Everything you know about obesity is wrong, by Michael Hobbes.
Michael Hobbes is a journalist who now earns his living as a podcaster. I learned about his work when my friend recommended the podcast Maintenance Phase, which he co-hosts with Aubrey Gordon. They discuss and debunk fads and misinformation about diets and fitness – or they used to, because as I write (February 2024), we haven’t had any episodes in a while. I hope they’ll be back.
It’s worth listening to the old episodes. A personal favourite of mine: The worm wars, where they dissect the idea that de-worming children will radically improve education in deprived countries. But that has less relevance to my actual everyday life than classic episodes such as Is being fat bad for you? or The Body Mass Index.
Not enough time to listen? The short versions are:
- Being fat is not of itself bad for you. Fat people can be healthy, and thin people can be unhealthy.
- The Body Mass Index is highly misleading. It was only ever intended as a way of assessing whole populations, and it’s not even a very good way of doing that.
I’m hoping to see the film about Aubrey Gordon, released recently: Your fat friend.
Meanwhile, I’ve been re-reading a classic Michael Hobbes article: Everything you know about obesity is wrong. US-centric, but resonates for the UK too.
Getting to balance 