For Obese People, Prejudice in Plain Sight

As a woman whose height and weight put me in the obese category on the body-mass-index chart, I cringed when Michelle Obama recently spoke of putting her daughters on a diet. While I’m sure the first lady’s intentions are good, I’m also sure that her comments about childhood obesity will add yet another layer to the stigma of being overweight in America.

Last August, Dr. Delos M. Cosgrove, a cardiac surgeon and chief executive of the prestigious Cleveland Clinic, told a columnist for The New York Times that if he could get away with it legally, he would refuse to hire anyone who is obese. He probably could get away with it, actually, because no federal legislation protects the civil rights of fat workers, and only one state, Michigan, bans discrimination on the basis of weight.

Dr. Cosgrove may be unusually blunt, but he is far from alone. Public attitudes about fat have never been more judgmental; stigmatizing fat people has become not just acceptable but, in some circles, de rigueur.

I’ve sat in meetings with colleagues who wouldn’t dream of disparaging anyone’s color, sex, economic status or general attractiveness, yet feel free to comment witheringly on a person’s weight.

Over the last few years, fat people have become scapegoats for all manner of cultural ills. “There’s an atmosphere now where it’s O.K. to blame everything on weight,” said Dr. Linda Bacon, a nutrition researcher and the author of “Health at Every Size: The Surprising Truth About Your Weight” (Benbella, 2008). “If we’re worried about climate change, someone comes out with an article about how heavier people weigh more, so they require more fuel, and they blame the climate change crisis on fatter people. We have this strong belief system that it’s their fault, that it’s all about gluttony or lack of exercise.”

It’s no secret that being fat is rarely good for your career. Heather Brown (no relation) has experienced this firsthand. A few years ago, she applied for a grant-writing job with a small nonprofit in the Boston area. After a successful phone interview, she was invited to the office.

“As soon as I shook the interviewer’s hand, I knew she would not hire me,” Ms. Brown said. “She gave me a look of utter disdain, and made a big deal about whether we should take the stairs or ride the elevator to the room where we were going to talk. During the actual interview, she would not even look at me and kept looking to the side.” Ms. Brown, 36, who now works as an assistant dean at a college near Chicago, said she never even got a “No thank you” letter after the interview.

That story is all too familiar to people like Bill Fabrey, an advocate who in 1969 founded the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance. The organization’s archives, he says, are full of stories from people who say they lost jobs or promotions because of their weight, or were not hired in the first place.