With the aim of promoting a healthy body image, Fat Talk Free Week begins on college campuses on October 18, 2010. For the third year in a row, college students across 35 campuses will participate in Fat Talk Free Week, a campaign to stop people from using language that hurts their own and other peoples' body image.
It's amazing how much fat talk we engage in. And it's even sadder how we don't even notice we're doing it. Positive body image is such a hard thing to come by when you're surrounded by (often well meaning) people who make comments such as, "You look so good! Have you lost weight?" Or, "You look really thin in that outfit! I love it!"
Think about a time when someone said that to you. Or think about the time when you overheard someone making a comment like that to someone else. How did you feel? If you were the one receiving the comment, most likely you felt positive or good about yourself. And that probably fueled your not so healthy body image. Translation, "I only look good if I lose weight."
How did you feel if you were overhearing a comment like that being made about someone else? You probably thought, "If I lost weight, someone might make a comment like that about me." Or, "I never get those comments because I'm fat." Either way, the translation is the same, "I only look good if I lose weight."
But that's not the only kind of fat talk we engage in ... and it's not the only kind of fat talk that effects female self esteem. How many times have you looked in the mirror after you get dressed, turning around, analyzing from all angles ... to make sure your butt doesn't look too big ... to make sure your bra strap isn't cutting in to your back fat too much ... to make sure your arms look toned enough in the sleeveless shirt ... to make sure your stomach isn't sticking out too much in the form-fitting dress. Do I need to go on?
That's fat talk. And if you ask someone else how you look, you too are engaging in fat talk.
The goal of the Fat Talk Free Week initiative is to eliminate that kind of talk from our lives. Whether you overhear someone else making a comment to someone else about how they look, or your friend is asking you to critique how they look ... or whether you're doing the critiquing on your own. We can't have a healthy body image if we're engaging in fat talk. So the motto of the campaign is, "Friends don't let friends fat-talk." A worthy and enviable goal.
Research shows that eating disorders and lack of a positive body image go hand in hand. With so many young women developing anorexia symptoms and bulimia nervosa, and those in high school and college being at high risk, this campaign is sorely needed. A great way to prevent eating disorders is by taking a stand against all the pressure to be thin. Researcher Eric Stice proved this in a study he published in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology in 2008. He found that female high school students and college students who spent three hours studying the "thin ideal" and critically analyzing it had the benefit of a 60% reduction in their risk of developing an eating disorder. And what is most profound is in a mere three hours, that reduction in risk prevailed even three years later.
Fat Talk Free Week is an excellent way for young women on college campuses to start developing a healthy body image. And hopefully, in the process of consciously eliminating fat talk for a week, they will become more aware not only of how fat talk is being used around them, but also of their own, internal fat talk. And maybe they can work harder to eliminate it from their lives altogether. Maybe they should consider doing these free self esteem activities while they're at it. Operation Beautiful and Fat Talk Free Week would make a wonderful marriage.
