Just a quick link to the latest paper from my research team and I. In this paper (co-authored with Fiona McKay and Prof Warwick Blood), we examined media reporting both in print and online of the SIEV 36 incident in 2009. We conduct an analysis of stories printed in The Herald Sun, The Australian and The Age newspapers. We also looked at the public responses to these articles in online forums.

‘Any one of these boat people could be a terrorist for all we know!’ Media representations and public perceptions of ‘boat people’ arrivals in Australia. Journalism 2011 12(5) 607–626

In April 2009 a boat (named the ‘SIEV 36’ by the Australian Navy) carrying 49 asylum seekers exploded off the north coast of Australia. Media and public debate about Australia’s responsibility to individuals seeking asylum by boat was instantaneous. This paper investigates the media representation of the ‘SIEV 36’ incident and the public responses to media reports through online news fora. We examined three key questions: 1) Does the media reporting refer back to and support previous policies of the Howard Government? 2) Does the press and public discourse portray asylum arrivals by boat as a risk to Australian society? 3) Are journalists following and applying industry guidelines about the reporting of asylum seeker issues? Our results show that while there is an attempt to provide a balanced account of the issue, there is variation in the degree to which different types of reports follow industry guidelines about the reporting of issues relating to asylum seekers and the use of ‘appropriate’ language.

If you can’t access this paper (there is no online link at the moment) or would like to know more, then feel free to drop me a line at thediscourseblog at gmail dot com or DM me your email address on twitter @doc_samantha

Today I was going to settle down and write about how I am going to be booze free for 3 months. EEEK! Originally I was going to do Dry July, but then I came across this awesome organisation called Hello Sunday Morning which encourages people to develop a healthy relationship with alcohol, and I thought it just sounded like a freaking awesome organisation to support – check em out!! (And more about that in an upcoming blog).

Anyway, I was just about to start writing and someone posted a link to this image on Twitter.

Okay… so not to state the obvious, but seriously offensive on so many levels. I’m guessing the complete muppet that posted this obviously thought they were making a terrific contribution to a) the total look of the model by putting the black strip over her eyes, and b) the health and wellbeing of the nation.

But then I was thinking about how common this opinion about ‘plus sized’ is. We have seen some pretty well known examples of body image initiatives that have drawn the line at certain body sizes because being a size 14 is curvy and about ‘real woman’, but anything over that is just sending a bad message about health.  And I actually read something that was sent to me this week that suggested that campaigns for more realistic models and women was actually sending a dangerous message that would lead people to embrace being fat and unhealthy.  Rather governments should reinforce NORMAL bodies.

And with the rise of the celebrity diet/fitness guru this attitude just seems to go on and on and on. Like New Zealand personal trainer Kim Taihuka who was reported to have said that the average sized woman should weigh no more than 60 kilo’s. Taihuka went on to give us this little gem:

“I wouldn’t trust a plus-size model to save me in an emergency. If there was a fit, healthy woman I would trust her.”

And Herald Sun columnist Suzie O’Brien who wrote:

While these women might make us feel better about our bulging butts and guts, the truth is, few women over a size 14 are in a healthy weight range. And many need encouragement to lose weight instead of being told to feel good about being overweight. Seeing big girls might give us healthier self-esteem, but it might not encourage us to lead healthier lives.

So here is the thing. We have been setting socially, asthetically and medically acceptable norms for a very long time now. I call these the ‘magic numbers’. BMI. Waist Circumference. Size 14. 1500 calories a day. 60 minutes of exercise a day. Blah de blah de blah. And it certainly has not stopped people becoming fatter.  And it may actually have contributed to obesity, as people have flogged their bodies on diets and unsustainable exercise regimes to try and achieve that norm.

So here is a radical thought. Maybe seeing some awesome larger men and women rocking out doing some fab things would actually be great for ALL OF US!! Because maybe we would all start to realise that weight is not a barrier to feeling great about yourself, enjoying your life, and respecting your body by focusing on your health not the number on your collar.

