Fat Talk

Parenting in the Age of Diet Culture

By: Virginia Sole-Smith

Narrated by: Virginia Sole-Smith

This program is read by the author.

In this illuminating narrative on the daily onslaught of body shame that kids face from peers, school, diet culture, and parents themselves, journalist Virginia Sole-Smith offers a compelling, reported look at how families can change the conversation around weight, health, and self-worth.

By the time they reach kindergarten, most kids have learned that “fat” is bad. As they get older, kids learn to pursue thinness in order to survive in a world that ties our body size to our value. Multibillion-dollar industries thrive on consumers believing that we don’t want to be fat. Our weight-centric medical system pushes “weight loss” as a prescription, while ignoring social determinants of health and reinforcing negative stereotypes about the motives and morals of people in larger bodies. And parents today, having themselves grown up in the confusion of modern diet culture, worry equally about the risks of our kids caring too much about being “thin” and about what happens if our kids are fat. Sole-Smith shows how the reverberations of this messaging and social pressures on young bodies continue well into adulthood—and what we can do to fight them.

Fat Talk argues for a reclaiming of “fat,” which is not synonymous with “unhealthy,” “inactive,” or “lazy.” Talking to researchers and activists, as well as parents and kids across a broad swath of the country, Sole-Smith lays bare how America’s focus on solving the “childhood obesity epidemic” has perpetuated a second crisis of disordered eating and body hatred for kids of all sizes. She exposes our society’s internalized fatphobia and elucidates how and why we need to stop “preventing obesity” and start supporting kids in the bodies they have.

Continuing conversations started by works like Girls & Sex, Under Pressure, and Essential Labor, Fat Talk is a stirring, deeply researched, and groundbreaking audiobook that will help parents learn to reckon with their own body biases, identify diet culture messaging, and ultimately empower their kids to navigate this challenging landscape. Sole-Smith offers an alternative framework for parenting around food and bodies, and a way for us all to work toward a more weight-inclusive world—because it’s not our kids, or their bodies, who need fixing.

A Macmillan Audio production from Henry Holt & Company.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2023 Virginia Sole-Smith (P)2023 Macmillan Audio

Critic reviews

“I am extremely grateful to Virginia for writing Fat Talk. It’s a fearless and game-changing addition to the conversation about kids, food and weight, and a book that all parents need to read.”—Emily Oster, author of Expecting Better and Cribsheet

“If you have ever held a piece of food or briefly glimpsed a part of your body and felt a complicated thing, you need to read this book. Fat Talk is about parenting—but also about living—within and outside of the nefarious stories we’ve been told about food and bodies and how and why they relate to health; about the dangers of restriction and the freedom and the power that can come from loving ourselves and one another on new and better terms.”—Lynn Steger Strong, author of Flight and Want

“Fat Talk is the book I wish my parents had when I was growing up.”—Julia Turshen, New York Times bestselling author

Essential reading for ALL PARENTS.

I'm a very thin person who was raised by a mother in a larger body. I witnessed her being constantly ridiculed, berated, shamed, picked at, pitied, and lectured at by everyone in her life from her husband to her doctors to my classmates in third grade (!) to her family (who also mostly lived in large bodies). She dieted all. the. time. It never worked and everyone blamed her. She was a failure to them and to herself because, as far as anyone knew (herself included), it was all her fault. Living every single day this way is torture. No person deserves that, not an adult and most definitely not a child. Diet culture needs to END. I honestly don't think it is possible for me, after all these decades, to fully remove the negative track in my head about weight even though I would love to. I could say I'm naturally thin but that's probably bullshit. I'm terrified thin and for good reason. I will NOT have this happen to my daughter. No way. Virginia Sole-Smith's book is an excellent corrective and I urge all parents--actually all readers--to read it. Because we all live in diet culture and unless we are aware of how we talk and think about bodies and food and weight there is a good chance we are hurting another person.

I needed to hear this!

I appreciated the research and message in this book and it is helping me start my journey battling anti-fatness, body shame, and responsibly talking to kids about this topic!

Good and interesting info

This listen gave me lots to think about. Helped me examine some issues, attitudes in my life and in people around me. Definitely recommend but I did NOT like the narrator's voice. Very raspy and monotone, not joyful or animated at all, so it was a bit torturous to listen to.

Foundational reading for humans

So grateful for Virginia's brain, heart, soul (sole;), body, wisdom, tribe, and all who helped her bring forth this critically needed work. The scope of the work is immense, exceeding my expectations. As a person who has struggled back and forth, in and out of a larger body from childhood, I can testify to the hurt, damage, and permanent injury wrought by a culture enslaved by diet culture. Regardless of one's body size, the psychological straight jacket of being convinced that our vessels are unacceptable no matter what we (increasingly radically) do to change them, turns each of us into shadows of who we are and what we can do in the short time we have on this planet. Imagine what we could accomplish together without the shackles of this misdirection! Imagine all of us being able to turn away from patent untruths told by generations about our human meat suits, and toward a cure for cancer, a solution to our precious planet tipping toward disaster, or a way to feed everyone? The stakes have never been higher. We need our whole selves back, thank you. Let's be kind to ourselves, each other, and our *children* through a complete paradigm shift with the practical tools and deeply explored insight of this lovely, beautifully wise woman.

A must read for parents and providers

This book was detailed and engaging. It helped me see how the dominant narrative about fat has crept into even my early childhood. It was definitely a great perspective shift for me. I am on my ED recovery journey and I'm so glad that I don't need to pass my trauma on to my kids or the kids I work with.

All-encompassing (and not just for parents)

Great read (listen) that encompasses the far-reaching effects of conflating weight and health on individuals and institutions. Covers topics such as anti-fat bias, weight stigma, diet culture, and eating disorders. While it is written by a parent for parents, it is relevant to everyone. I highly recommend this book for anyone interested in better understanding our complicated relationships with our bodies and food.

Essential listening

A critical parenting guide for anyone with children in our fat-phobic society. The author is non-judgmental, warm, and so helpful for parents. Wish I could give it more stars!

Easy to follow and important

Explaining beautifully the mechanisms of fat phobia and it’s potential harm to children.
This is important for everyone, not just parents.

My New Too Resource

As an eating disorder therapist who works with teens and families, I always struggled to find a resource that had it all. But I found it all in this book.
I’m about to start buying copies to hand to strangers on the street. Everyone, no matter their demographic, needs to read these powerful words.

Helpful advice and very well researched and easy to understand

I appreciate all the research as well as the personal vulnerabilities that went into making this book. I find this helpful as a therapist and with helping to raise kids.