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"  Last Saturday, model Crystal Renn walked for the second consecutive season in Mark Fast&amp;#039;s London Fashion Week runway show. A designer whose signature dresses leave nothing to the imagination (think bodystocking-tight knit minis), Fast chose the size-12 Renn\u2014as well as the similarly-built Haley Morley\u2014not only for their height and good looks but also for what their full-bodied figures represent, or more accurately, what he and others who decry the fashion industry&amp;#039;s &amp;quot;too thin&amp;quot; fa\u00E7ade hope their inclusion represents: a shift toward a more tolerant, more realistic idea of female beauty. Recently, Renn, along with controversial anti-obesity activist MeMe Roth, writer and self-proclaimed `Fatshionista&amp;#039; Marianne Kirby, and Kim Bensen, a woman whose Weight Watchers-assisted 212-pound weight loss has earned her recognition in People magazine and on Good Morning America, joined GMA co-anchor Juju Chang for a panel discussion at The Cooper Union&amp;#039;s Great Hall in New York City (as part of Nightline&amp;#039;s Face-Off series), tackling the question, &amp;quot;Is it OK to be Fat?&amp;quot; Before I offer my take on the dialogue, I should mention that I have my own issues with food and exercise, and they are ones I only recently acknowledged and still battle on a daily basis. Coming off a decade-long phase where I, like Roth, mistook self-discipline for superiority\u2014and then proselytized under a guise of concern\u2014inevitably colored how I listened to the conversation. When it comes to obesity, there is no question that Americans have a problem. According to a study published in last month&amp;#039;s Journal of the American Medical Association, more than 33 percent of American adults are clinically obese, and more than two-thirds (68 percent) are overweight. These staggering statistics no doubt influenced First Lady Michelle Obama&amp;#039;s decision to launch her nationwide  Let&amp;#039;s Move initiative\u2014a multi-disciplined effort to curb childhood obesity\u2014less than two weeks later. Her message to the American people was clear: Obesity, especially in children, has become an indefensible epidemic.  On the flip side, there&amp;#039;s no denying our fixation with the idealized tall, slim form promoted by the fashion and entertainment industries. Though eating disorders affect far fewer individuals than obesity (according to the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders, 4 percent of American women suffer from bulimia, while only 0.5 percent suffer from anorexia), these afflictions are no less worthy of public attention, especially when so many of them fall into that nebulous, statistically unrepresented third category, Ednos (the acronym used by the American Psychiatry Association for &amp;quot;eating disorder not otherwise specified&amp;quot;). Within the first few minutes of the discussion, it was clear which side of the debate each of the four women was on\u2014not surprisingly, the seating arrangement reflected the divide: Renn and Kirby on the left, Roth and Bensen on the right. The nearly two-hour discussion covered many topics, but at its core, the question wasn&amp;#039;t as much, &amp;quot;Is it OK to be Fat?&amp;quot; as it was, &amp;quot;Is it Healthy to be Fat?&amp;quot; Roth, whose own immediate family is plagued by &amp;quot;super obesity,&amp;quot; answered no to both questions and used her quiver of statistics to shoot down all counterarguments posted by Renn and Kirby: Fat people cost thin people money, insurance-wise; fat people die at an earlier age; fat people have lower brain volumes (it&amp;#039;s true, there is such a study), and so forth. Kirby, for all her charm (of the four, she is the one you&amp;#039;d most want to befriend), did little to disprove or even distract from Roth&amp;#039;s full-court press. Instead of challenging Roth and her numbers, she used only herself as an example of an obese person in good health\u2014which, even to an audience member who wanted to believe her, wasn&amp;#039;t fully convincing. Kirby lost further credibility when she placed the blame for her size on genetic predisposition and her &amp;quot;permanently screwed up&amp;quot; metabolism, the result of &amp;quot;dieting from the age 7 to 27.&amp;quot; At no point did she acknowledge or admit how her own behaviors\u2014diet and/or lack of exercise\u2014may play a role in her obesity, and it was this lack of ownership that earned Roth more points than she may have deserved. When Renn spoke, it was often sensational, countering with extreme examples from her own battles with anorexia. In response to Roth&amp;#039;s claim that obesity puts stress on one&amp;#039;s hips and joints, Renn said, &amp;quot;Well, I remember when I&amp;#039;d been exercising for eight hours a day\u2014what that did to my hips was amazing. I found it very difficult to walk down the street.&amp;quot; Renn also accused MeMe of being &amp;quot;fatphobic&amp;quot; (which, in all honesty, I think she is). Bensen was definitely a supporting player, though she instigated the most powerful moment of the debate, in my opinion: When she challenged Kirby&amp;#039;s claim that she is the way she is because of forces beyond her control, Bensen told her she also yo-yo dieted her entire life and began her journey to weight loss at an even heavier weight than Kirby now carries. It was a shame that Bensen didn&amp;#039;t speak up more, because it was her more rational, more seasoned and articulate perspective that I most wanted to listen to.  To watch the full report on the &amp;quot;Is it OK to be Fat?&amp;quot; panel discussion, tune into tonight&amp;#039;s episode of Nightline on ABC (11:35 PM EST). "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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