Bite Back with Abbey Sharp - Fact Checking Jillian Michaels Takedown of Body Positivity (PLUS her DEFAMATORY Statements Against ME!)

Starting point is 00:00:00 So for Jillian to name me, who was not involved in any of this, I hadn't worked with these companies, I hadn't failed to disclose, and for Jubilee, not to fact-check this, is the definition of defamation and slander. Welcome to another episode of Bite Back with Abby Sharp, where I dismantle die culture rules, call it the charlatans spinning the pseudoscience, and help you achieve food freedom for good. So a wee little story time here. but a few weeks ago, I was honestly just trying to mind my own business on my March break vacation with my family when my phone literally started to blow up. A new episode of Jubilee Surrounded was released

Starting point is 00:00:45 featuring Gillian Michaels who was debating 20 body positivity activists on the merits and dangers of the body positivity movement. Now, I have been a loud critic of the biggest loser and the harms of weight loss competition reality TV. So I surely would have been pinged by my followers to respond to the episode's claims. But what I wasn't expecting was to be wrongfully called out as part of a scandal I had nothing to do with. So today I'm going to be breaking down some of the arguments that Gillian and the body positivity activists made the good, the bad, and the clear-cut case of defamation against yours truly. First of all, if you're new here, welcome.

Starting point is 00:01:36 If you like Diet Culture commentary, please do subscribe to bite back. Leave me a five-star review if you're loving this and check out my new bestselling book, The Hunger Cushing Combo Method in the show notes. Second, I do want to set the stage for where I kind of fit into this quote-unquote debate. Contrary to what it seems, Jillian may think, I would not identify myself as part of the body positivity community as a dietitian. I support folks who feel empowered by the movement, But ultimately, this is not really an ideology that I identify with as a professional.

Starting point is 00:02:10 As I feel that at times it can feel exclusionary to a lot of folks. It could feel unrealistic for a lot of folks and therefore discouraging for those who kind of struggle to love their body all of the time. And ultimately, it doesn't always align with the research on the risks of obesity. At the end of the day, I believe in body autonomy and meeting people where they are. So unlike some of my Bopo dietitian colleagues, I don't think it's unethical to support folks who want to lose weight and provide gentle evidence-based strategies that provide the most benefit for the least risk of harm. But I also support you if you want to focus on acts of self-care that have nothing to do with the scale. So this is why I personally prefer the term body kindness or body respect, and I really just try not to pigeonhole myself into one way of, quote, quote, doing dietetics.

Starting point is 00:03:01 I also want to note that a lot of folks in the Bopo community do not like the word obesity, and I understand that. This is still a word used in the literature, and I do have a policy to not censor science, so I will be using it in context throughout this episode. All right, friends, let's get into Gillian Michael's first argument about the body positivity movement and where I net out in my interpretation. Obesity is not healthy and pretending it is puts lives at risk. Okay, so I think Jillian starts off strong here, mostly because she kind of stuck hard to the science around the claim itself. And I agree with her acknowledgement that there are real documented risks of obesity. More specifically, because specificity matters here, we do have MRT research that shows that excess visceral fat is strongly associated with type 2 diabetes, coronary artery disease, and some liver fat-related diseases. We don't see causal evidence for all diseases, and we also don't see strong causal evidence for

Starting point is 00:04:03 body fatness or a high BMI. We are specifically talking about the inflammatory visceral fat. And this is really the main reason I don't identify myself as a quote quote body positivity advocate dietitian, because there does seem to be this echo chamber in the community at times that I feel sometimes fails to acknowledge the biological realities of carrying excess fat and instead kind of shifts the blame solely on the social determinants of health, fat stigma, and poor medical care in explaining fat people's poor health. Not all folks who identify as BOPO feel this way, but I do hear it and I do see it a lot and that is why I've distanced myself from the movement. The reality is this is not an either or argument in my books.

