Recent Reads – “Skinny Bitch” by Rory Freedman and Kim Barnouin

If you are unfamiliar with the “Recent Reads” series, click here for an explanation.
Short story even shorter: I tell you about books I have recently read (came as quite a surprise, regarding the title, hm?)

This time I will share with you a book I picked from my Skoobe library when I was bored.
I picked it because I am quite into healthy eating, it said it was “life-changing” and a “New York Times Bestseller” and because I wanted a break from reading fiction.

Reading Essentials

The title itself is quite explicit: “Skinny Bitch – The truth about crappy diets, fat women and good looks”.

The topic as described by Amazon:
Not your typical boring diet book, this is a tart-tongued, no-holds barred wakeup call to all women who want to be thin. With such blunt advice as “Soda is liquid Satan” and “You are a total moron if you think the Atkins Diet will make you thin”, it is a rallying car for all savvy women to start eating healthy and looking radiant.
Unlike standard diet books, it actually makes the reader laugh out loud with its truthful, smart-mouthed revelations. Behind all the attitude, however, there is solid guidance.

Source: Amazon

The topic as I see it:
Definitely not your typical diet book.
The authors, a model/nutritionist and the owner of a model company, share their view on healthy food, eating meat and diet myths using a language meant to be “girlfriend talk”, but in my eyes borderline offensive.

Did I like it:
No.
For several reasons.

If any of my girlfriends would use this kind of language while speaking to me (or anyone else in my presence), we would have some serious talk afterwards.
The only place I have heard people talk to each other like this is during trash TV shows where people are payed to yell at each other about having sex with their neighbors dog (not an actual topic – I hope! – but you get the point)
If you want to draw attention to your topic, try using the topic, not abusive language.

Going the same way is the whole chapter about eating meat.
Yes, I am well aware of the way animals are treated before they end up being consumed by humans, and yes, it is an important topic that gets way to little publicity.
I am living pescetarian myself 95% of the time, and I salute everyone who has decided to go fully vegan.
But for one thing: Being vegetarian/vegan is NOT about weight loss.
And for another thing: Reading the descriptions they gave in this chapter made me actually gag.
And I am by no means a sensible soul when it comes to written content or violence.
This may be the way it is, but again: Let the topic speak for itself. No need to traumatize a teenager reading your book!

Putting all this aside, just focusing on the facts included, I still have complaints.
The authors do have some good points, like: Stay away from refined sugar, Complex carbs aren’t as bad as some people tell you and Eat more vegetables, but they go on mixing this with things that are simply and utterly wrong!
It is NOT TRUE that eating too much protein will injure your kidneys. Fact is, if your kidneys are injured, they can’t excrete the protein as well as they used to, so you should watch your protein intake then.
And this is just one example.

Now I am lucky to know a good share about nutrition and human bodies myself, so I can filter facts from myths and maybe get some useful information from reading it. But for the average reader, who is neither nutritionist nor physician, and probably from a younger audience, there are some dangerous misconceptions hidden in there.

So if I started living by these rules, I would probably get skinnier.
If I were as strict about cutting out refined sugar, I would probably get healthier.
But if I had to cope with this language any longer, I would for sure become a bitch!

MerkenMerken

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