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Welcome to Indulgence Gospel After Dark. This month we asked our favorite question—IS IT A DIET?— about…
⭐️ Electrolytes! (Corinne is mad)
⭐️ Journaling!
⭐️ That viral sweet potato/ground beef/cottage cheese bowl!
⭐️ Living without furniture (yes really)!
⭐️ And so much more…
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Is Kids Eat In Color anti-diet?
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Episode 196 Transcript
Corinne
Today we’re doing a mailbag episode, and today’s episode has a theme: “Is this a diet?” That is a framing that we use a lot on Burnt Toast. So we asked listeners to tell us which food, fitness, and lifestyle trends you wanted us to analyze and decide “diet or not a diet?”
Virginia
We should disclaim before we get started: This is a hot takes episode. We have not done extensive reporting. We haven’t done serious research on any of these. We’re going to look at them, and we’re going to give you our immediate assessments, and you might agree or totally disagree, and that is great. We are here for that.
Corinne
Before we dive into the individual topics, should we talk a little bit more about the whole “Is it a diet” thing?
Is Everything a Diet?
What walking pads, breast reductions, and native plants have in common — and why it makes people mad.
Virginia
Yes, because this is one of the most common “annoyed reader” comments we get: Virginia, you think everything is a diet. So I wrote an essay about this, where I sketched out why I use this framing so often. Because I think a lot of us have this sense that we are the problem. Like, “I just get really obsessive if I do step counting.” Or “I am such an overachiever," and it was so hard for me to not get straight As in school.” Or “I have to compulsively people please,” like all these ways that we like, try to be perfect.
We think it’s us, that somehow we are wired to want to be that way. And, I mean, you might come from a family of people who’ve done this. There is all of that backstory. But we also live in a culture that is telling us, especially women, that we have to live that way in order to be valuable.
So that is what I am always trying to push back against, both for myself and as a culture critic.
Corinne
I think that makes sense. And we have discussed in the past how some people have the ability to do diet-y things without it feeling like a diet for them.
Virginia
Absolutely. If we say something is a diet, we’re not saying you were on a diet for doing it. We’re saying this is a concept that has the potential to be executed in a diet-y manner.
Corinne
And we’re not saying if you like any of these things that you’re bad or wrong. There are some things we’re going to discuss which, personally, I like.
Virginia
Corinne is on all the diets.