Starting point is 00:04:52 is really an and both situation. So to understand how to help folks in larger bodies, we need to acknowledge the biological effects of excess visceral fat, the environments that can increase both fat gain and disease risk, and the stigma, discrimination, and stress of living in a fat body. In my opinion, I can see why Gillian may want to downplay this part of the picture, because it may mean confronting criticisms of her work on the biggest loser. But let's move on to claim two. The large food companies are one of the primary beneficiaries of the body positivity movement. Okay, this is an interesting take, and I think it's best that we listen to Gillian's explanation before I give you my thoughts. So there have been two really big exposés, one by the Washington Post

Starting point is 00:05:43 and one by the examiner. The Washington Post analyzed more than 6,000 social media posts by 68 registered dietitians with a combined reach of over 9 million followers. 40% of them were using the anti-diet language, right? Like food freedom, no food rules, ditch the diet, healthy any size, so on and so forth. Very often not disclosing the fact that they were paid by the big food companies. Okay. Okay. So they're basically going after the intuitive eating dietitians.

Starting point is 00:06:15 I can give you Abby Sharp. What did she just say? I can give you Abby Sharp. Oh girl, we have a lot to unpack. First of all, I had a little chitty chat chat with my lawyer the other day when this video came out, and that my friends is considered defamation and slander. Because not only did my name and my name alone get brought into a scandal that I have no business being a part of here, but she also just kind of totally random called me out a few minutes later as well.

Starting point is 00:06:44 Abby Sharp. So what actually happened here and does it even prove her point? while a few years ago the Washington Post published a series of articles that were not really flattering to dietitians. The author, Anahad O'Connor, who is a vocal proponent of kind of more low-carb, high-fat diets, called out a handful of my dietitian colleagues, many of which who do more work in the kind of anti-diet space for their social media partnerships with a few more controversial commodities. The American Deverage Association and the Canadian Sugar Institute. The campaign content itself was, in my opinion, at least totally sound.

Starting point is 00:07:24 So the former was a campaign explaining the who's listing of Aspartame as a carcinogen, and the latter focused on reducing extreme fear-mongering around sugar at times like Halloween. Totally benign and evidence-based content, in my opinion, and really something that most of us dietitians would be putting out there anyway. But the issue was more so that in some cases, the dietitians didn't make it super-duper-clear. that their posts were being sponsored, which is a huge no-no in my books. And actually, when the story came out, I expressed my disappointment because it sure as fuck didn't represent how I have come to the table for over a decade in this space. And I did a whole YouTube video discussing

Starting point is 00:08:08 the controversy, which I will link in the show notes as well. So for Gillian to name me, who was not involved in any of this, I hadn't worked with these companies, companies I hadn't failed to disclose. And for Jubilee, not to fact check this, is the definition of defamation and slander. As for her claim, honestly, I think it's one of her most weak arguments, to be honest. You know, big food is opportunistic. It's not ideological. So these companies profit from both sides of the same body anxiety economy. Like they've got regular soda, they got zero sugar soda. They got candy. They got better for you, snap. They got indulgence. They got restriction. Big food benefits from all of our vulnerabilities and

Starting point is 00:08:55 insecurities and wants and desires. They sell to people who are restricting, people who are rebelling against restriction, and people who are literally just trying to get food on the table for their family. And you can be mad all you want at big food and we obviously can advocate for better access to more nutritious choices. But that is an economic and societal and also really a business issue. a body positivity problem. But moving on to claim number three. The body positivity movement oversimplifies disordered eating and trauma. Okay, so I feel like oversimplifies was kind of a confusing word to use here. It really did trip everyone up trying to figure out what she meant by this claim, including myself. But what it seemed like she meant, and again, this is my paraphrasing and interpretation,

Starting point is 00:09:44 because I'm not 100% sure, was that body positivity reduces the solution to complex issues like eating disorders and trauma to simple messages like just love your body or just eat intuitively while ignoring the deeper psychological or medical roots. I think that's what she was saying because this argument was messy AF. Her evidence of this was largely around her experience seeing intuitive eating being essentially kind of prescribed online for folks with EDs in BOPO circles when in reality, in reality, intuitive eating is not necessarily an appropriate, quote, quote, treatment for someone with anorexia. And if that is happening, like, yeah, I agree with Jillian wholeheartedly that that is not good.

