Nothing about the Safeway Amendment makes sense. When the Senate finance committee approved its version of the health reform package earlier this month, Chairman Max Baucus announced that his bill would extend coverage to almost every American, and that it “would prohibit insurance companies from discriminating on the basis of gender or health status.” If Congress really wants equal access to medical care, why are we fattening a loophole for discrimination?

It doesn’t make sense to charge fat people higher insurance premiums. - By Daniel Engber - Slate Magazine

Posted on November 30, 2009

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Background
It is commonly believed that the pathophysiology of obesity arises from adiposity. In this paper, I forward a complementary explanation; this pathophysiology arises not from adiposity alone, but also from the psychological stress induced by the social stigma associated with being obese.
Methods
In this study, I pursue novel lines of evidence to explore the possibility that obesity-associated stigma produces obesity-associated medical conditions. I also entertain alternative hypotheses that might explain the observed relationships.
Results
I forward four lines of evidence supporting the hypothesis that psychological stress plays a role in the adiposity-health association. First, body mass index (BMI) is a strong predictor of serological biomarkers of stress. Second, obesity and stress are linked to the same diseases. Third, body norms appear to be strong determinants of morbidity and mortality among obese persons; obese whites and women – the two groups most affected by weight-related stigma in surveys – disproportionately suffer from excess mortality. Finally, statistical models suggest that the desire to lose weight is an important driver of weight-related morbidity when BMI is held constant.
Conclusion
Obese persons experience a high degree of stress, and this stress plausibly explains a portion of the BMI-health association. Thus, the obesity epidemic may, in part, be driven by social constructs surrounding body image norms.

The body politic: the relationship between stigma and obesity-associated disease

Posted on November 30, 2009

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(via )

Posted on November 30, 2009

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Many academic associations have policies barring discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. Many of those same associations have job listing services that are used, in some cases, by religious institutions that require all hires to hold certain beliefs or follow certain rules, in some cases barring sex outside of marriage between a man and a woman.

News: Philosophers Against Bias - Inside Higher Ed

Posted on November 30, 2009

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sugar town | Miss Moss

Posted on November 30, 2009

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(via )

nigeria troped as corrupt (and then flipped)

Posted on November 30, 2009

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The global food crisis of 2008, forcing 100 million people below the poverty belt, may have been a catastrophe for the working poor of the world – peoples living in slums and on streets with no name, but for Wall Street, the ‘crisis’ – pushing up the price of grain by 140 per cent, was nothing less than the beginning of a new frontier: Harvesting power through dominion over farmland. Though the US squarely laid the blame for increased food prices on scarcity and the rapidly growing ‘middle class’ segment of both China and India – estimated at 650 million – a leaked document written by senior World Bank analyst Don Mitchell, revealed that 65-75 per cent of the increase was caused by the conversion of ‘crops for fuel’ ie: biofuels. (via Land grabs: Africa’s new ‘resource curse’?)

Posted on November 30, 2009

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