Female genital mutilation, which, according to this NY Times article, has only been illegal in the US since 1996, is still the norm in at least 29 nations, according the UN. Despite the ban on the practice in Western countries … Continue reading
A co-authored piece, “Trigger Warnings Are Flawed,” appeared in Inside Higher Ed earlier this year to explain how the movement to introduce trigger warnings into a classroom setting is already having a “chilling effect” on pedagogy. The authors proceed to … Continue reading
Following up on other related posts, this just in from NPR: “A Fresh Cry Of Pain: Fat-Shaming In Science.” From an interview for a lab position: “She told me that her team did a lot of collaborative work in this … Continue reading
Many of you will have already seen Paul Krugman’s Sunday Op-ed piece presenting a defense of the Obama presidency that can be summed up succinctly: “Health reform is a very big deal; if you care about the future, action on … Continue reading
It is well known that men outnumber women in philosophy – as students, as academics, as authors and as perceived authorities. The imbalance can seem intractable and firmly entrenched; it is discouraging to our students and potentially distressing for those … Continue reading
Of the top 100 domestic U.S. grossing films of 2013, women comprised 15% of protagonists, 29% of major characters and 30% of speaking characters – numbers that have barely changed since the 1940s. Given these ridiculous numbers, we as spectators … Continue reading
This doesn’t really have anything to do with feminist bioethics, but it does tie in with a series of posts Tim ran at the beginning of the year about adjunct exploitation In the area of beneficial generic cialis online testimonials, … Continue reading
From the Commonwealth Fund report: The United States health care system is the most expensive in the world, but this report and prior editions consistently show the U.S. underperforms relative to other countries on most dimensions of performance. Among the … Continue reading
Predictions made ten years ago about the proposed ban on smoking in Irish pubs turned out to be dead wrong. An article in the New York Times provides details about compliance with the ban, noting that not only was it … Continue reading
Worth the laugh. Over the weekend, anti-feminists on 4chan started the Twitter hashtag #EndFathersDay to trick people into thinking feminists were rallying on Twitter against Father’s Day. Despite there being zero evidence of a The best way to buy both … Continue reading
“Orange Is the New Black” enters a landscape that labels non-thin bodies, at best, unattractive and, at worst, diseased, and inverts Along with the above nutritional pet medicationyou should sildenafil sale confirm that your companion get plenty of work out, … Continue reading
Something is changing the bodies of Americans. 1 in 3 are now overweight or obese, with a variety of possible causes and impacts. But how important is this, medically? And what ought physicians to do about it? Should they aim their impressive modern toolkits at the malfunctions which follow obesity for some obese patients? Or at obesity and body size, itself? Many readers of this blog may be aware that on Tuesday, June 18 of 2013, the American Medical Association (AMA)’s House of Delegates endorsed further medicalization (for more on this notion, skip to the end* of this piece) of obesity. In doing so, the AMA went against the strong recommendations of its own Council on Science and Public Health. Obesity, once considered a risk condition for diseases and malfunctions such as diabetes and joint pain has now, itself, been classified as a disease by the AMA. Rather than aiming at what follows obesity for some obese patients, we are now aiming at body size for all obese patients.
Holley Mangold, Olympic athlete, member of the 2012 U.S. Weightlifting team. Her personal record in the combined snatch and clean-and-jerk is 562.2 pounds. With obesity defined as a disease, she is by definition unhealthy. Photo credit: Scripps Howard News Service.
As the AMA acknowledged in its resolution, the organization is by no means the first to make this classification: “The World Health Organization, Food and Drug Administration (FDA), National Institutes of Health (NIH), the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists, and Internal Revenue Service recognize obesity as a disease.” Indeed, the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists and the American College of Cardiology pushed hard to have the AMA recognize obesity as a disease even after the Council on Science and Public Health recommended against it.
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