Starting point is 00:10:32 Intuitive eating is not an appropriate suggestion for everyone, especially someone in an active ED. But I think a common theme for Jillian in this debate is that she kind of tends to conflate a lot of other concepts with body positivity. Intuitive eating is not the same as the body positivity movement. And real professionals like eating disorder dietitians are able to assess the nuance of each individual's experience and determine the safest and most supportive course of action. Not just tell them to like get on IG and tell them to love themselves in the mirror. So sure if randoms online are telling people with anorexia to just eat intuitively, that is

Starting point is 00:11:27 a problem. But I don't feel like it proves her point in any way. Nor did the bombshell she dropped next. I think that these tools or things like, oh, you know what? It's society. It's diet culture. It's this. It's that it's bigotry.

Starting point is 00:11:43 I'd like, no, dude, it's probably the fact that like somebody, God forbid, touched you when you were a kid. Okay, so this is when I believe I started to better understand Jillian's ultimate narrative. It seemed that Gillian was arguing that, eating disorders or obesity, or really any under or overeating behaviors, all come from, quote, and quote, primary wounds like sexual assault or childhood trauma. In my opinion, it seemed like she was kind of vehemently rejecting that diaculture or any kind of problematic media like the biggest loser could possibly negatively impact someone's relationship with food, because it sounded

Starting point is 00:12:23 like by her thinking, you know, why would you even be triggered by diaculture messaging if you weren't abused as a child? Like those things should only bother you if it all started with a more catastrophic, quote unquote, primary wound. And again, I do believe this framing could make sense for her because it shifts accountability away from the role that media, like the biggest loser, may play in shaping people's relationship with food. The reality is that eating disorders are rarely caused by a single trigger. They're more like a perfect storm where biological vulnerability, psychological traits, social pressures, and life experiences collide and intensify with each other. And not everyone who gets an ED has childhood trauma, myself included. Also, if we want to talk about oversimplifying

Starting point is 00:13:13 complex solutions, Diet culture does this better than anything with messages like just eat less and move more, or calories in, calories out, or weight loss equals health, et cetera. So this critique is not unique to body positivity online. But let's move on to claim number four. That the body positivity movement is fundamentally disempowering. This one also took me a little while to understand Gillian's points. So here are some direct quotes. First, it's externalized shame. As opposed to appreciating that this is something that does arise within. And if you'll hear me all the way out, I think I can illustrate that for many, it is actually a choice. So it externalizes it first. And then it invalidates it right off

Starting point is 00:13:58 the top. It's bad. It's evil. It's this. It's that. Instead of like, what can we explore? What can we learn here? And then it replaces it with things that I think are platitudes and really difficult to believe. Oh, no, I'm perfect. I'm beautiful. This, that. But. Okay. So to recap, My interpretation of this is that perhaps Jillian believes that the body positivity movement teaches people to blame their body on diet culture rather than looking at that quote unquote primary wound, which to her is likely childhood trauma. And because the BOPO movement may teach you to recite these positive affirmations like, you're beautiful, you never acknowledge that obesity is your quote quote choice and therefore you don't make changes

Starting point is 00:14:43 that could improve your health. Okay, so first of all, I don't love the framing of obesity as a choice. Body weight is influenced by a complex mix of genetics, metabolism, hormones, mental health, access to food, socioeconomic status, trauma, medications, epigenetics, and environmental factors like di-culture and weight stigma. Of course, we absolutely do have choices and agency in behaviors that affect our weight. But choices don't exist in a vacuum. And they're often shaped and constrained by factors that people don't choose.