UPDATE: Have just been told that the model is Velvet D’Amour who wrote this about herself and her health:

“By virtue of being plus size I am thusly expected to tout my health, yet my smaller counterparts, be it in contemporary dance, or film, or in fashion, are never asked the state of their health. I do not drink alcohol and I never have, I do not take drugs and I never have, I do not smoke and I never have, yet many of these same counterparts do one, or a combination of all of the above, and yet merely by virtue of weighing less then I, are completely excluded from this patronizing question.”

Last night Doctor Christian from the show Embarrassing Fat Bodies told us all about how being overweight was unhealthy.

I was incredibly enlightened, because most studies I have read in the past have shown me people in the overweight category are the healthiest happiest of all of us.

I thought I would share this little post that my colleague Prof Colin McLeod and I wrote. Some of you might have read it before on a different blog site, but I thought it was kind of appropriate to share here.

Enjoy….darlings Xxx

__________________________

Obesity Myths and One Inconvenient Truth

In the early 1980’s Sid and Jenny Craig migrated to Australia with a dream of opening a successful weight management company. By 1983, the first Jenny Craig clinics had opened in Melbourne, in the working class suburbs of Frankston, Preston, Knox, Moonee Ponds, Ringwood, and Cranbourne.

Jenny Craig has gone on to be one of the most famous, and certainly the most profitable weight loss company in the world.

Given this Australian claim to fame, coupled with intensive celebrity endorsement of the benefits of weight loss (Magda has already lost 25 kilos, and Chrissie Swan has achieved her goal of getting pregnant after achieving a healthier weight on Jenny’s program), it is perhaps unsurprising that Australians are more than a little fixated about weight.

Fatness is, according to many of our health professionals, academics, and mass media, not only aesthetically undesirable, but also a sure ticket to an early grave.

Every day in Australia we are bombarded with a plethora of facts and figures about the causes for, impacts of, and solutions for weight gain. Media reporting about obesity has increased 100 per cent since the late 90s, and now eclipses the reporting of any other health issue.

Who would deny the impact of an epidemic of lazy fatties on our health care costs, global warming, life expectancy, insurance costs and even the ability of our military to function? After all, Australia is just about the fattest nation in the world – even challenging the United States for the world heavyweight crown. Most of our elite athletes are ‘obese’ according to the Body Mass Index. And the exploding rates of childhood obesity have even the skinniest of children quaking in their Bata Scouts.

Being fat is simply unpatriotic – they should be ashamed of themselves and we should be ashamed of them too. And according to most of our media campaigns and advertising claims about fatness, it could all be resolved if we ate a little less, and exercised a little more and took some “personal responsibility.”

Right?

An increasing number of health professionals, academics and community groups are challenging the inconvenient truths that we have created about the obesity ‘epidemic’.

Some argue that a culture of ‘moral panic’ about fatness has been created. NGO’s, academics, health care providers and the weight loss industry have exaggerated claims to justify the need for more funding, or to spruik products and services. Many now admit that this may have hindered rather than helped our efforts to effectively respond to obesity in the sectors of the community that it affects the most.

Research clearly shows that people who are obese feel that simplistic and exaggerated public claims about obesity have led to a culture of blame and shame. Some describe that the public pressure to lose weight has led them to engage in radical and risky weight loss attempts, and pushes them further away from essential services that could help them improve their health and wellbeing. In an effort to become thin, many describe that their physical and mental health is getting worse.

There is no doubt that obesity poses serious health risks for some people in our community. But perhaps if we were more sensible and less hysterical about obesity, we may actually find it easier to engage and support the people who need it most.

Exposing the Myths

Myth One: Australia is the Fattest Nation in the World.

False. The International Obesity Taskforce ranks Australia as the 44th fattest nation in the world, with 19.3 per cent of men and 22.2 per cent of women classified as obese (BMI over 30). Importantly, obesity in Australia is influenced by socio-economic status. Quite simply, the poorer you are, the more likely you are to be obese.

