrote that her final wish was for other women of size to advocate for their health and not accept that fat is the only relevant health issue. For years, she had sought medical help, only to be told repeatedly to lose weight, while the cancer that was killing her went undiagnosed. Her story is a tragic testament to a deeply ingrained prejudice, one that is often disguised as concern. In the book Myths About Fat, author Aubrey Gordon dismantles the pervasive and harmful beliefs that allow stories like Ellen’s to happen, arguing that anti-fatness is not a matter of health or personal responsibility, but a critical social justice issue.

Narrator: One of the most persistent myths about fatness is that it is a simple matter of choice and willpower. The logic follows that if fat people dislike their treatment, they should just lose weight. This belief is built on the oversimplified "calories in, calories out" model, which suggests that anyone can become thin if they just try hard enough. Gordon systematically dismantles this idea, revealing it as a harmful fiction that ignores the complex biological, genetic, and social factors that determine body size.

The author illustrates this through a personal story from her college years. At a party, a thin male stranger cornered her and began an unsolicited lecture on weight loss, insisting, "It’s not like diets are rocket science. It’s just calories in, calories out." This stranger, with no knowledge of her history, health, or life, felt entitled to explain her own body to her, dismissing her lived experience. This encounter is a microcosm of a broader societal attitude that blames fat individuals for their bodies.

Gordon explains that this perspective completely ignores the science. Hormones like ghrelin, which drives hunger, can increase for a year or more after weight loss, making it biologically difficult to maintain a lower weight. Furthermore, research shows that most diets fail in the long term, with the vast majority of people regaining any weight they lose. For very fat people, the odds of achieving a "normal" BMI are astronomically low—1 in 1,290 for men and 1 in 677 for women. The myth of choice serves to place blame on the individual, absolving society of its role in creating and perpetuating anti-fat bias.

Narrator: When the "choice" argument fails, the conversation often shifts to a seemingly more legitimate concern: health. However, Gordon argues that this concern is often a façade for deep-seated bias, a bias that is institutionalized in the very tools doctors use to measure health. The primary culprit is the Body Mass Index, or BMI.

The history of the BMI is not rooted in medicine but in 19th-century racist science. It was created by a Belgian polymath named Adolphe Quetelet, who was not a physician. His goal was to define the "average man," using data exclusively from white, Western European men. It was never intended as a tool for individual health diagnosis. Yet, it was later adopted by insurance companies and eventually the medical establishment, becoming the global standard for health. This flawed metric consistently overestimates health risks for Black people and underestimates them for some Asian communities, leading to misdiagnosis and inequitable care.

The real-world consequences of this bias are devastating. Gordon shares the story of Rebecca Hiles, who for six years suffered from bloody coughing fits. Doctors repeatedly dismissed her symptoms, attributing them to her weight. Only after years of suffering was she finally diagnosed with lung cancer. She was filled with rage, knowing that an earlier diagnosis could have saved her lung. Stories like hers and Ellen Maud Bennett’s show that medical anti-fatness is a deadly force, preventing fat people from receiving the care they need and deserve.

Narrator: A common defense from those who deny the harm of anti-fatness is the claim that fat people don't actually experience discrimination. Gordon refutes this with overwhelming evidence, showing that anti-fat discrimination is not only real but legally permissible in 48 U.S. states. This bias has tangible, far-reaching consequences.

In the workplace, this discrimination is stark. Studies show a significant wage gap, with fat women earning nearly $5,000 less per year than their thin colleagues. In one extreme case, the Borgata Hotel Casino in Atlantic City enforced a policy where its waitstaff, known as "Borgata Babes," could be suspended if they gained more than 7% of their body weight, a policy that was upheld in court.

This discrimination extends to public spaces, particularly air travel. Film director Kevin Smith was famously ejected from a Southwest Airlines flight for being a "customer of size," despite having purchased two seats. The humiliation is a common experience for fat travelers, who must navigate shrinking seats and inconsistent, often punitive, airline policies. These examples reveal that anti-fatness is not just about hurt feelings; it is a systemic barrier to economic security, fair treatment, and basic dignity.

Narrator: The discomfort surrounding fatness is so profound that it even dictates the language we are allowed to use. Many people, particularly thin people, insist that fat people shouldn't call themselves "fat," viewing it as a bad word. Gordon tells a story of being at an airport when a young child pointed and said, "That’s a fat lady." The mother was mortified, shushing the child and insisting "fat" was a bad word, despite the author's attempts to reassure her that she was not offended.

Gordon argues that this reaction is not about protecting the fat person's feelings but about soothing the thin person's own fear and discomfort with fatness. For many fat activists, reclaiming the word "fat" is a powerful act of defiance. It strips the word of its power as an insult and reclaims it as a neutral descriptor, just like "tall" or "short."

This conversation is often derailed by the claim that "skinny shaming is just as bad as fat shaming." Gordon clarifies that while all body shaming is harmful, this is a false equivalence. Skinny shaming is typically an act of individual aggression. Fat shaming, however, is backed by a massive system of institutional power that denies fat people jobs, healthcare, and justice. There is no systemic structure that benefits fat people at the expense of thin people.

Narrator: Perhaps the book's most challenging argument is its refutation of the idea that "anti-fatness is the last socially acceptable form of discrimination." While often said with good intentions, Gordon argues this statement is dangerously inaccurate. It erases the ongoing, violent, and systemic discrimination faced by countless other marginalized communities, including Black people, Indigenous people, disabled people, and trans people.

Oppression is not a checklist where one form is solved before we move to the next. Instead, systems of oppression are interconnected and mutually reinforcing. Anti-fatness is frequently used as a tool to uphold other bigotries, particularly anti-Blackness. Gordon points to the tragic murder of Eric Garner, a Black man killed by a police officer using a chokehold. In the subsequent trial, the defense attorney argued that Garner died not from the illegal chokehold, but "from being morbidly obese." His fatness was used to excuse racist violence and deflect accountability.

By understanding anti-fatness as one thread in a larger web of oppression, we can see how it functions to maintain existing power structures. It is not the "last" form of discrimination, but a foundational one that intersects with and amplifies racism, ableism, and misogyny.

Narrator: The single most important takeaway from Myths About Fat is that anti-fatness is a social justice issue, not a personal health crisis. It is a system of beliefs and discriminatory practices designed to marginalize a group of people, and it is deeply interwoven with other forms of oppression like racism and ableism. The myths we tell ourselves about weight are not harmless misconceptions; they are, as Gordon writes, "tools of power and dominance."

The book leaves readers with a profound challenge: to look beyond individual feelings about body image and confront the systemic nature of anti-fat bias. It asks us to stop policing fat people’s bodies, health, and language, and instead turn that critical lens inward. The most uncomfortable but necessary question it poses is not about how we can "fix" fat people, but about how we can dismantle the systems that benefit from their oppression, starting with the biases we hold ourselves.