Fat: More than a feminist issue

2002-01-23 11:55

Astrid Zweynert

London - Fat used to be a feminist issue. Now it's universal.

The psychotherapist who helped Princess Diana overcome bulimia says eating disorders have reached near-epidemic levels.

"When I first wrote about this, the problem was pretty much hidden ... I didn't expect it to get as bad as it is," Susie Orbach, an international authority on eating disorders, said.

Orbach must at times think the strident anti-diet message of her ground-breaking book Fat is a Feminist Issue has got lost since it was written more than 20 years ago.

Girls, boys, old people - even the famously well-rounded female population of Fiji is falling victim to fat fears.

"If anything, the situation has got much, much worse. We now have kids as young as eight and women in old people's homes obsessed with the way they look," Orbach said in an interview.

Concern about the marketing of thinness has surfaced in many of her books, the latest of which has just been published.

On Eating has been noted for its self-help format and slender appearance - but Orbach, adept at combining polemic with a rigorous academic approach, has no problem with re-packaging her "eat when you're hungry" message.

"It's a basic message at one level, but very complex on another because young people have to relearn how to deal with food and to recognise when they are hungry."

Even though it has been documented that repeated dieting results in little more than regaining most of the lost weight, surveys show constant calorie-counting has become a way of life for many women.

A Mori poll published this month showed 48 percent of British women aged 25 to 35 were on some kind of diet and that 20 percent of young women dieted all or most of the time.

Two thirds would swap their body and one in five said they would pop a pill to give them their ideal shape, even if it meant risking their health.

World-wide, 70 million people are estimated to have an eating disorder. Most are women, but men are increasingly affected too, according to the US-based Alliance for Eating Disorders Awareness.

At the same time, figures for obesity are rocketing.

More than half the women and two-thirds of the men in Britain weigh too much, while in the United States more than one quarter of adults and about one in five children are overweight, according to the American Obesity Association.

'Diet virus' spreads

Obsession with body image is not just a western problem, Orbach points out.

Globalisation has extended fashion's corrupting pull into the developing world, she said, and a society's modernity can be measured by the level of new eating disorders it experiences.

As an example she cited how since television arrived in the South Pacific islands, young Fijian women have become so dissatisfied with their opulent bodies that bulimia is increasing.

The "insane" notion that ideal female beauty is a very thin body could be changed, Orbach said, if clothing manufacturers and magazines reflected images of women of all shapes instead of opting for skeletal-like models and stick-thin actresses.

But that is easier said than done.

Voluptuous catwalk model Sophie Dahl shed pounds after hiring a personal trainer, while actress Kate Winslet - a one-time vocal opponent of diets - now shows off her much slimmer waistline on the cover of glossy magazines.

Another way of freeing us of the "diet virus" would be a major campaign involving the media, fashion industry, governments and international organisations is needed, Orbach says.

She has begun talking to decision-makers in the advertising industry to run a progressive campaign aimed at helping women to accept their different body shapes instead of constantly attacking and judging their bodies.

"We're trying to involve idols of the young, like pop stars, in this campaign as well as trying to work with health visitors, the health system, school teachers - you have to attack this on lots of different fronts."

To get her message across she is also considering talking to pop stars such as "Posh Spice" Victoria Beckham and her former colleague Geri Halliwell, both of whom have admitted having suffered from eating disorders.

- Reuters