UC-Boulder 'encouraging' obesity with 'weight bias' workshop, conservative group says
But one College Republicans member says the event is actually promoting unhealthy habits.
UC-Boulder is hosting a "Body Liberation" workshop to discuss topics like "thin privilege."
The University of Colorado-Boulder is hosting a “Body Liberation” workshop Tuesday, where attendees will learn about topics such as “thin privilege” and “weight bias.”
The event, hosted by the UC Boulder Human Resources office, is titled “Body Liberation: Examining weight bias through a cultural lens workshop.” It is open to any university faculty and staff members, where they can learn about “societal weight-based beliefs” and also learn about size and weight “through a cultural lens.”
“Weight bias impacts people across the weight spectrum and is a form of oppression that we can - and need to - do something about,” the event description states. “Body size is not the problem, but oppression around body size is.”
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According to the description, “Our bodies are not problems to be solved,” and that people only try to “fix” their bodies because society tells them that “certain bodies are more worthy and valuable.”
The description goes on to explain that everyone “must seek to learn about weight and size from a cultural lens, and dismantle the weight-biased beliefs that we all hold.”
In addition, the description states that after the event, participants should be able to “Identify weight bias and thin privilege,” “Learn to use our bodies as allies,” “Understand the Health At Every Size (R) approach to well-being,” and “Create a culture of inclusivity.”
Melanie Marquez Parra, a spokesperson for UC Boulder told Campus Reform that the workshop is being hosted by the university’s Human Resources department.
Parra also said that the workshop on weight bias was chosen by employees through a survey sent out earlier in the year.
The facilitator of the event, Carmen Cool, promotes something called the “Health at Every Size approach,” which she states on her website “helps people integrate sustainable health-care practices and celebrates the diversity of human bodies.”
Her website says that there’s “freedom” in the “Health at Every Size approach,” which includes the “freedom to eat the cake” and the “freedom to not eat the cake.”
Additionally, she states that “Dieting is not self-care,” and “restrictions are not nourishing.”
Max Bleise, the Vice President of the UC Boulder College Republicans told Campus Reform that the workshop doesn’t seem necessary, and is viewed as encouraging obesity.
“I do not believe that the concepts of ‘weight bias and thin privilege’ have any utility; rather, it seems to me that encouraging those unfortunate enough to suffer from obesity to accept their condition, rather than to seek healing for their ailment, is doing them a tremendous disservice,” Bleise said.
Instead of hosting workshops that instruct “bystanders to ignore obesity,” Bleise says that the university should be providing resources to those who suffer from obesity.
[RELATED: Prof wants ‘body size’ added to diversity curricula]
Cool was previously the board president of the Association for Size Diversity and Health, which has an infographic on its website that claims that attempts at weight loss are a “risky business,” and that instead, people should “make peace” with their body.
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