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| I googled "healthy" |
Lately, I have had the uncomfortable experience of fielding questions on my vegan lifestyle. A majority of the people questioning me believe that lifestyles centered on the complete exclusion of certain foodstuffs yield "healthier" weights and appearances. They think I must be so "healthy", and that attracts them enough to say things like "Maybe I should become vegan, or gluten-free or something!" Although this fascination with the magic bullet diet frustrates me, I can empathize.
I feel pretty confident in saying that the majority of my generation has experienced that sinking feeling of "I need to get healthy. From here on out, I'm not going to *insert food product or portion size here*".
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| I googled, "healthy" |
Whether it be a sudden change in weather that requires the tugging of too-tight shorts up unyielding things, an Oreo carton with just a few sad, de-sandwiched cookie remnants remaining, or watching a nike clad, bronzed, muscular runner zoom past your car window, that sinking feeling has been felt by most nowadays.
But what is healthy, really? What does it do to improve your lifestyle? What does it entail?
“Healthism tends to negate the role of pleasure in human well-being. As both Skrabanek and Crawford note, healthism shares much with early temperance movements, which associated denial with goodness. Richard Klein (2010) reminds us that pleasure can be healthy, including the risks that inhere in adult pleasure. For he asks, what is longevity without pleasure?" --Guthman, 2012
In my Globalization, Food, and the Environment class this semester we have been examining the close relationship individuals, economics, politics, and the environment have with food. This week we will be delving into the relationship people today have with food, and the effects globalization has on that relationship. The above quote incapsulates a very interesting concept that I have been pondering for the past couple weeks.
Healthy living has been molded into an unattainable, denial-central lifestyle in recent decades, promulgated by media and diet-crazes. It makes me extremely uncomfortable when acquaintances, who discover I'm vegan, extoll the amount of "self-control" and "will-power" I must have. I'm not vegan because I'm good at denying myself, I'm vegan because I believe in nourishing the Earth and my body.
Nicely ranted Lily. I get frustrated too when I hear people talking about how they are bad because they're eating a piece of cake. "Healthy" is much more than a singular food choice; it has to be sustainable, and an ingrained practice that includes a balanced diet and exercise. It's silly to dub one lifestyle choice as the ultimate in "healthy" when lifestyle is so personalized, and it puts a target on your back when you identify as "vegan". Keep on ranting.
ReplyDeleteAwesome post! I think it is really important for everyone to remember why they choose to add/not add certain food groups, and that ultimately it should be contributing to a happier you, not self deprecation. Also, you can find ways to be unhealthy on any kind of diet or food plan. That being said, it's hard to remember these things sometimes because of how ingrained this idea of "healthy" is in our society, especially for women. Keep on ranting Lily, this needs to be discussed more, by everyone.
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