Today, I’m sharing a video review with you of the non-fiction book Fat!So? by Marilyn Wann. I hope you enjoy, and thanks for watching. I’m no professional vlogger, so enjoy the ride.
quotes from fat!so?
“People with the same height and weight could have radically different fitness levels, nutrition habits, blood pressure, blood sugar, and cholesterol numbers. They would have the same BMI, but totally different health profiles.”
“If your doctor suggests a diet, ask, ‘Why would you recommend any treatment that has a 90 percent failure rate?'”
Books of Fall 🍂🎃🍵
- Feeding Ghosts by Tessa Hulls
- Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
- Just Desserts by G.A. McKevett
- Slewfoot by Brom
- She Throws Herself Forward to Stop the Fall by Dave Newman
- Submerged by Hillel Levin
- The Unmothers by Leslie J. Anderson
- Homing by Sherrie Flick (DNF)
- The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories by Angela Carter (DNF)
- Ask Elizabeth: Real Answers to Everything You Secretly Wanted to Ask about Love, Friends, Your Body — and Life in General by Elizabeth Berkley (DNF)
- No Good Deed by Allison Brennan (#10)
- Fat! So? by Marilyn Wann
- Notes on an Execution by Danya Kukafka
- The West Passage by Jared Pechaček
- Quest for the Unknown: Bizarre Phenomena by Reader’s Digest
- Icebreaker by Hannah Grace
- A Life in Letters by Zora Neale Hurston
- Bitter Thirst by S.M. Reine (Preternatural Affairs #8)
- Deaf Eyes on Interpreting, edited by Thomas H. Holcomb and David H. Smith
- Compassion, Michigan by Raymond Luczak
- Syd Arthur by Ellen Frankel
Grab the Lapels 
Paper dolls! I had paper dolls when I was a kid! Loved them! There are so many variables to a person’s health other than weight and yet we persist in putting all the emphasis on it anyway. Like you said, a fat person can be healthy and a skinny person can be in terrible health. It’s really sad that we still can’t get past that.
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I remember seeing studies of thin people who are incredibly unhealthy. The fat wasn’t on their stomachs, where we normally see it, but instead focused around their organs, which is incredibly dangerous.
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When I see video review I internally groan because it’s going to take longer to hear than it would to read, but when it’s you I can’t resist because your presentation is so natural, so lighthearted but so serious as well. I thoroughly enjoyed this review. The book looks wonderful. I’m lucky enough never to have really had a weight issue but I’d be tempted to buy this book because it sounds so sensible and perhaps possibly applicable to wider body and health issues.
I loved paper dolls when I was a kid and they were around in your time because I remember buying a paper doll book for my daughter who was born a year or two after you. It was one of those old-fashioned looking books but it was a modern book. I guess they were a cheap way of providing dolls to little girls in the past. And you could draw your own clothes for them once you tired of the ones that came with the dolls.
By the way we have that same shelving system in our house that you have behind you with your plants. It’s a great little system isn’t it?
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Hahaha, this is why I don’t do video reviews very often. I just knew that this book deserve a video, though, because it’s so great to look at. Also, I couldn’t show you the flipbook with just pictures! It kind of cracks me up how much I kept giggling during the video because I was amusing to myself. Is that terrible or just wonderful? I’m a little hesitant about the expression weight issue because typically the issue is societal, not personal. If society can’t match different kinds of body types, and I do mean fat people, disabled people, parents pushing strollers, elderly people using walkers, etc, then the issue doesn’t seem to me to be a personal problem.
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Wonderful, not terrible, because it was a joyful join-in sort of giggling.
Language is a challenge isn’t it!! Technically weight issue doesn’t have to mean personal – it just means weight is an issue – but connotatively it tends to suggest it’s personal. Context can sway that a bit?
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Lots of people who are fat don’t feel that they have any issue, which is why I feel like it’s societal. Typically, other people are telling them they have an issue.
