First, My Rant

I have to admit that I harbored a certain prejudice against the Skinny Bitches before I ever cracked the binding of their book, (which I did look through about a month back as I was killing time during a long airport lay-over).  I didn’t like the idea behind their book, I didn’t like the title, and I haven’t liked the people I’ve met who rave about the book and how it’s changed their lives.  My worst fears were confirmed when I read the first few pages and browsed the index and chapter headings.  The book capitalizes on the worst of body-loathing and self-loathing that permeates our culture, but the ‘Bitches’ insist that their book is dedicated to changing the world by converting people to a vegan diet that will get them to eat better.   But they aren’t just meat haters (a loathing which I can understand…. as I’m just not that into the harvesting and consumption of flesh myself). They hate on caffeine, sugar, wine, fun, and all human bodies that don’t live up to the painstakingly emaciated “ideal.”

The Bitches initiate their readers into their bitchy crew with heavy doses of castigation (they inform their readers that they are suffering from “bloated fat pig syndrome.” Ouch…. please miss, may I have another?), followed by model-body idolatry (“healthy = skinny”) , topped with a whole slew of rules we should all follow more closely than the ten commandments (like “sugar is the devil” and drinking alcohol “equals fat-pig syndrome” and “coffee is for pussies”).  They also have a whole chapter dedicated to Pooping.  Hmmm… do I smell former laxative abusers therein….?

More on the “Bitches” I hate, the “Hungry Girl” I love, and a chance to voice your views after the jump…

The Bitches’ website proclaims, “If you can’t take one more day of self-loathing, you’re ready to get skinny.”  Worst of all, the Bitches have built a bitchin’ empire on this pyre of self-hatred and general immaturity.  They have recipe books, a diet book for pregnant women called “Skinny Bitch: Bun in the Oven,” and they will soon be releasing a book called Skinny Bastard, a book geared toward men.

The NYT recently did a little piece on the new Skinny Bastard book:  It is apparently a little less strident and much more flirtatious. Rather than screaming at their readers for being fatties and slobs, the Bitches coax the “Bastards-in-training” into dieting by stroking their egos a little, “Chances are, you haven’t done so badly, despite the few extra lbs you’re carting around”  before hitting the “Bastards-in-training” with the book’s real message, vanity should rule your life, “don’t kid yourself, pal: A hot-bodied man is a head-turner.” Ugh!

I guess my main problem is that these gals obviously have all sorts of food and body issues and they are now profiting on spreading their disease to other, less-diseased minds.  I tend to think their books are principally about vanity and only secondarily about food and health, and their tone and technique gives vegans a bad name.

Now, My Rave

Hungry Girl, however, I completely love.  While the Bitches seem to take great delight in torturing their fanbase, Hungry Girl gently coaches her fans towards nutritional awareness. According to a recent Washington Post article on the Hungry Girl, 43-year-old Lisa Lillien, she wants her readers to think of her as their “crazy best friend,” the woman “who will go get the answers to what they want to know but don’t have time to get themselves.” And that’s exactly what she does! Teaming up with food chemists, she’s been known to challenge products that claim to be low-fat or low-cal when their healthy claims fail to stand up to lab tests.

I guess I appreciate Hungry Girl’s take on things because it’s so obvious that the woman loves food (and not just good-for-you food, but the food I sometimes urgently crave, JUNK FOOD) and makes no apologies about it.  As the Post reported:

Hungry Girl speaks the language of chips, cake, cereal, breakfast sausage, taco shells, easy noodles. By doing so, she acknowledges something we all know about ourselves: For all our slow-cooking, sustainable gardening ambitions, we are a nation of snackers.

That’s right, while we aspire to consume that which is best for us, Hungry Girl understands that many of us have neither the self-discipline nor the desire to cut out all soda-pop and sweet and salty treats.  The ultimate foodie consumer advocate, Hungry Girl’s website helps us sort through the not-so-good for us food so that we can settle on the best lesser-evil candidates to satiate our baser food instincts.  She’s more of a food analyst than a diet crazed weirdo, though she has been on the weight-watchers point system for eight years. Hungry Girl is on a lucrative crusade: she’s written recipe books and has 700,000 subscribers to her website.

Maybe I’m just a sensitive chica who appreciates the difference in tone between these folks, but I think there is a substantive difference between berating people into eating and thinking like you, and giving people information on what the nutritional value is in the stuff they eat….  Am I way off base here?  Am I a total hypocrite?  Can you all suss out some other  underlying reason why “Hungry Girl” appeals to me while I can’t stand the “Skinny Bitch” ladies?

And do you feel the same?

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Pics: Hungry Girl &  Skinny Bitch