Diet Industry

Contemporary Western cultures celebrate the slender female body and a muscular male physique. While prevalent today, these ideals have not always been in vogue. For example, by today's standards, the voluptuous female nudes painted by 17th-century painter Peter Paul Rubens or the 1950s cultural icon Marilyn Monroe would be labeled “overweight.” Today, these hegemonic beauty ideals work hand-in-hand with health discourses to promote weight loss. Cultural ideals dictate that it is unattractive to be “fat” and health discourses label “overweight” and “obesity” unhealthy medical risks.

Given these seemingly ubiquitous ideals about beauty and health, it is not surprising that weight-loss practices are prevalent. On a global scale, the World Health Organization (WHO) has expressed concern that more than 1 billion adults are overweight, with at least 300 million of them obese. The WHO acknowledges multiple ways to address these conditions, including weight loss. In the United States, similar concerns have been expressed by federal, state, and local governments about growing waistlines. Indeed, governmental mandates for weight loss encourage dieting. The belief that weight loss is possible partly fuels high rates of dieting. In Western cultures, an ideology of individualism suggests that many things can be accomplished, including weight loss, simply with determination and a strong work ethic. The body is seen as a product of the psyche and those who are unable to lose weight are deemed morally wanting, lazy, and lacking in willpower.

To help individuals lose weight, the diet industry proffers an array of products and services that are widely available on a growing international weight loss and diet management market that is predicted to worth about $586 billion by 2014. These include various weight-loss drugs, diet programs, and related products. Estimates indicate that Americans spend over $50 billion a year on dieting. In recent years, there has even been an explosion of dieting sub-markets targeting specific niche populations. For example, a growing Christian diet industry provides followers with programs fittingly referred to as Bod-4God, the Maker's Diet, and the Weigh Down Diet. In general, the industry has been subject to criticism about the safety and efficacy of its products and services, and these critiques have given birth to an anti-dieting ethos stressing physiological and psychological health for individuals of all sizes.