"The terms ‘‘overweight’’ and ‘‘obesity’’ are themselves powerful and contested frames for understanding higher body weight as either a risk factor for disease or a disease in itself. Body weight is thus ‘‘medicalized’’, rather than being treated as a political or civil rights issue, as other claimsmakers argue it should be. Fat acceptance activists reject the terms ‘‘overweight’’ and ‘‘obesity’’ because they reject the medical framing of higher body weights. Instead, they reclaim the term ‘‘fat’’ to speak of larger bodies as part of a natural and desirable form of diversity.

Research on framing shows that different media frames imply not only different ways of understanding social problems but also different courses of action. If fat- ness is framed as a natural and desirable form of biological diversity, this suggests that we should promote greater social tolerance. If, on the other hand, fatness is framed as the product of unhealthy choices, fat people (and ethnic groups with higher population weights) are likely to be cast as morally deviant or even ‘‘villains’’."