Something is Broken, and It's Not Our Bodies. It's the System.

This past weekend, I watched the Kendrick Lamar concert, which happened to be cushioned on both sides by some football. I could wax poetic about the symbolism of Kendrick's powerful performance (during BHM no less) but alas, we have other things to discuss today.

Those other things being the most nauseating and infuriating weight loss commercial I may have ever seen, produced by a little company called hims and hers.

I refuse to insert the actual commercial, because quite frankly, it should be taken down. But those wishing to understand the context of what I'm about to discuss, you can view the commercial HERE.

But in short, the commercial starts out by using the words "obesity" and "epidemic", and then goes on to mention that the weight loss industry is now a $160 billion dollar industry.

After fear mongering about the perils of being "overweight", the commercial proceeds to say "Something is broken, and it's not our bodies. It's the system," before introducing their solution — a weight loss drug similar to GLP1s.

And if I wasn't already furious, this is the exact moment I completely lost it.

The Hims and Hers commercial quite literally appropriated and co-opted the language of body liberation — the words of Black women (myself included) who have been educating about the link between fatphobia and white supremacy — and used our words to sell a weight loss drug.

That statement "Something is broken, and it's not our bodies. It's the system," is the sentiment of my entire book. One of the core messages of The Body Liberation Project is that we need to dismantle the systems of oppression that are making it difficult for all of us to exist in our bodies, free of harm and discrimination.

The statement – Something is broken, and it's not our bodies. It's the system – is factually correct.

The problem isn't our bodies.

The problem is the system.

The system being white supremacy and racism which demonizes folks in larger bodies. The system being anti-fat bias and weight stigma. The system being the deep seated connection between anti-blackness and fatness, which is the very root of diet culture and body oppression. The system being toxic wellness culture which tries to convince us that something is wrong with our bodies so they can turn around and sell us the solution for their profit.

But the “system” they are referring to is expensive weight loss drugs, offering that their alternative is a low cost and accessible option, albeit not FDA approved.

The irony of the commercial is that they basically said, “weight loss drugs are bad, but not ours.” Theirs is the solution.

And isn’t selling us “solutions” at the very crux of diet culture.

The diet industry is invested in telling us that we aren’t enough and that we need something outside of ourselves to be worthy and deserving of love. The more they can convince us that something is wrong with the bodies we reside in, the more we continue to spend our hard-earned money on the “solutions” they provide us. Hence, the fact that the weight loss industry is now a whopping $160 billion industry, a fact the commercial acknowledged while at the same time selling us another product.

So excuse my French, but these mutherfuckers really had the gall to use the language of body liberation – the language of Black women – to sell diet culture back to us, while trying to make it appear like they’re not part of the problem.

It also wasn't lost on me that the commercial primarily showcases Black and brown folks in larger bodies, the same individuals that are most harmed by anti-Black fatphobia.

It's equally important to note the song, This is America, playing in the background. The song, released in 2018 by rapper Childish Gambino, a Black man, is about the racism and violence experienced by Black Americans.

So they used Black bodies and a Black song about the racism and violence experienced by Black people to participate in diet culture, which has its roots in anti-Blackness, to perpetuate more violence. Because rather they know it or not, body oppression is violence.

And all this messaging is tied up with a pretty bow, with the concern for “health” being the underlying core message.

If they were truly concerned about people’s “health” why not use that $16 million (the estimated cost of a one minute Super Bowl ad) to educate the world about the social determinants of health, the economic and social conditions that influence individual and group differences in health status – things like education level, income, and even your zip code.

Here’s a non comprehensive of the things that we should be addressing instead of convincing people that their “health” is related to the size of their bodies:

• Lack of access to affordable healthcare

• Chronic stress

• Racism and white supremacy

• Redlining and food apartheid

• Rising food costs

• Lack of affordable housing options

• Lack of affordable mental health resources

• Capitalism

• Unemployment and job security

All that to say, we are constantly bombarded with messages that have formed our opinions about our own bodies and the bodies of others. We have conflated the idea of what it means to be healthy with a physical look, and we stigmatize fat bodies. We have also put the idea of health and being healthy on a pedestal and use it as a basis of morality. Understanding this reality is what will allow us to see the insidious nature of diet culture and hopefully begin the process of actively decolonizing our minds and seeking liberation for ourselves.

We all have implicit bias about bodies, and for the majority of the population, thinness equates to health.

We make assumptions about people based on what their bodies look like. We judge our own worth and how good we feel about ourselves based on the way we look and how “healthy” we are.

Also, many of us believe that we have ultimate control over our health. We believe that if we eat well, exercise, and make good choices for ourselves, that we will never be sick, disabled, or chronically ill.

When we believe this, we fail to realize that health is a privilege, and it’s also quite possible that we have implicit bias around the idea of health in general. When we think of health and even body size as a personal choice, it’s easy to make judgments about those we don’t view as healthy, because it’s easy to fall into the line of thinking that they just didn’t take good care of themselves or make good choices. But really, that’s just our bias showing. There are societal, economic, and social implications that impact health and the choices that we as individuals have access to.

The Ozempic era has had a huge detrimental impact on the body liberation movement because it has burst the door wide open for pathologizing individuals' bodies as a problem. Something to be fixed. And luckily, we are all just a shot away from obtaining a 'normal, healthy' body.

But this is incorrect.

Size does not equal health.

Bodies don't need to be fixed.

Not all bodies are supposed to be thin.

Although I may end up spending the rest of my life sounding like a broken record, I will keep talking about these issues until I’m blue in the face because diet culture will keep reinventing itself. It will keep trying to disguise itself as something created to “help” us, when in fact, diet culture is a system of beliefs that worships thinness and equates it to health and moral virtue. It convinces us that weight loss and the attainment of a smaller body will make our lives better and “healthier,” regardless of the detrimental impact the means of attainment may have on our physical and mental health. That being thin is the goal at any cost, even if it means taking weight loss drugs that aren’t even FDA approved.

And let me be ever so clear, I am not judging anyone for taking weight loss drugs. I will never shame anyone for the choices and decisions they make for their own body. That’s not my job, and neither is it yours. I believe in body autonomy, the right to make decisions over one’s own body.

However, this is my gentle reminder that these companies in the diet industry – the ones that are now co-opting our language – do not, nor have they ever, had our best interests in mind. They aren’t concerned about our health. They are concerned with one thing and one thing only: their bottom line.

It's always been about profit margins over people, and that fact still remains.

And finally, I would be remiss is I didn’t remind that our bodies are just the shells that are allowing us to have this experience. In the words of Stephanie Chinn, it’s simply the keeper of our magic.

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