Canadian culture is strongly influenced by diet culture — a set of beliefs that promotes a narrow idea of health and body size, often linking physical appearance to personal worth. Diet culture encourages unrealistic body standards and places heavy emphasis on food rules and weight-focused goals. By labelling food and bodies as “good” or “bad” or “healthy” or “unhealthy”, it can contribute to shame, guilt, and strained relationships with food and body image.
These messages are reinforced by systems and industries that profit from quick-fix, narrow wellness ideals, and ignore the cultural, social, and emotional dimensions of health and the diversity of body size and individual experience.
The Every Body Collaborative is working to change the conversation about body image, weight and food in Northwestern Ontario.
Coordinated by TBDHU and St. Joseph’s Care Group, the community is invited to come together and talk about these issues on Thursday, February 5 at the Sister Margaret Smith Centre (301 Lillie St), from 6:30-8:30pm.
Entitled “Beyond Diet Culture: Supporting Relationships with Food and Our Bodies,” the community forum will explore how the culture about food, bodies, and health influence our daily lives, with opportunities to discuss more inclusive perspectives on the topics.
“We want to create a conversation around weight bias and work towards shifting the diet culture paradigm,” says Kim McGibbon, Public Health Nutritionist with TBDHU. “This event is a chance for us to come together as a community to look at how we can support each other in ways that promote our individual and community well-being.”
Individuals with lived experience will share their stories, followed by a panel discussion with a question-and-answer period. The event will finish with a mindful movement session and opportunities to connect with local community agencies through interactive booths.
The free event requires registration. Event details can be found here.
The forum coincides with Eating Disorders Awareness Week and focuses on building more supportive relationships with food and our bodies.
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For more information:
TBDHU Media Line
807-625-7994 or news@tbdhu.com
The Every Body Collaborative is a community partnership initiative coordinated by the Thunder Bay District Health Unit and St. Josephs Care Group – Eating Disorder Program. It involves over 20 organizations from multiple sectors including health, education, social services. This group is part of a provincial eating disorder prevention strategy, and is guided by Eating Disorders Ontario - Prevention (EDO-P) for provincial leadership. The aim of this local working group is to gain insight and feedback from community partners on local and provincial eating disorder prevention activities while building capacity in committee members (and their organizations) to serve those impacted by disordered eating and to promote overall well-being for the community.