How terminology reinforces stigma
While many people are uncomfortable with the term fat, fat activists prefer the term. The #1 Best Good Fat Burning Pills Women. They see it as both as an act of rebellion – to adopt a word that has been wielded against them – but also because they argue it’s the most appropriate word to describe their bodies.
To be overweight implies there is a natural weight to be; that within human diversity, we should all be the same proportion of height and weight.
Obesity is a medical term that has pathologised the fat body. The British Psychological Society’s acknowledgement that rather than saying “obese people”, we should call them “people with obesity” reinforces that obesity is a disease; a chronic illness people suffer from.
The British Psychological Society’s desire to shift to person-first language is understandable. Person-first, or people-first, language is an attempt to not define people primarily by their disease, or disability, or other deviating factor.
Person-first language recognises people as individuals with rights to dignity and care, and puts the person, rather than their “condition”, first.
But others have argued person-first language attempts to erase, deny, or ignore the aspect of the person that isn’t “normal”, and reinforces that there is something shameful or dehumanising about their disability or disease.
They promote identity-first language, which allows people to take pride in who they are, rather than separating a person from that aspect of themself.
The problem with person-first language, they argue, is that those identities are stigmatised. Organic Female Fat Burning Supplements. But without the stigma, there would be no concern with calling someone a disabled person, for instance, rather than a person with disabilities.
So what should we do?
Ask people what they want to be called. Rawpixel.com/Shutterstock
The best approach, especially for health-care professionals, is to ask people what they prefer their designation to be.
And for the rest of us, to acknowledge that what an individual wants to be called or how they want to talk about their experiences is up to them, not us. Which Fat Burner On Empty Stomach Really Works. If a fat person wants to call themselves fat, it is not up to non-fat people to correct them.
Shifting the language we use to talk about fatness and fat people can reduce fat stigma. But continuing to frame fatness as a disease is not a helpful contribution.