Killer Fat: Media, Medicine, and Morals in the American "Obesity Epidemic" PDF

Rating: (3 reviews) Author: Visit Amazon's Natalie Boero Page ISBN : 9780813564852 New from $23.36 Format: PDF

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Review

"Boero’s analysis provides an insightful perspective on the framing of the obesity epidemic. Her book is an engaging and fascinating read, as well as a vital contribution to medical sociology."

(Jennifer Fosket McGill University 2012-02-29)

"Boero weighs in powerfully for healthy sanity in the 'war against obesity.' Killer Fat clarifies complex science, punitive clinical care, and the relentless screech of the media with aplomb. Brava!"

(Adele E. Clarke UC San Francisco 2012-04-06)

"This book is both an enjoyable read and incredibly informative. Written in a style that is both authoritative and accessible, Natalie Boero's Killer Fat is a must-read for anyone seeking to understand the so-called 'Obesity Epidemic.'"

(Kjerstin Gruys author of Mirror, Mirror Off the Wall 2013-02-21)

"Killer Fat is a significant contribution to the project of skepticism about the so-called 'obesity' epidemic and a compassionate exploration of the burdens it imposes on individuals' lives."

(Marilyn Wann author of FAT!SO? 2013-03-15)

About the Author

NATALIE BOERO is an associate professor of sociology at San Jose State University. She is the author of “Bypassing Blame: Bariatric Surgery and the Case of Biomedical Failure” in Biomedicalization: Technoscience, Health, and Illness in U.S. Biomedicine and “Fat Kids, Working Moms, and the ‘Epidemic of Obesity’: Race, Class, and Mother-Blame,” in The Fat Studies Reader.

Direct download links available for PRETITLE Killer Fat: Media, Medicine, and Morals in the American "Obesity Epidemic" POSTTITLE

• Product Details
• Table of Contents
• Reviews

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: Rutgers University Press; Reprint edition (July 15, 2013)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0813564859
• ISBN-13: 978-0813564852
• Product Dimensions: 0.4 x 6 x 9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)

Killer Fat: Media, Medicine, and Morals in the American "Obesity Epidemic" PDF

What is fascinating about this book is the vivid and detailed information that San Jose State University sociology Associate Professor Natalie Boero provides about what it's like to be fat. Especially interesting is her experience with Weight Watchers and Overeaters Anonymous in Chapter 3. She went to their meetings and conducted interviews. She analyzed and reported on the various degrees of success and failure experienced by clients. She compared and contrasted the two approaches and exposed the underlying assumptions. In short, Weight Watchers uses a diet-based, point-counting formula while Overeaters Anonymous follows the Alcoholic Anonymous approach.

Boero labels their differing approaches respectively as the "normative pathology model" and the "unique disease model." She thinks that Weight Watchers see women as "emotional eaters...prone to excess." In the Overeaters Anonymous mindset, obesity is a "chronic and incurable disease" best treated with a 12-step social program.

Also fascinating was Chapter 4 in which Boero looks into bariatric surgery and finds it wanting justification. She makes a strong case by showing that even after surgery many people were still obese and others became obese again. Even the successful clients were not home free since they had to maintain a strict diet lest they extend their stomachs making it likely that they would gain back the weight they lost. She argues that it is a serious question about whether "gastric bypass is more akin to a surgically enforced eating disorder than it is to a surgical cure for obesity." (p. 121)

I think the book would have reached more readers if Boero had begun with these chapters since they are eye-opening and interesting.