Gluten and weight-think

Commenter Lisa raises some important points on my gluten post below. So many I'm addressing them, and continuing the discussion, in a new post:

-The reason I linked to the Refinery29 slideshow wasn't to launch some kind of witch hunt, or to claim I know anything about the specific health concerns of any of these individual women. I wasn't, and I don't. Rather, I linked to it because it was about the best example I've seen of the new, more euphemistically-expressed weight-think. Of the ambiguous discourse that's kind of about health, kind of about beauty, where the line between the two is imprecisely drawn, and where different audiences are being addressed simultaneously. In particular, I was struck by the "trigger" (in Jezebel lingo) aspect of the slideshow, where these women's diets are laid out in detail. This sort of thing may not be intended as thinspiration (if that term can be used for text?), but when there's stuff like that in women's and "health" mags, that's how it's appropriated.

-My intent wasn't to mock anybody. I think it's sad, not silly, that so many thin women feel the need to diet. And I certainly didn't intend to mock those with debilitating migraines. I mean, I get debilitating migraines. My point there was that maybe I'm the one who's being ridiculous by going ahead and eating gluten even if there's some chance that I could get rid of them by eating totally differently.

-There are medical reasons other than celiac for which not eating gluten is beneficial. Not as necessary perhaps as for those with celiac, but legitimate all the same. Thank you, Lisa, for linking to the science on this. That said, the existence of real issues doesn't mean there's no convenient self-diagnosis going on. When lo and behold much of the female staff of a fashion blog announces, in unison, joining the likes of Gwyneth Paltrow, that they're all incapable of eating bread/pizza/pasta/cake, you have to wonder if maybe, just maybe, the concern is weight.

-That a particular diet is used as a proxy for weight loss doesn't mean the ostensible non-weight-related reasons for that diet aren't also real. The Beheld points us to new research showing that women with eating disorders are four times as likely to be vegetarians than other women. This, as Autumn Whitefield-Madrano correctly insists, doesn't mean that there aren't fantastic reasons to be a vegetarian, or that all female vegetarians have eating disorders, or that no female omnivores do. And, as I must add here, I am absolutely not suggesting that the women in the gluten-free slideshow suffer from eating disorders. Lord knows I wouldn't be qualified to diagnose that sort of thing in person, let alone via blog! The issue that concerns me is the obsession that many women have with exactly what it is they're eating, an obsession that the vast majority of the time falls short of anything that would be diagnosed as an eating disorder, but that nevertheless constitutes a profound waste of time and energy, one for which there's no real equivalent in the lives of men.

-Lisa reminds us of the "paleo" diet, which is more of a guy thing. I don't doubt it, but the bigger picture here is that the number of men preoccupied with what they eat is vanishingly small compared with the number of women doing so. Weight-think is a feminist issue, not because no men ever ever ever think about their weight, but because for women, it's the default.

-That someone might cut out gluten, meat, dairy, whatever, to lose weight isn't in and of itself a problem. Some people would benefit from losing weight - health-wise, social-stigma-wise, etc. The question I'm addressing is that of women who don't need to lose weight, and who recognize this, which is precisely why when they diet all the same, they feel the need to hide behind health or ethical concerns.

-Eating delicious, real food is one of life's pleasures. So too is going about your day without giving much thought to food, and, you know, getting other things done. It's understandable that those with real weight concerns might feel the need to sacrifice both of these somewhat, but it's truly upsetting that doing so is, again, the default for women.

-It is theoretically possible to maintain or gain weight on a restrictive diet. Not all weight-loss diets work, so maybe someone eating no gluten is eating a ton of rice pudding. But I'm not sure how the possibility of not losing weight on a gluten-free diet tells us that those cutting gluten for the heck of it aren't doing so as an attempt to lose weight. Some attempts are failed attempts.

-The challenge of this topic, as Lisa's reaction illustrates, is that it's socially unacceptable - not to mention potentially rude - to cast any doubt on the health (or, for that matter, ethical) claims people give for their dietary restrictions. The answer, I think, is to do with euphemistic dieting a bit as we did regarding the expression "Jewish self-hatred." We need to be able to discuss this very real phenomenon. But only insult people and hurt the cause if we start accusing individuals of being self-hating Jews. So on this topic, we need to be clear we're not saying that Woman X (especially if she's sitting at the table with us) is lying about her newfound intolerance of all fattening ingredients. But we also absolutely need to be able to talk about the phenomenon more generally.