OK, Let's Talk About the AAP Guidelines
Here's your safe space. Harold is not invited.
Yesterday, a piece I’ve been working on all month about the AAP’s new guidelines for the treatment of ob*sity ran in New York Times’ Opinion. It is always interesting to go back out into genpop with these issues and the response has been exactly what I expected: Emails, tweets and a heck of a lot of DMs from the Harolds and the Franks, telling me I’m “ignoring the evidence,” and then telling on themselves in so many other ways. To be clear, I’m fine. And I’ve got a massive piece coming for you Tuesday that will do a much deeper dive into all of that evidence, and problems therein.
But for today, I just want to offer up a safe space for us to process it all. I know the news that pediatricians may now start pushing weight loss interventions on kids as young as two has hit a lot of us very, very hard. If you’ve been following this story and having feelings—as a fat person, as a former fat kid, as a parent of fat kids, as a human being who cares about other human beings—you are welcome here to vent, rant, and support others who are venting and ranting. We will keep fighting for change, but we have to feel our feelings too.
On a related note: Our next community podcast episode will be all about the guidelines, and we want your thoughts! How are you responding as a parent? As a healthcare professional working to reduce weight stigma in your field? As a former fat kid? Etc? We won’t share comments from today’s discussion without following up for permission, but if you’re interested in participating, feel free to note that below. Or, even better, record a voice memo on your phone (we LOVE to hear Burnt Toast voices!!) and email it to Corinne at virginiasolesmith.assistant@gmail.com.
Friday Links
Because I feel like we could all use some JOY after this dumpster fire, here is a recording of the delightful conversation I had with Aubrey Gordon last week to celebrate her new (and New York Times bestselling!!!) book, You Just Need To Lose Weight and 19 Other Myths About Fat People. We touch on the AAP news a bit, and I so appreciated Aubrey’s framing on this: We’re making progress and that means the fight is intensifying. That feels extremely right.