INTERFACES BETWEEN FATPHOBIA AND THE PROFESSIONALIZATION IN NUTRITION: AN ESSENTIAL DEBATE

Abstract

The study proposes to reflect on how nutrition training is likely to reproduce fatphobia, and the risks imposed on fat people by this oppression. Fatphobia, as a discrimination against fat individuals, resulting from stigmatization, translates into inequalities in the most diverse environments, affecting biological, psychological, social and economic levels. The hierarchy between populations considered to be more or less healthy, based on the medical-statistical logic polarized between normal and pathological, supports the predominance of physiology in the study of health sciences, consolidating practices of intervention and control over deviants, as preventive measures. The theoretical formation, as a definition of the practice, presents dilemmas creating a trend of pathological action, directing the Courses of Nutrition to prioritize economic interests to the detriment of social demands. This pathologization contributes to the maintenance of the health model that corroborates the incessant search for the ideal body type, favoring the commodification of health practices. The conceptual and theoretical debate is essential for the discussion of the practical approach, since the belief in obesity as a reflection of the moral qualities of individuals has important social consequences. Worse yet, when reproducing the stigmatization of fat people, professionals distance them from access to health services. In order to develop humanized practices, promoting health and recognizing the individual in his historicity and socialization, it is necessary to develop other concepts of health, since the clinical-biomedical approach is insufficient to perform satisfactorily before this complexity. DOI: 10.12957/demetra.2018.33311

Keywords

• preconceito. estigma social. obesidade. risco.