The March Madness That Is Women’s History Month
[guest post by Dana]
Not to beat a dead nag, but this is certainly the month that keeps on giving. As previously posted here, Women’s History Month brought us Sheryl Sanford’s national Ban Bossy campaign, wherein the public was exhorted to stop using the other B-word, lest there be hurt feelings or worse… We also had the We Nag You, Because We Love You campaign. This is the one where the White House, celebrity moms, and even Mrs. Obama herself, assured us that it’s not only okay to nag and guilt adult children into signing up for Obamacare, but that it’s a moral imperative: If you love them, you will…
And now to round out the month, we have a Fat Justice and Feminism seminar hosted by Swarthmore College and presented by two feminist organizers, Cora Segal and Nicole Sullivan, who describes herself as an “angry, man-hating lesbian,”
What follows are points made by the speakers and recorded by an attendee. The attendee’s counters to speaker comments are bracketed. Accusations and topics discussed included everything from the inventor of the Body Mass Index (BMI) being a white supremacist; socialism and communism being a viable alternative to capitalism and exploitation; discrimination toward the small-breasted; and, as is inevitable, a conservative is at the root of this injustice. In this case, Ronald Regan has the honors. Seriously. (…which is not how women will be taken if this madness doesn’t stop)…
Body Mass Index (BMI) is an entirely erroneous and useless metric, as it was invented by a “white, male, French astronomer,” Adolphe Quetelet. Thus BMI has “direct links to a white supremacist, patriarchal, colonizing, exploitative force.” [Quetelet was actually a Belgian mathematician – but a man responsible for evilness of this degree merits having his experience diminished and inaccurately represented, fair representation of facts be damned].
We should stop celebrating the heroes of women’s suffrage, because they “threw everyone else under the bus” in the name of their own social prestige. Many first-wave feminists had ties to flapper culture, but, far from being courageous and rebellious young women demonstrating their fortitude and independence in a male-dominated social scene, the flappers of the 1920s ought to be chided for a style that de-emphasized their distinctly feminine attributes, as it somehow reflected poorly on larger women with large breasts.
For Segal and Sullivan, the 1960s and 1970s were notable because they welcomed “communism and socialism as viable alternatives to capitalism and exploitation.” [No mention was made of the large-scale human exploitation experienced in the Soviet Union and China during these exact decades under Communist regimes]
Ronald Reagan is partially responsible for all suffering of fat people, as he “f*cked everything up.” [No specific evidence about Reagan’s perverse policies or animosity toward obese people was offered.]
One of the main problems with the “war” against obesity is that doctors did not start addressing the issue as a major health crisis until the 1990s. This demonstrates that obesity was not a threat to American public health until lobbyists in the “medical-industrial complex” infiltrated every doctor’s office in the country.
“There is no scientific consensus whatsoever that fat people need to exercise more, or that fat is unhealthy. There is no evidence that [being] fat causes diabetes. Medical professionals are informed of this so-called knowledge by lobbying groups.” [A quick glance at virtually any reputable medical source such as the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute lists demonstrates the increased risk to obese people of Coronary Heart Disease, Hypertension, Stroke, and a number of other life threatening conditions]
“Overweight people live longer. They’re better protected from heart disease.” [By using the term “overweight,” they skirted the fact that this does not apply to obese people; rather, it refers to those slightly overweight as opposed to extremely thin.]
Obese people who undergo gastric bypass surgery are “reduced to involuntary anorexia and bulimia.” Moreover, “every hospital in the country has a bariatric [surgery] unit.” Segal and Sullivan are also convinced that anesthesiologists lack the expertise to calculate anesthesia doses for larger patients and therefore purposely deny obese women’s access to late-term abortions by lying and saying they don’t have “enough anesthesia.”
–Dana
I wonder what it cost to host and/or attend this seminar?
There is truly one born every minute.
Pious Agnostic (7eb3b0) — 3/27/2014 @ 9:28 amAcademia will humor any nutcase extremist, provided that nutcase extremist be anti-white, anti-U.S., or anti-Israel. You say that Nicole Sullivan self-describes as an “angry, man-hating lesbian.” I am sure that is supposed to be somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but I am equally sure that Miss Sullivan is absolutely a third-rate thinker and basically a crude and stupid person.
JVW (9946b6) — 3/27/2014 @ 9:46 amMars Bars-lovin’ Naughty Nina Redux!!!
Colonel Haiku (c1bfa3) — 3/27/2014 @ 9:47 amPerhaps Swarthmore (often thought of as one of the best liberal arts colleges around) is trying to compete with Dartmouth for running after the PC validation index (PCVI).
I imagine she has fuel to fire her male-hating anger, and that is sad and unfortunate, but I don’t think giving seminars like this is going to be a help to her or to her audience. She probably would not be inclined to ask for prayer, but she needs it at least as much as I do.
MD in Philly (f9371b) — 3/27/2014 @ 9:48 amI’m no fan of the BMI having visited my appropriate weight only during extreme boughts with viruses or briefly in ultra-marathoning insanity years ago.
At my peak level of fitness I was overweight with a body-fat index of 10-12%.