Myth Two: Being obese will markedly increase your health risks.

The relationship between weight status and negative health outcomes has been overstated. The relationship between weight and mortality is fairly low until people reach quite high BMIs. Most epidemiological studies suggest that overweight people do not have shorter lives than people in the healthy weight range and we know that the negative effects of weight on health can be mitigated by physical activity.

Myth Three: Rates of childhood obesity are exploding

False. In the historical long run (30 years plus) there have been increases in both adult and childhood obesity in Australia. However, experts now generally agree that the levels of childhood obesity have plateaued in the last decade.

Myth Four: Obesity is caused by a simple equation of eating too much and exercising too little

Whilst at the most basic level this is true, weight loss is far more complex than eating less and exercising more. This is because of the complex range of genetic, environmental, socio-cultural and psychological factors that lead people to be obese.

Similarly, messages that tell obese people that they simply need to “take personal responsibility” or just make up their mind to lose weight are simplistic in the extreme.

Myth Five: Most of our AFL footballers are ‘obese’ according to BMI

Whilst there is no doubt that the BMI is flawed when applied to individuals, the vast majority of our AFL athletes actually fall in the normal and overweight categories according to the BMI. A recent analysis of an AFL club showed that 75 per cent of its players would be classified within the normal weight range for their height, 25 per cent of its players would be classified as overweight and none were obese.

Of course when 19th-century Belgian astronomer and mathematician, Adolphe Quetelet invented the body mass index (BMI), he probably didn’t envisage that it would be applied to professional athletes who design their body to be “fit for purpose.”

Inconvenient Truth One: Discrimination on the basis of weight is on the rise

According to an extensive study undertaken by the Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity at Yale University, discrimination on the basis of weight is the fastest growing form of discrimination in the US in the last 10 years, and is now more prevalent than racial discrimination.

Perhaps by focusing on the facts rather than the myths, we might be able to help people manage obesity rather than marginalize them through what is rapidly becoming a propaganda war against obese people.

I don’t normally write about personal stuff. I’m much better at commenting on everyone else’s business rather than my own.

But I was really struck today by something I read in a blog written by Australian politician Kate Ellis.

This week a member of the Australian parliament Senator Penny Wong was ‘meowed’ at by a male member of Parliament during a debate in the Senate. Obviously there has been a huge amount of reaction to this – mainly from people who called Senator Bushby on this complete and utter bullshit.

Kate Ellis rightfully called for change:

“There are so many outdated notions and outdated behaviours in our national parliament and it’s time we all stood up and said enough is enough”

But I was kinda interested in how Ellis referred to Wong as a ‘strong woman’ and that she was proud to work with some ‘tough and talented’ women in Parliament.

And it got me thinking about how, under adversity, so many of us in the workplace are expected to  ‘be tough’, to ‘suck it up’ and not show any vulnerability. Unlike Wong, many people do not feel able to call out this sort of treatment in the workplace.

At times, during periods of adversity, I have shed tears because of things that have happened at work. Or I have lost sleep over things.

And I suspect I am not alone.

Because sometimes work is just bloody stressful. And that might be because of workload. Or peoples behaviour. Or being up all night with a sick little boy and then having to rock up to someone elses moans and groans about things. Or things not working out the way you expected with something. Or not getting a grant or a contract after a massive amount of effort. Or if you are told you are not being put forward for promotion. Or [Insert any other crappy workplace thing here].

Sometimes, it is tough to be ‘tough’ and ‘strong’.

Sometimes you can’t suck it up.

Sometimes things hurt.

Sometimes people feel powerless to do anything about said crappy workplace situation.

And I reckon it’s okay to sometimes feel vulnerable, and upset. I don’t think it is an indicator of how ‘talented’ you are. Or of your abilities. Or of your worth in your workplace.

I admire Penny Wong too.

But I am different, and I probably wouldn’t have reacted in the same way as her.

And I probably would have had a good cry afterwards!

Maybe that makes me weak. I just reckon it makes me, me.