Starting point is 00:15:19 So I just really wish that we could be more empathetic and really meet people where they are on that. Second, I do understand to some extent why Gillian sees what she sees. There are definitely fringe like Bo-Po advocates online who may kind of co-opt the movement to explicitly promote gaining weight or not taking care of your body, almost like an act of resistance. And when I look at those interpretations of the movement, I agree with Jillian. Like, that, that's kind of fucked up. But there were so many different stories told here in this debate. Like, she spoke to folks who used the Bopo movement to help inspire them to exercise more without

Starting point is 00:15:58 shame, to lose weight, to recover from an ED, or to feel better about aspects of their body that they cannot easily change, like the woman with the genetically large breasts, for example. So if we are at least going by the experiences of the activists in this debate, body positivity isn't inherently anti-agency. Like these people took accountability and acknowledged the aspects of their life that they could change and the choices that they do have. The key, of course, is to approach that accountability from a place of curiosity and self-love rather than shame and self-loathing, which we'll speak to in just a moment. So, again, I think I agree with some aspects of what you'll be. is saying, but real people's experiences are far more nuanced and talking kindly to yourself is not just an SNL skit like Gillian says when it comes to helping people take that next step

Starting point is 00:16:54 to make better choices given the circumstances that they're in. But let's look at the last claim. Shame is far more dangerous than body positivity. So this was Marcy's claim that she spearheaded. And while I don't think that Jillian was ever explicitly saying, yeah, you should feel more shame, her work has been heavily criticized for contributing to a culture of body shame. So again, in my opinion, you know, it doesn't really surprise me that Jillian may perhaps kind of try to double down on this idea that it's childhood trauma, not die culture, that causes you to under or overeat. But here's my, like, honest take on this one.

Starting point is 00:17:35 As I've already said, I'm not a Bopo dietitian, and while I do not agree with downplaying or ignoring the scientific health risks of excess body fat, there are absolutely aspects of the body positivity movement or adjacent behaviors like having a positive body image that can be enormously helpful for a lot of folks. So I'm not totally sure why Jillian is opposed to this, but I am not threatened at all by the existence of this movement. But you cannot argue with me that shame is like more beneficial, than the existence of body positivity. Shame has literally no benefits. Like across the literature, weight stigma and body shame

Starting point is 00:18:13 are consistently linked with more disordered eating, more avoidance of health-promoting behaviors, and significantly worse engagement with care. Not durable, self-directed health habits. So one 2025 study specifically tested the, hey, well, maybe shame works as a motivation for weight loss idea, and they literally found the opposite. Attempting weight loss because of weight-based teasing was associated with elevated blood pressure, inflammation, and skipping meals among U.S. youth.

Starting point is 00:18:43 The paper's conclusion was explicit. Shaming someone into losing weight does not work. And when we actually look at behavior change research grounded in self-determination theory, we see that more durable health behavior change has to be driven by autonomous motivation, not external pressure, guilt, or shame. So to summarize, here is where I stand with and against Jillian's takes. Number one, excess fat, specifically visceral fat, absolutely does independently increase the risk of disease. And I really do hope that we can continue to innovate effective strategies, including pharmacological, behavioral, structural, and social changes to help folks find their healthiest, happiest weight. Number two, I was wrongfully accused by Gillian Michaels for participating in a scandal that I was never

Starting point is 00:19:34 part of, which did not even really prove her point anyway. Number three, big food benefits from all consumers, including those who are dieting and those who are rejecting diet culture. Number four, EDs are not solely caused by childhood trauma or because you were touched as a kid. They result from the interplay of multiple factors that amplify and reinforce one another. Number five, body positivity is an inherently anti-agency, and you can benefit from aspects of the movement, while still taking accountability for what you want to change in your life, including weight change. And finally, shame is never an effective behavior change strategy. Well, folks, that is a wrap.

Starting point is 00:20:16 And honestly, it would have been really nice to just enjoy my family holiday and not to have spent hours watching and rewatching these clips, trying to ascertain the points that Jillian was trying to get at. But here we are, we made it through. And if you guys want to help me out, I would really love if you would flag that Jubilee video as misinformation, and leave them a comment asking them to retract the defamatory use of my name, and for both Jubilee and Jillian to issue a corrective statement. Or at the very least, please share this episode far and wide because it really, really does help me out. All right, friends, signing off with science and stats.

Starting point is 00:20:48 I'm Abby Sharp. Thanks for listening.

Bite Back with Abbey Sharp - Fact Checking Jillian Michaels Takedown of Body Positivity (PLUS her DEFAMATORY Statements Against ME!)

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