I am big-boned. Uh, you have a dirty mind.
gary gulrud (e2cef3) — 3/27/2014 @ 10:09 amWell Swarthmore gave us Michael Dukakis, enough said.
narciso (3fec35) — 3/27/2014 @ 10:12 amLesbianism is the highest form of feminism according to the rad fems. All of you deluded by the white heteronormative patriarchy need to WAKE UP and smell the crazy.
daleyrocks (bf33e9) — 3/27/2014 @ 10:23 am@ gary gurlud,
I have my qualms about the BMI, as well. Not necessarily because I would have to be nearly anorexic to be within the accepted range, but because of its lack addressing the whole picture.
But I am honest enough to recognize the real problem of those extra pounds is still a hand-to-mouth problem, and nothing to do with Ronald Reagan.
Dana (9f8700) — 3/27/2014 @ 10:31 amThis is what happens to minds polluted with hatred. Segal and Sullivan may present themselves as angry man-hating lesbians, but behind the insane accusations and the idiot rhetoric, lying just under the skin, these sob sisters are life haters. For them, the glass is only half full because some big strong bully stole what was rightfully theirs so now everyone has to feel their pain.
ropelight (9a5314) — 3/27/2014 @ 10:53 am[By using the term “overweight,” they skirted the fact that this does not apply to obese people; rather, it refers to those slightly overweight as opposed to extremely thin.]
The big problem here is that ideal weight has been set too low, so a level characterized as overweight, in fact, isn’t.
Sammy Finkelman (2c707f) — 3/27/2014 @ 10:56 amI wish the left wingers could get behind one collective (pun intended) narrative.
On the one hand, Michelle O is telling everyone to “get moving!” and former Mayor Bloomberg was telling everyone they didn’t need to drink a Big Gulp at 7-Eleven.
And on the other hand, these ladies are telling America that being overweight is cool.
Or something.
One thing is for certain; left wingers are thin-skinned.
Elephant Stone (6a6f37) — 3/27/2014 @ 11:05 amThe government needs to mandate more women STEM Phd’s, whether they like it or not.
daleyrocks (bf33e9) — 3/27/2014 @ 12:19 pmSince the government has legislated the removal of gender based pricing in health insurance, out of fairness it must do the same in auto insurance (h/t Hoagie) and life insurance.
daleyrocks (bf33e9) — 3/27/2014 @ 12:22 pmBMI is neither erroneous or useless, it is merely an abused measurement. BMI as originally created was a statistic for the measurement of populations, but it was never intended to be applied to individuals. Thus while in the group consisting of people who have a BMI from 25-30 most will be overweight, some members of that population will be at a healthy weight for them as an individual, some members will be obese and some might even be underweight.
max (131bc0) — 3/27/2014 @ 2:17 pmI thought BMI was an airport abbreviation.
daleyrocks (bf33e9) — 3/27/2014 @ 2:24 pmThese women know they’re f#cked up. They are just trying to convince themselves otherwise. A nice woman –someone I know and like– quite innocently used the word “feminist” in a sentence recently and I screeched at her to lose that word from her vocabulary. I explained that “feminist” has an entirely different meaning and connotation now than it once had. I’ll be forwarding this post to her just as reinforcement, Dana. 🙂
elissa (1aca9b) — 3/27/2014 @ 3:11 pmLesbians are certainly not working for the cause of feminism. Let’s get real. The patriarchy is not going to f*** itself, now is it? Somebody has to do it and these ladies are declaring themselves conscientious objectors.
nk (dbc370) — 3/27/2014 @ 4:17 pmThanks, max, I didn’t know that.
MD in Philly (f9371b) — 3/27/2014 @ 4:30 pmLies,… and statistics…
I support ladies and lady parts!
Don’t judge me.
daleyrocks (bf33e9) — 3/27/2014 @ 4:56 pmAn old cowboy went to a bar and ordered a drink. As he sat sipping his whiskey, a young lady sat down next to him. She turned to the cowboy and asked, “Are you a real cowboy?”
He replied, “Well, I’ve spent my whole life on the ranch, herding horses, mending fences, and branding cattle, so I guess I am.”
She said, “I’m a lesbian. I spend my whole day thinking about women. As soon as I get up in the morning, I think about women. When I shower, I think about women. As I watch TV, or even eat, I think about women. Everything seems to make me think about women.”
The two sat sipping in silence. A short time later, a man sat down on the other side of the old cowboy and asked, “Are you a real cowboy?”
He replied, “I always thought I was, but I just found out that I’m a lesbian.”
nk (dbc370) — 3/27/2014 @ 5:04 pmthanks, nk.
mg (31009b) — 3/27/2014 @ 6:11 pmBabies 7, Pink Sneakers 0. http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/us-appeals-court-upholds-new-texas-abortion-rules/2014/03/27/ef6b30da-b612-11e3-bab2-b9602293021d_story.html
nk (dbc370) — 3/27/2014 @ 7:10 pmComment by max (131bc0) — 3/27/2014 @ 2:17 pm
It is a mis-used metric, I’ll give them that.
SarahW (267b14) — 3/28/2014 @ 8:30 amI had a stroke last year and my neurologist had a conversation with me that went somewhat like this:
“You know how you’re overweight, how you’re obese?”
“Yeah?”
“Stop it.”
I lost 60 lbs.
CrustyB (5a646c) — 3/28/2014 @ 10:08 am