UCLA medical school has been condemned by a renowned Harvard doctor for forcing its students to take a “fat positivity” course.
All first-year medical students at UCLA must read an essay by Marquisele Mercedes, a self-described “fat liberator” who claims that “fatphobia is the status quo of medicine” and that weight loss is a ” desperate enterprise.”
Mercedes’ article, titled “No Health, No Care: The Great Flaw in the Hippocratic Oath,” is on the required reading list for the required course on Structural Racism and Health Equity.
The course syllabus, obtained by the Washington Free Beacon, shows what students at this elite medical school learn — which has caught the attention of experts across the country who disagree with the lessons of the course.
Jeffrey Flier, former dean of Harvard Medical School and one of the world’s leading experts on obesity, criticized the course and said the program “promotes widespread and dangerous misinformation.”
All first-year medical students at UCLA must read an essay by Marquisele Mercedes (pictured), a self-described “fat liberator” who claims that “fatphobia is the status quo of medicine” and that weight loss is a “desperate enterprise”.
Jeffrey Flier (pictured), former dean of Harvard Medical School and one of the world’s leading experts on obesity, criticized the course and said the program “promotes widespread and dangerous misinformation.”
UCLA “has centered this required course on a socialist/Marxist ideology that is completely inappropriate,” Flier said. “As a long-time medical educator, I found this course truly shocking.”
Mercedes’ essay details how weight has become “pathologized and medicalized in racialized terms.”
She offers tips for “resisting the ingrained oppression of fat,” according to the course syllabus.
Mercedes claims that “ob*sity” is a slur “used to demand violence against fat people” – particularly “black, disabled, trans, poor, and fat people.”
“This is a deeply flawed view of obesity, a complex medical disorder with major adverse health consequences for all racial and ethnic groups,” Flier said, adding that teaching these “ignorant” ideas to medical students is “professional misconduct”.
She uses her social media account to further express her activism for “fat-positivity.”
“It’s so isolating to be a fat, disabled black person working for individual and collective liberation,” she wrote in an Instagram post – adding that being fat is a disability.
Mercedes also led presentations on how “the fight against obesity shows up in the work you do” – which she said includes using “alarmist language to encourage healthy eating and physical activity “.
Mercedes also taught students at a public health seminar that “obese people are forced to fight obesity in all areas on a daily basis throughout their lives.”
Mercedes says “making the decision to engage in health care for obese people often means making the decision to likely put yourself at risk”
She also led presentations on how “the fight against obesity shows up in the work you do” – which she said includes using “scare-mongering language to encourage healthy eating.” and physical activity.
Mercedes also taught students at a public health seminar that “obese people are forced to fight obesity in all areas every day, throughout their lives.”
She says that “making the decision to engage in health care for obese people often means making the decision to likely put yourself at risk.”
DailyMail.com has contacted Mercedes for comment.
Mercedes is just one voice amid a wave of “fat-positivity.” Virginia Sole-Smith, an “anti-fat activist,” sparked controversy by claiming that childhood obesity is not a problem, but anti-fat prejudice is.
Mercedes (pictured) claims ‘ob*sity’ is a slur ‘used to demand violence against fat people’ – particularly ‘black, disabled, trans, poor and fat people’
Virginia lets her children eat whatever they want, even against the wishes of her estranged husband who caught his daughter eating a stick of butter.
She is the author of “Fat Talk: Parenting in the Age of Diet Culture” and an advocate for dismantling diet culture and anti-fat bias.
“We don’t determine parents’ body sizes,” Sole-Smith said on the Pressure Cooker podcast. “How your child eats and how much their body moves is really the smallest piece of the puzzle. When you focus on this in an effort to control your child’s weight, you are doing a lot of harm.
While Sole-Smith’s book is a New York Times bestseller and many turn to her for parenting advice, others believe she is promoting a dangerous lifestyle.
“It’s not okay to be overweight, it’s not okay to eat too much sugar and animal fats, it’s not okay to eat junk food, it’s not okay to not move your body, it’s not good to pretend that being overweight is a good thing”, Caroline Hailstone. » said on one of Sole Smith’s Instagram posts.
Mercedes also received plenty of backlash — and Flier isn’t the only expert to criticize UCLA for including his ideas in the course curriculum.
Nicholas Christakis is a sociologist who has spent decades providing medical care to underserved communities, including on the South Side of Chicago.
He called the curriculum “absurd” and said the course was “embarrassing for UCLA.”
First-year UCLA medical students were also forced to attend a bizarre lecture by a pro-Hamas activist that had them praying to “Mother Earth” while a faculty member sought to identify a student who refused to participate.
Lisa Gray-Garcia gave a two-hour presentation at Geffen Hall on the university’s downtown campus on March 27.
The lecture was a required part of the course on structural racism and health equity administered by pediatrician Lindsay Wells.
The UCLA course curriculum shows what students at the elite medical school learn — which has attracted the attention of experts across the country who disagree with the course’s teachings.
UCLA is not the only university to be criticized for integrating certain lessons into the curriculum for DEI purposes.
Stanford Medical School has peppered lessons on “microaggressions,” “structural racism,” and “privilege” into its teachings.
Yale Medical School students are required to complete an “Advocacy and Equity” sequence on “becoming physician advocates for health justice.”
Professors at Columbia Medical School are told they should refer to women as “people with uteruses” to promote “anti-bias and inclusive” curriculum.
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