‘Embracing Your Big Fat Ass’ a waste

   I read this book so you won’t have to.
   Authors Laura Banks and Janette Barber both have done stand-up comedy, and they intend "Embracing Your Big Fat Ass" (2008, Atria Books) to be helpful, encouraging and humorous advice for larger-size women. Evidently they think  such women need their self-help ladled out with big helpings of crass and crude. They say they chose the profanity "ass" to give the title the "bite" it needs.
  No it doesn’t.
  A chapter subheading is "You Are Who You Think You Are." The authors go on to say, "What you think of yourself is often more powerful than what others think of you." Absolutely true. Then why talk about fat ass dates, ask how big is your fat ass, have a chapter devoted to the B-FLAB (big flabby ass babe) and devote pages to "managing fat ass sprawl on trips of any kind."
   In a country where a lovely 6-foot, size 4 teenager can be told that if she wants to be a successful fashion model, she needs to lose weight and be able to get into a loose size 2, where people are killing themselves with anorexia and bulimia, and where, in spite of all the pressure to be thin, obesity is epidemic, maybe giving our body parts ugly names isn’t the best answer. Banks and Barber are right to lament the state of mind of many women today as those women agonize over their looks and size. But, I’m sorry to say, this book is a waste of time and trees.
   Maybe we women should try something else. Here’s some advice, consider it a free gift:
   Don’t be the first to tear yourself apart.
   Whatever our size, every woman has features to celebrate: wild, gypsy hair, doelike eyes, graceful hands, pretty feet, a sexy throat, a lovely voice. We can, and we ought, to think of ourselves in kind and loving terms. We teach others how to treat us by how we treat ourselves. More importantly, we teach our daughters how to treat themselves.
   You’re welcome.