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PaperclipPerfector  2yr ago (text post)   36198 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 26, 2023

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staying healthy

I need to nitpick this slightly, because I think the NYPost is being deliberately dishonest in their framing. Yes, there's some wokeish language in the body of the AMA report they're referencing and mocking, but that really isn't the punchline. Here's their actual conclusion:

  • This report evaluates the problematic history of BMI and explores other alternatives to BMI. It outlines the harms and benefits to using BMI and points out that BMI is inaccurate in measuring body fat in multiple groups because it does not account for the heterogeneity across race/ethnic groups, sexes, and age-span. The recommendations recognize the issues with the use of BMI clinically, and highlights the need to use other methods. This report also acknowledges that AMA did not participate in the development of the “Indications for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery” guidelines and therefore cannot endorse these guidelines. recognize the significant limitations and potential harms associated with the widespread use of body mass index (BMI) in clinical settings and supports its use only in a limited screening capacity when used in conjunction with other more valid measures of health and wellness; and support the use of validated, easily obtained alternatives to BMI (such as relative fat mass, body adiposity index, and the body volume index) for estimating risk of weight-related disease; and amend policy H-440.866...

Go read the whole thing for both the woke nonsense, but more importantly to get the sense that woke nonsense is emphatically not what they're hitting on, and they're especially not saying that it's racist to consider obesity a health risk. I've defended BMI as a decent enough starting metric, but more fine-grained distinction of looking at body-fat and other metrics really are superior, and there really is considerable heterogeneity across height, gender, and ethnicity.

That said, I'm sure there are plenty of other examples of more extreme people claiming that health is just a social construct promoting whiteness, since I've read such ridiculousness myself, but I find this example to be pretty weak.

Ok, how about this clip covering a woman of color, and equity director, who does not believe obesity has any health consequences, or that nutrition is real at all, to the Nutrition Council?

https://youtube.com/watch?v=cd-VnRofGcU

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