Power and Surveillance: The Critical Examination of the Medical Construction of Fat <= o:p>
Juno Jose
St Dominic’s Colle=
ge, Kanjirapally, Kottayam, Keral-686512, India
*Corresponding a=
uthor
(E-mail address: junojose@sdck.in)
Received:08/12/2=
024,
Received in revised form: 19/12/20=
24, Accepted:
28/12/2024
Abstrac=
t
Sti=
gmatization
and discrimination against individuals with higher body weights occur in
multifarious ways in different cultures. Fatness was not a medical conditio=
n or
even a health issue a century before. Medical field was more concerned about
slenderness. But fatness is assess=
ed as
a medical condition nowadays. Upswing in the pathologization of fatness,
through which the medical industries thrive is shocking. This paper tries to
analyze, with the help of the Foucauldian terminologies- power, panopticon and surveillance, how and why the medical
industry medicalizes fat.
Keyword=
s: Fatness=
, Medicalization,
Panopticon, Power, Surveillance
Michel
Foucault’s disciplinary modalities of power, especially panopticon have evo=
lved
over time [1].
There is an unrelenting growth in surveillance, by which institutions and p=
ower
structures monitor, and discipline the people. According to Michael Foucaul=
t,
body and sexuality are social constraints. Power operates everywhere. Knowl=
edge
and even truth are defined by power. Power regulates gender roles, morality=
, beauty and wellness. To Foucault, power is knowledge i=
tself.
It subjugates the social agent from human beings to fat bodied/ disabled/
docile bodies. To Foucault, docile body is “not a passive but as malleable,=
as
a contested and contestable site of power and knowledge [2].” The fat bodied becomes an object to medi=
cal
industry where the person undergoes panoptic surveillance. With the help of
social media, advertisements and medical industry, the power wins over the =
fat.
Fat activists are medicali=
zed
for their desires and actions. “The human body is itself a politically
inscribed entity, its physiology and morphology shaped by histories and
practices of containment and control [3].”
=
2. =
Discussion:
The biome=
dical
model of fatness states that the source of ill health is in the individual.=
It
views fatness as one’s own choice. Biopower refers to policies and rules th=
at
manage the biological functions of a population- births, deaths, reproducti=
on,
and health and illness. Foucault’s power is circulating throughout the soci=
al
body. Fat as something to be cured=
and
life threatening becomes inscribed in our mind as part of the thinspirational discourse propagated by medical and o=
ther
industries. Biopower operates in the field of medicine by medicalizing and
naming fat as obesity, something to be treated and corrected.
2.1&=
nbsp;
A
Brief Overview of Body Types and Normalcy
A century
ago, it was believed that the underweight is riskier than the overweight. As
decades went by, the standards of perfection as well as health got assessed
using the measuring scales. The measured deviation from the hourglass figur=
e of
34-23-35 scale made it compelling for the women to groom themselves. After
globalization, we stated to forget the reality that, there were cultural and
social differences across the world and even among small communities on the
beauty standards.
Studying =
the
modern women, in 2015, Brinbridge wrote, “resea=
rch
shows that between 50 and 80 per cent of women are dissatisfied with their
bodies, a constantly higher value than that of men…. Parents, friends, enem=
ies,
the media, even dolls affect women’s self image.
Appearance and attractiveness have been described as personal bill boards [=
4].”
It is sure that this abstraction has surged over time.
2.2&=
nbsp;
Fat
as a Medical Condition
Medical
surveillance can be defined as the monitoring, assessme=
nt
and regulation of the health. Medical diagnosis plays a major role in the
social construction of illness. We adjoin all the socio-cultural factors li=
ke
gender, language, class, culture and economy to
construct a base for this biomedical paradigm of fat [5]. It begins from weight
monitoring, health risk assessments and lifestyle interventions which even
leads to medication and surgery. The medical industry views fatness as a
medical problem rather than a natural difference in body type. In this way =
does
the medical (here, weight loss) industry prosper. Medical gaze pathologizes=
and
stigmatizes fat bodies [6=
].