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Ordinarily I will not watch videos but I wanted to know what you thought of this book bad enough I found some time and watched it. I’m amazed that you have the courage (and as you said of the little dancing lady flip book, you go girl!) to take a book like that out in public. I own a copy and have it stuck into my bedside table so no one but me will see it. Thank goodness for you and people like Wann, changing a few judgy attitudes.
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I’m so glad you watched, Jeanne! I don’t do video reviews very often, but I felt like I couldn’t do this one to justice by just describing what it looked like. I’m curious about what your hesitation is, to take this book out in public, I mean. What might happen? Similarly, I read a book about disability (the review goes up next week I believe) in which the author talks about how statistically, everyone’s going to be disabled at some point in time. I feel like there’s a lot of crossover between disability activism and fat activism. The issue tends to be societal, not personal. This past weekend, I went to a large deaf festival that was held inside a completely accessible building. They host the special Olympics there, too. It was amazing to see a microcosm of what society could be if we all got on board with accessibility.
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What might happen if I took a book like that out in public? Just a little more of the same, probably, like why fat people don’t eat much in public if they can help it. The recent downturn in public civility hasn’t improved the million daily little judgy looks and comments, although getting old and being obviously disabled has, to some extent–it’s a good trick for a person as big as I am to become invisible!
There are little daily things we can all do to help improve accessibility. I contribute to an app called “roll mobility” that gives people details about how accessible certain businesses and restaurants are for the mobility impaired. My friends and family have gotten way more outspoken to people they see parking in a handicapped space “just for a minute.” We do have a funny story about the time they confronted a woman for parking in a handicapped space and she said she had to because her hair was on fire. Literally!
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Oh, that app sounds wonderful! It’s like the book I read about fat girls hiking that shares every place the author and her cohort have been that includes accessible trails and had benches and bathrooms.
If I read Fat!So? in public and someone gave me a look, I would say, “look!” and show them the flip book lady. I’m going to assume they’re curious, even if their face looks like they ate shit, as a way to diffuse.
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Sorry, I haven’t watched the video. When I was in my twenties I lived on Coke and diet pills (to stay awake) and I have the teeth – or gaps – to prove it. But I can’t stand Coke or any chemical drink now.
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Well, now my whole image of you has just changed into a cute lil jack-o-lantern driving a semi. I can’t believe the things truckers do to stay awake. I think the laws in the US around how long you can be on the road have changed drastically in recent years.
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There is so much to love in this book – the paper dolls! The photos!!! Man those photos are so awesome. This should be required reading for everyone in North America
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I loved it and I hope you read it. It’s totally worth having a paper copy. It’s the kind of book you can put on your shelf and turn back to whenever you feel like society’s getting you down. It’s from the ’90s, but it’s still crazy relevant.
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I loved your video! Especially your delighted giggle at the flip book! 😂 I have to say I do love Diet Coke, especially from a fountain, with ice. I genuinely love the taste! Also Dr. Pepper Zero. This book sounds awesome and I will see if my library has it. I think so much of a person’s health is influenced by genetics. Which is totally out of your control. But doing things that make you feel good (fun movement, eating fruits and veggies you enjoy) is very important no matter what your weight.
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The author is absolutely not against health. I think that’s something that we hear a lot of now; that fat activists are glorifying obesity. I’m sure you’ve heard that phrase before. What Wann is saying is that you don’t have to do activity that feels like punishment to get a health benefit, and you really should eat fruits and vegetables, things like that. And if you’re working toward your health goals and you’re still fat, then you’re just fat. It’s not always indicative of your health. And I’m sure you know that when people lose a drastic amount of weight, that tends to cause health issues itself. I’m with you that I love Dr. Pepper, but I still thought the little quiz thing was funny. I was giggly during this video, you’re right! 🤣
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Yes, I am with her – you can do all the “right” things and still be fat. Like you can also do the “right” things and still get sick. I think everyone is just meant to be different and people need to chill out!!
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