Diet Culture Isn't Real

The Reification of Anti Diet Ideology

To start off I know this will be a controversial piece. Many professionals are entrenched in an ideology whether they’re conscious of it or not. You see this all over social media with the anti-diet, HAES, intuitive eating, and or food freedom stamp in someone's bio or even in their social media handle. But this is a conversation that needs to happen, ideology clouds objective insight and discourse.

First, I will consolidate the methods of intuitive eating, HAES, and food freedom when I refer to ‘anti-diet’. Anti diet will include all weight-neutral approaches in the medical and nutrition space; when I say anti-diet ideology I am referring to the collective methods and ideas of weight neutrality in the health and nutrition space. The antithesis to anti-diet ideology is diet culture.

Diet culture is defined as a belief system that focuses on and values weight, shape, and size over well-being. Christy Harrison, dietitian and author of the book Anti Diet, states this belief system entails worshipping thinness, promotes weight loss to attain higher status, demonizes certain ways of eating over others, and oppresses people who do not match up with the supposed picture of health. Proponents who support the anti-diet narrative also attribute the creation of food rules to manipulate body size as stemming from diet culture.

Now there is a lot to get into when it comes to the concept of diet culture but what is clear is the political connotation. Thin individuals are seen as ‘privileged’ and fat people are seen as ‘oppressed’, both results come from diet culture according to the anti-diet ideology. Diet culture is noted as something we ‘can’t see’ until we become aware of it, this eerily reflects the notion of critical consciousness stemming from social justice scholarship. Critical consciousness involves seeing society in terms of systems of power, privilege, dominance, oppression, and marginalization. This concept is clearly reflected in the writings about diet culture, a great example comes from Christy Harrison, “Diet culture is a form of oppression, and dismantling it is essential for creating a world that's just and peaceful for people in ALL bodies.” Does this perpetuation of diet culture as ‘oppressive’ truly resolve issues we need in the fitness and wellness industry? Hopefully, my argument will help shed some light on the problems with the current view of diet culture

My argument will consist of the following points:

1. The current view of diet culture is reductionist.

2. The current view of diet culture is tribalistic.

3. Anti diet ideology is recifying diet culture.

Reductionism

When all you have is a hammer every problem looks like a nail. I am sure many people have heard of that expression before; that expression implies the need for different tools for different problems. It seems pretty foolish to solve complex issues with simple solutions because those solutions might miss the complexity of the initial issue. This foolishness translates to diet culture, diet culture is the hammer, and issues in health are perceived to be the nail.

To anti-diet ideology the obesity epidemic is caused by diet culture, issues in healthcare are caused by diet culture, nonsensical diet products being sold are because of diet culture, and anything else you can think seems to be caused or directly related to diet culture. Some might argue this is not what they’re arguing yet there are some people blatantly arguing diet culture being the root of these countless issues. Saying, implying, or insinuating diet culture in of itself is the cause of matters such as the obesity epidemic is reductionist.

Our perception of weight and health can be largely informed by science. There is data supporting the idea obesity is caused by a multitude of factors including genetics, behaviors, and the food environment. The implication many people are obese because of diet culture takes away the nuance of the illness and those affected by it. It reduces the narrative to a simple you are either the victim or perpetrator; the perpetrator being diet culture and all its constituents and the victim fat people and or dieters. The NEDA states this when it comes to resisting diet culture, “When you see someone pathologizing fat bodies, you can explain that there are healthy and unhealthy people of every shape and size and that adding healthism to sizeism is not a good look.” While it is true a person can have a disease at any body size there is no denying those who are at higher body fat percentages are at increased risk of many diseases. But to suggest this is a tenant of diet culture shows the ideology has effectively reduced a complex health issue (obesity) into a sociopolitical struggle with a binary outcome (resisting diet culture).

