It doesn’t take an in depth history lesson to know that power has been intentionally withheld from women. Look at voting rights, property ownership and wage disparities, among just a few things.

When it comes to the power that everyone can have within themselves, power is the ability to have autonomy over your own body and choices.

Attention has always been placed on women’s beauty and in the late 20th century, the thin body ideal was formed as a way of valuing thin women as feminine and attractive. Over time, the value system shifted to include health and success as other attributes to thinness.

We’ve been sold and told that for a woman to be successful, attractive, and healthy, they need to be thin.

Most women don’t even question this belief because it’s woven into the fabric of our culture. When a belief is formed and reinforced over and over, it’s very difficult to consider a different way of thinking.

Diet culture is the force that reinforces this belief and then offers people a solution; diets. Diet culture is what fuels the $70 billion dollar weight loss industry that keeps growing and expanding.

Diet culture convinces people that dieting and food restriction is an effective way to lose weight and be healthy.

When in fact, dieting and food restriction has been well researched and regarded as being only effective at long term weight gain.

But I think you know this. If diets were really effective, wouldn’t you have lost weight on the first one you went on, kept it off and never needed another one?

And here is where the deception comes in. When folks diet, they…

Feel like a failure and blame themselves.
Spend countless hours a day obsessing about food and their body weight.
Change social plans if they’ve eaten the wrong thing or don’t feel good about their body.
Feel body shame and want to hide.
Are exhausted and depleted.
Become disconnected from their body which often leaves them feeling numb.
Lose trust in themselves and look for external validation (like the number on the scale) to feel good about themselves.

If your body doesn’t conform to the thin body ideal, you’ve been told your body isn’t good enough. It’s not feminine, attractive or healthy.

The social structure then tells you how to fix your body with diets, clean eating, restriction of food groups and trying to control what you eat.

If you’ve been dieting to have a better body, you’ve been doing everything that our culture tells you to do.

But our culture, diet culture and the system that takes away power from women (the patriarchy), has been giving you a solution that’s only harming you. And it’s done on purpose.

When you’re exhausted, obsessing about food, and feeling like shit because you just stepped on the scale, are you able to…

feel happy,
engage fully in your life,
pursue your passions and dreams,
and trust in yourself and your own abilities?

Of course not. And this is why dieting is a money making tool that takes away women’s choice and power.