The fat bodied are thus seen as the disabled who need sudden curing or
normalization which is promised to be offered by an expert medical
practitioner! BMI calculation to make health risk classification is in itself found erroneous. The terms ‘obese’ and
‘overweight’ are used by the medical professionals and this underpins the
stereotypical, negative way in which the society view the fat.
Foucault’s
heterotopia is a world where things are different. It contains undesirable
bodies trying to create a real utopian space. The heterotopias of fat bodie=
d is
a crisis heterotopia which later turns into heterotopias of deviation.
Medicaliz=
ation
of fatness is scientifically planned and supported by huge data ranging from
cases of Type II diabetes to heart attacks. The causes of diabosity
as leading to high BP, cholesterol, heart disease, stroke, gall bladder
disease, osteoarthritis, sleep apnea and breath=
ing
problem which ends up in low quality of life shudders us.
Why is the
medical industry so dedicated at curing fat people than treating any other
disease? Because it is the easiest way to make profit and it is the easiest
answer to all diseases. “Helping people to consider themselves ill or at ri=
sk
of illness provides a platform for piggybacking commercial interests onto
medical authority [7].”
Aesthetic
medicine, a growing area of research and practice, with 91 percentage of fe=
male
patients includes the branches like plastic surgery, dermatology, cosmetic
dentistry and liposuction [8,9].
Liposuction/lipoplasty /body contouring is the =
most
requested procedure where 9 women to 1 men do th=
is to
normalize themselves. Bariatric surgery/ gastric bypass and other types of weight-loss surg=
ery/
metabolic surgery make changes our digestive system to help us lose weight.=
The
health risks of surgery include breathing problems, blood clots and death. =
Dietetic
industry is booming day by day. Alternative diets are reducing selected typ=
e of
food and replacing it. By this, wellbeing is negatively affected sometimes =
as
this diet may end up in nutrient deficiencies. Annie Morgan Elledge observes
weight loss as a cure that works to remove the fat people from the future.-Spatial and temporal disciplining of body. “The
dietetic project conserves a limited, consumerist, and decontextualized
understanding of health... [10]”
which is unaccessible for the low-earning.
It is
shocking to see the intersection of the medical and the beauty industries in
spreading thinspiration. Fatness, =
body
image, weight loss interventions, and societal attitudes toward fat individ=
uals
are becoming a topic of discussion but still not a persistent one.
2.3&=
nbsp;
Self Surveillance
Medical
discourse, a dominant discourse supported by power, operates in our life. T=
he
disciplinary power operates by conditioning us to watch our activities and
bodies and self discipline them so that we need=
no
external power to regulate us. We =
are
devised so that we exert surveillance and discipline, overt or insidious, on
the people around us. The root stigmas and conceptions of fat set by the me=
dical
industry are shocking for the common people.
Michel
Foucault’s concept of panopticon speaks about this self
surveillance where people internalize the concepts and standards set=
by
the authority, and self regulate their behaviou=
rs [11]. In this context, the
‘patients’ regulate their body through diets, exercise or even medication a=
nd
surgery. Recording food intake and portion sizes to regulate themselves is
common now a days. Apps and online media wholeheartedly appreciate and supp=
ort
such ‘self help’ initiatives where they track t=
he
patterns and triggers for unhealthy eating habits. Weight tracking and phys=
ical
activity tracking are part of this self monitoring
and regulating process.
Young people of 10 to 24 y=
ears
are agents of social change and they are constantly exposed to awareness on
body weight and the need to regulate their body. The young adopt self calibration as a way to
reduce bias. In many ways does the
beauty industry intersect with the medical industry. The society should be
cautious about the type of control they exercise.
3.
Conclusion
The tende=
ncy
to view the fat as disabled, disfigured, deviant, unfeminine (for women) and
unacceptable is a product of social and cultural attitudes. Medical and
scientific discourses have been increasingly medicalizing the fat in various
ways. The fat bias intensified by the pathologization of fat and disease
mongering is a shocking reality indeed.
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Volume 2 Issue 1
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