The concept of diet culture is a springboard for people into categories of “fat” people and “thin” people. The “thin” people have privilege while the “fat” people are oppressed. These categories effectively reduce complex social interactions into neat dichotomous boundaries of oppressed and privileged people based on physical characteristics. However, a person can lose weight and not be fat or gain weight to become fat; being fat is not a permanent physical characteristic that cannot be changed unlike race, height, or eye color (no contacts don’t count). The boundary between “thin” and “fat” arbitrarily decided by anti-diet ideology is also reductionist because it ignores the fact a person can be “thin” or “fat” due to other factors not only choice (even though choice does play a role). A person can be “thin” because they can’t afford food so they cannot eat; a person can be “fat” because they choose to eat a lot of ultra-processed foods that contain a lot of calories. Both examples are oversimplified but they’re counterexamples to the seemingly false dichotomy between thin and fat people. A person isn’t necessarily thin because they’re privileged and another person isn’t necessarily fat because they’re marginalized.

There are many complex circumstances that can push an individual to become obese or not. These factors do not necessarily favor the health of obese individuals. This individual would probably be physically healthier with less body fat and more lean mass. Spearheading diet culture as a means to justify obesity and giving simple explanations to complex issues reduces these issues to ideological sound bites. In order to combat the problems related to health we need to see complex issues as complex; we can not reduce these complexities to reductionist ideological “us vs. them” narratives about diet culture.

Tribalism

Anti diet ideology often frames diet culture as a malicious entity that must be resisted, a monster that has its ‘tentacles’ wrapped in the medical field, a pervasive system that is connected to western culture, and a thief that steals life. Diet culture in one word is the enemy of anti-diet ideology. This enemy immediately frames a state of conflict between diet culture and what is not diet culture (anti-diet ideology). How can this conflict come to a peaceful resolution? Well, many in the anti-diet crowd are not particularly helpful with this. Advocates of anti-diet ideology often put ideology over science, are not charitable when assuming intent, and perpetuate forms of misinformation (e.g. 95% of diets fail).

Diet culture entrenches people in particular frames of belief. You’re either supporting diet culture or against diet culture. As the EDRDPRO states, “Diet culture says you should lose weight and keep it off, live a lifestyle of forever dieting, hate yourself and your body, talk bad about yourself and other people of size, feel worthless unless you are dieting or trying to lose weight.” This demonization of diet culture clearly incites a conflict, an idea you need to fight against this and if you don’t you’re part of the problem. This can quickly lead to a “us vs. them” dynamic, anti-diet knows better and diet culture is evil so be a part of anti-diet to resist diet culture. This group frames itself as good (anti-diet) while this other force is evil (diet culture). But is this dynamic accurate? Is diet culture an actual thing? How can we have an objective discussion surrounding these ideas? What if I don’t believe diet culture is a thing? Am I just blinded by diet culture?

The opposition against diet culture can effectively cut off the conversation. If I want to lose weight for my health an individual on the anti-diet side can just say diet culture is fooling me without taking anything else into account. It’s not a helpful discussion to encompass oneself around an ideology because there probably won’t be an objective evaluation of claims in that ideology. We have objective science surrounding weight loss. Does this mean everyone should lose weight? No, it does not, but it does warrant individual consideration. This individual consideration and nuance are lost when the boogeyman of diet culture is propped up. Anti diet ideology becomes a tribe that excludes methods, ideas, and stances that do not agree with the tribe.

This lack of consideration is illustrated perfectly by NEDA stating, “This is why a Size Acceptance/Health at Every Size® paradigm is the only acceptable paradigm.” This is not a considerate statement and seeks to assert a paradigm as absolute. Let's make this clear, no paradigm is absolute as they all have limitations, to suggest otherwise is tribalistic.

Reification

Imagine I have an invisible friend named Bob. Bob likes to break the rules and be a rebel so he often steals, speeds on the highway, start fights, and commits other crimes. I always hang out with Bob when he commits these actions, since no one can see Bob the responsibility falls on me. One day Bob is speeding on the highway and he gets pulled over by a police officer. The cop walks up to the driver's side window, I am in the driver's seat and no one else is in the car. I insist it was Bob who was speeding not me, do you think the officer will believe me? Of course not because Bob is an abstract personification of my law-breaking ways I just made up.

