Brazil: On the Frontier of Fat

September 22, 2022

The people of Brazil are known for their good looks. Bikinis and thongs are standard wear on
the beaches. The country is among leaders in the use of plastic surgery and body sculpting.
Beauty is important.

But now Brazil is becoming a country leading in the recognition of the rights of obese people.

“Gordofobia” is the Portuguese term for weight-based discrimination. It is a buzzword in

Brazil. The country is joining the U.S. and Europe in featuring full-bodied women in ads and
on catwalks. But it is also leading in public policy. The debate went from the media and into
city halls, state legislatures, and Brazil’s Congress.

For example, schools are buying bigger desks. Hospitals are purchasing larger beds and
M.R.I. machines. Movie theaters are offering wider seats.

The movement has its center in Recife, a city with a population of 1.4 million. Recife is one
of the fattest cities in Brazil.

The rate of obesity in Brazil doubled over the past 20 years. It has led to a movement to make
life easier for overweight people. The changes are not just about attitudes, but about laws as
well.

Measures across the country now entitle the obese to seats on subways, and to receive priority
at places like banks. In some cases, there even is legal protection from discrimination.

Lesson plans now include teaching about weight-based discrimination. A day is set aside to
promote the rights of overweight people.

An expert said what is happening in Brazil is not taking place elsewhere. For example, a
judge fined a comedian $1,000 for making jokes about a dancer’s weight. But passing laws
and promoting rights does not change everything.

In the meantime, Brazilians are getting fatter. They are now closing in on the three fattest
countries which are Mexico, the U.S., and Russia. An expert said it was because wages are
rising in Mexico. People are able to eat more fast foods and processed foods. This leads to
health problems such as diabetes and high blood pressure.

The “gordofobia” debate is not about health but about image. Brazilian people pump up their
lips, breasts, butts and suck out their fat at a rate far higher than most other countries.

The movement for weight acceptance has three goals. The first is to improve the self-image
of overweight people. The second is moving Brazil from worshipping shapeliness to
recognizing differences in body types. And the third is to just make “chairs bigger.”
 A Hijab Story

October 18, 2022

The seven-year-old girl at school in Maplewood, NJ, told her mother her teacher tried to pull her hijab
off her head. This upset the child and the mother. The mother complained about it on Facebook.
End of story? No. Ibtihaj Muhammad, a famous Olympic medalist, denounced it as abuse in an
Instagram post that went viral.
By the next day, Gov. Philip D. Murphy had weighed in on Twitter. A statewide Islamic group called
for the teacher’s “immediate firing.”
One year later, the matter is in court. The girl’s family sued the school district and the teacher, Tamar
Herman. A court dismissed the suit. This month, the teacher filed a defamation suit. It accuses the
Olympian and the New Jersey chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Rights (CAIR) of causing
“irreparable harm.”
The facts remained unclear.
The teacher said in the lawsuit that she “brushed” back a hooded garment that was blocking the
student’s eyes. She thought that the girl was wearing her typical “form-fitting” hijab underneath. She
said she replaced the head covering right away and apologized to the girl once she realized her error.
Her lawsuit claims that Ms. Muhammad, the fencer, and CAIR-NJ were “motivated by a combination
of greed and a fierce desire to burnish their brands as fighters against Islamophobia.” Her reputation
was so damaged that she could never be hired by another public school district.
The lawsuit alleges that Ms. Herman is afraid for her safety. She has lived and taught in the
community for 20 years. Now she has had to move out of her home.
Ms. Herman has said that the girl’s face was almost entirely covered by the mask the students were
required to wear to slow the spread of Covid-19. And also a “hood.”
After realizing the girl was not wearing a hijab underneath, Ms. Herman “immediately brushed the
hood back to cover all the student’s hair and apologized.” The hood never left the student’s head.
The story quickly went far beyond the school.
The head of CAIR wrote, “racist teachers like this cannot be trusted around our children.” He went on
ABC’s “Good Morning America” and demanded that Ms. Herman be immediately terminated.
Ms. Muhammad, who has a large social media following, urged people to call and email the school.
“Imagine being a child and stripped of your clothing in front of your classmates,” she wrote. “Imagine
the humiliation and trauma this experience has caused her. This is abuse.”
Over the next few weeks, the district fielded thousands of angry emails and calls.
Facebook groups from Maplewood were flooded with opinions. It got more heated when Ms.
Herman’s Jewish faith was known.
Ms. Herman said she had been subjected to “antisemitic vitriol and hatred.”
What are the rights and wrongs here? What are the lessons? One is that any event can take on a life of
its own. What really happened is buried by the opinions of people with their own agenda.
The world will move on, but some harm has been done.
 Do Not Worry Anymore About That Asteroid Hitting Earth

September 27, 2022

The Hollywood version has an asteroid bearing down on the planet. Movies like
“Armageddon,” “Deep Impact” and, “Don’t Look Up,” thrill viewers.
Scientists are now taking the threat in a more serious way. Astronomers found all of the big
asteroids that would wreak planet-wide destruction. Just like the one that doomed the
dinosaurs 66 million years ago. They are not a danger.
There are many smaller asteroids. They would not set off mass extinctions, but they can
unleash more energy than a nuclear bomb.
NASA showed how it would destroy one heading to this planet.
A spacecraft headed toward an asteroid. Well, not a real spacecraft, but one at a lab near
Baltimore. it pursued its target — a small space rock seven million miles from Earth. The
spacecraft in the lab collided with the asteroid.
“Humanity has now demonstrated the ability to target and alter the orbit of a celestial object,”
a scientist said.
Hitting an asteroid with a high-speed projectile nudges its orbit. For an asteroid headed
toward Earth, that could be enough to change a direct hit to a near miss.
The spacecraft had spotted the asteroid about an hour earlier, as a dot of light. Then, the pile
of celestial rubble grew bigger and bigger, until the picture of the asteroid’s surface filled the
screen. The mission’s engineers were on their feet, cheering.
Its signal stopped as it collided with the asteroid.
There is a growing focus on planetary defense. A new U.S.-financed telescope in Chile will
scan the night sky and find thousands of potentially hazardous asteroids. A space-based
telescope that NASA is working to build will find many hazardous asteroids. Including some
that are hard to spot from Earth.
If any of those asteroids turn out to be on a collision course with Earth, the mission shows
that deflecting them is a realistic possibility.
This was a successful demonstration that an asteroid can be deflected, A scientist said, “I
think that earthlings should sleep better. Definitely, I will.”