Let's Talk about Fitness, the BMI and White Supremacy with Simone Samuels.

02/26/24 • 53 min

Simone Samuels, B.A. (Hons.), J.D., B.C.L. is a consultant in equity, diversity and inclusion and a weight-neutral personal trainer/group fitness instructor. A lawyer by training and a fitness professional, she has consulted for fitness organizations in Canada, US and the UK and has delivered courses on weight stigma, fatphobia, anti-racism, allyship and anti-oppression.
Simone is a tireless advocate for making the fitness and wider world a more inclusive place.
I was SO excited to chat with Simone and knew it would be a confronting and very important conversation. She was incredibly generous with her time and I know you will very much enjoy this meaty conversation.
We chatted about:

How white female Fitpros can actually be inclusive in the fitness space?
The racist roots of the BMI and diet culture. Simone recommends some must-read books for those serious about doing the work.
According to the BMI the ROCK (Dwayne Johnson) is morbidly ob*se. It was never meant to be used at a population level.
Overcoming fatphobia in fitness spaces. How we can get informed.
Finding real joy in movement in this hustle culture and untangling weight loss and exercise.
We chat about Aqua Zumba and ask why aqua is always associated with an older demographic.

What a chat! I was truly buzzing afterwards and cannot wait to get Simone back for part 2.
Recommended Reading for Fitpros or anyone engaged in the fitness industry:
Sabrina Strings - Fearing the Black Body. The Racist Origins of Fatphobia
Da'Shaun L. Harrison - The Belly of the Beast: The Politics of Anti-Fatness as Anti-Blackness
Ibram X Kendi: Stamped From The Beginning: A Graphic History of Racist Ideas in America
If you'd like to know more about Simone, find her on Instagram or have a look at her website, where she has lots of different options to work with her.
* Simone was the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion reviewer of the canfitpro Personal Training Specialist textbook, helping to create an inclusive curriculum for future personal trainers in Canada. She has won multiple awards and commendations in the fitness industry, the most nota

Please reach out if you would like some support with your relationship to food OR movement. Ela currently has limited spaces for Intuitive Eating coaching and if you'd like to reconnect with movement, contact Christine.
AND if you enjoyed this episode, please share and follow the 'Find Your Strong podcast' and if you have time, write us a short review. It would honestly mean the world. Love to you all, Ela & Christine x

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How white female Fitpros can actually be inclusive in the fitness space?
The racist roots of the BMI and diet culture. Simone recommends some must-read books for those serious about doing the work.
According to the BMI the ROCK (Dwayne Johnson) is morbidly ob*se. It was never meant to be used at a population level.
Overcoming fatphobia in fitness spaces. How we can get informed.
Finding real joy in movement in this hustle culture and untangling weight loss and exercise.
We chat about Aqua Zumba and ask why aqua is always associated with an older demographic.

Previous Episode

Men Have Body Image Issues Too. A Conversation with Jonny Landels

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Today I am chatting with Jonny Landels, a former diet culture-obsessed fat loss coach turned Intuitive Eating coach and Health at Every Size Advocate. He spent YEARS fighting his own body but a couple of years ago, managed to turn things around and now adopts a non-diet approach.
I was really interested to get a male perspective on the impact of diet culture and Jonny feels incredibly passionately about ending the stigma, when it comes to discussing disordered eating, body dysmorphia and body image issues amongst men.
We touched on the following topics during our chat:

We spoke about Jonny's transition from fat loss coach to weight neutral coach and how his clients reacted.
We talked about cultivating a healthy relationship with movement when historically it's associated with dieting and self-punishment
How to know when too much is too much

I am so excited to bring you this conversation and love Jonny's passion and conviction for his work.

If you're interested in working with Jonny, he mainly hangs out on Instagram OR you can see what he's got coming up through his website.

Next Episode

Your Fat Friend. Let's Talk About It.

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This week I grabbed my good friend Ela Law from @elalawnutrition to chat about the Your Fat Friend documentary, by Jeanie Finlay which followed Aubrey Gordon across 6 years, since she released an anonymous blog from an account called @yrfatfriend .
Aubrey has since written 2 New York Times Bestselling books (You Just Need to Lose Weight and What We Don't Talk About When We Talk About Fat) and along with Michael Hobbes (adamantly NOT on instagram!) has created something truly special with the informative, endearing and forever engaging Maintenance Phase podcast .
Ela and I chat about weight bias and how it permeates our society. Neither Ela nor I have lived experience of being in a fat body and both of us were truly touched by being able to see the world even for a brief time through Aubrey's eyes.
At one point in the film, Aubrey alluded to the fact that she has been struggling with an eating disorder but really struggled to get the help and support she needed. Eating disorders do not discriminate. They impact people of all body sizes, of all ages, ethnicities and genders.
We chat about repairing our relationship with food AND finally finding peace with our bodies when we live in a dieting culture and thinness is a value praised above all else. It is the air that we breathe and the sea that we swim in.
Ela and I then segway into the world of Intuitive Eating.
I hope you enjoy this episode and let us know what you think. If you can PLEASE find an opportunity to watch Your Fat Friend It is a triumph and Aubrey and Jeanie IRL are simply a joy to be around and were both SO generous with their time.

Find Your Strong Podcast - Let's Talk about Fitness, the BMI and White Supremacy with Simone Samuels.

Transcript

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00:00:02.420 --> 00:00:18.789
Christine Chessman: So welcome to another episode of the find. Your strong. Podcast I have got a very exciting surprise tonight. We've got Simone, Samuel joining us. Simone, how are you? I'm great, Christine, thanks for having me.
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00:00:19.100 --> 00:00:44.090
Simone Samuels: I'm so excited. I get so nervous for these podcasts, especially when I'm interviewing somebody that I followed for a while, and I'm a bit of a Fan girl. I feel the sa