Is there a guy named Bob who breaks the law? That is probably true. Is there a guy named Bob who breaks the law and is my friend? That is a possibility. Is my friend Bob invisible? Highly unlikely, but how do I know this is highly unlikely? The current weight of the evidence does not support a person can become invisible, it also doesn’t support my claim someone named Bob is invisible let alone this invisible Bob is breaking the laws around me. The theory I’ve created to justify my law-breaking is my invisible friend named Bob but it is highly improbable and lacks evidence.

Theory can be defined as an explanation that proposes unobserved objects, events, forces, properties, etc. to account for an observed phenomenon. We theorize all the time in our lives. The bus was probably late because of traffic, a person cannot directly know this without seeing their bus in the traffic but the explanation proposes an unobserved event (traffic) to account for the phenomenon (lateness). I made up a theory about my invisible friend Bob to justify me breaking the law, the unobserved force (Bob) explained the observed phenomenon (breaking the law).

I would argue diet culture is a theory to explain observed phenomena. If you read into the resources I quoted from, diet culture in the anti-diet ideology can explain the obsession with thinness, thin privilege, problems in the medical field, the obesity epidemic, and probably more. All of which are observable phenomena or seem to be observed by those in the ideology. However, just because you make up a theory does not make that theory true, anyone can make any theory to explain anything. I made up a theory about invisible Bob that wasn’t true but germ theory is true. So, what differentiates a theory we should accept from one we should reject?

The ability to make a bold prediction separates an acceptable theory from a rejectable theory. If a theory is true it should be able to be tested, this test should be in the form of a bold difficult prediction. The prediction from the theory should be directly observable. If I want my theory of invisible Bob to be true I will make the bold prediction Bob will pick up my soda can, walk 6 feet to the trash can, and drop the can in the trash can. Of course, I would have to be clever about my test by making sure independent observers are present, I’m not next to the can, there is no magnet, etc… However, if it can be verified a can of soda floated through the air, traveled six feet, and was dropped in the trash can with no outside manipulation, then my theory about invisible Bob is supported. Maybe Bob is a real person who is invisible.

The problem with diet culture is the fact it lacks any evidence of being true. Yes, it is a theory that can explain a set of observations but anyone can make up a theory to explain any observation. Without being tested by making a bold prediction that can be observed we cannot say with certainty whether diet culture is real or not. Yet people still treat it like it is real stating, diet culture ‘steals’ life, diet culture must be ‘resisted’, diet culture is a ‘40 billion-dollar industry’, etc... How can that possibly be verified as true? So far no one has verified it as true. Diet culture is an abstract concept treated as if it is a concrete entity or force, this is known as reification or the fallacy of misplaced concreteness. There is no evidence diet culture has an influence on concrete reality, there is no testing diet culture with a bold prediction. Diet culture is a theoretical concept, an interesting explanation that cannot be proven nor disproven. To suggest diet culture is a concrete entity or force acting upon reality in the absence of evidence is fallacious.

Conclusion

Diet culture is defined as a belief system that focuses on and values weight, shape, and size over well-being. It is a theory used to explain phenomena, ranging from supplement company marketing to the obesity epidemic. Unfortunately, seeing extremely elaborate issues from the frame of diet culture reduces the issue into ideological sound bites which are framed as a dichotomy. You are either with diet culture or against it, this leads to an overly simplistic narrative riddled with ideological overtones.

This reductionist narrative gives way to tribalism, anti-diet is fighting against diet culture and diet culture is bad. If you support diet culture in any way you are either bad or a victim. If you want to be liberated or free you need to join the anti-diet side, obvious problems with that conclusion. A conclusion that is divisive and seeks to support one's own tribe.

Lastly, diet culture is an interesting theory on paper but there is no body of evidence supporting the concept in its entirety as true. The ability to explain does not make a theory true. From my knowledge, the theory of diet culture has not been verified making a bold prediction about an observable phenomenon. Diet culture is not a concrete entity that has bearing on reality.

Is diet culture real? We don’t know but from the points outlined I would argue the concept doesn't help solve current issues we are seeing in the health space.