What's eating Brandon Williams? At age fourteen, he seems to have everything American teens are entitled to: he's blond, blued-eyed, with a surfer pose. Although a bit chubby around the waist, he has muscles in all the right places, and lives in a million-dollar house that overlooks the ocean in Santa Cruz, California. Like his high-school senior brother Chad, he gets a generous allowance from his liberal-minded parents; and there's even a maid to clean up his room, which is stuffed with the latest high-tech gear. So, why isn't Brandon happy? What's missing from his perfect life of sun, surf and skateboards? He's gone to a private all-white school from kindergarten through eighth grade, but has wasted a year in a fog of dope dreams; and the only friend who hasn't abandoned him is Tommy Turner, a fat twelve-year-old who lives next door.
Brandon hopes to be a writer someday and fight against injustice, but pot gave him no inspiration. A fantasy warrior in cyberspace, he's a crusader without a realtime cause, a fighter with nothing to fight for. Although he knows these things exist, he's never experienced prejudice, discrimination or hate. After all, what is there to hate about Brandon? He's not handsome or muscular enough to be envied for his looks, he's open-minded in an innocent way, and he's not chubby enough to be dissed for a fat kid. The only "problem" he's part of is not knowing he's part of a problem.
But, this year is different: against his parents' wishes he decides to attend a public high school. It's a whole new world for Brandon, and scary because no one knows him. Not surprisingly, he finds himself among the outcasts. His first new friends are an enormous fat boy named Travis, one of the few black kids in Santa Cruz and maybe the fattest dude on the planet. Brandon's other first-day friends include a fat Native-American boy named Danny Little-Wing, a chubby Latino gang member named Carlos, and Rex Watson, the school's smallest kid who skipped a grade to find himself in high school a year too soon. There is also Bosco Donatello, a chubby world-class surfer-dude, but strangely lost in space. Bosco is also oddly out of date, like a ghost boy from 1963, a time when surf music ruled the airwaves, before the Black Panthers, the Vietnam War, and protest marches by kids with long hair who knew the System was lying to them.
In the months that follow, Brandon discovers the fat-kid world and all its different inhabitants, from kids forced on diets by "health-nazi" parents and made to feel guilty about everything they eat as if food were some sort of dangerous drug, to other kids who love being fat and even try to get fatter. It's a secret and often cyber-world of "gainers, feeders, admirers and encouragers" from all around the world.
Brandon also discovers hate... hate for fat kids that is made "okay" by American society. It might not be politically-correct to dis a kid for being black, Latino, Jewish, or gay, but it's totally acceptable to make a kid's life an endless hell just because they're "overweight." Like any form of ignorant hate, some kids can handle it while others can't... sometimes with fatal results. And, the constant pressure to be movie-star thin makes normal kids suffer and healthy kids sick, while feeding a billion-dollar industry of mostly bogus "health" and diets.
In this first year of public school, and through a mild yet turbulant Santa Cruz winter, Brandon discovers his real self and strength. While society constantly preaches that inside every "fat kid" is a thin kid crying to be free, Brandon finds that he's always been a happy, healthy, chubby warrior with the power to fight injustice and hate.
Wikipedia in English
Here is a quote from the book:
"Formerly loving, caring parents had turned into anti-obesity priests beating their bibles of fat-hating rites. They made every meal a torment of guilt, and every snack a deadly sin. They set weight limits and lectured on health -- parroting TV, of course. They punished with doctors, diets or camps, and apologized to their neighbors and friends for the "fat little slob" their kid had become."
Another quote:
"Nobody wants to defend these kids. They gave up their rights by getting fat. No one cares if they're teased or bullied. Or even beaten up."
"Yeah," agreed Brandon. Like, 'your kids are fat, and if you loved them you'd make them lose weight.' So, if they're fat you don't love them. And if they don't like being teased, bullied, beat up and hated, then they should get skinny. Like, we've finally found some people to hate and nobody cares if we do. ...Like, open season on fat kids and nobody needs a hunting permit. Or has to prove they're qualified. Just get a gun and start shooting."
There is a multi-billion-dollar "heath" and diet industry that gets more obese every year buy selling diet and health plans and pills, most of which don't work. Most of the pills and "weight loss formulas" don't have to be tested to see if they are even safe, yet people who you would think were fairly smart put them in their mouths.
Another quote:
"...Every year," the teacher droned, "There are 300,000 deaths in America because of obesity. Furthermore..."
Travis raised his hand. Mr, Mortimer looked surprised. "...Yes?"
"Those statistics were never objectively proven," said Travis. "The original study never mentioned other health-risks fat people might have, like drinkin', smokin', an' drug use. Including diet drugs. Especially all those sold on TV that never have to be tested so nobody knows what's in `em. That study also never mentioned excessive dieting, yo-yo dieting, an' diet itself as contributing factors to health risks. Also not gettin' exercise. Or depression or stress... like from gettin' dissed all the time or havin' to listen to lectures like yours. None of those things were stuided, an' their effects on average size people were never compared to fat ones."
Mr. Mortimer blinked like a deer caught in headlights. Then he cleared his throat. "These are facts in your Science book," he said in an almost astonished voice, as if Travis had spit on a Bible."
These are some of the things that are talked about in this book. But this is not a book about whether it is bad to be fat or good to be skinny. Jess Mowry leaves that up to the so-called "experts." Instead, Phat Acceptance is a story about friendship that crosses all lines of race, color and size. It's a story about accepting other people for who they are, not what they look like. The main character is Brandon Williams. Brandon is an average size (or maybe a bit chubby) boy of 14. He has blond hair and blue eyes. Some people might say he is a rich kid because he lives in a million-dollar house by the ocean in Santa Cruz, California. Brandon has everything that most teens in America either have, want, or think they are entitled to. His room is stuffed with all of the newest and coolest gear, and there is even a maid to do his laundry. Brandon has gone to a private school from kindergarten to 8th grade. He is smart, but he has also had problems with dope and has basically wasted a year of his life staying high. One of Brandon's lifetime friends, Troy Durrant, mostly abandoned him during this year, and the only friend who stayed true was Tommy Turner, two years younger than Brandon and fat, who lives next door. Against his parent's wishes, Brandon decides to go to a public high school. Since nobody knows him there, and nobody knows if he is cool or not, he hooks up with the kind of kids who are usually outcasts in high school, and many of them are fat. There is Travis White who just moved down from Oakland. Travis is the school's fattest kid at over 500 pounds. He is also one of the few black kids in that school. There is Bosco Donatello, a word-class surfer dude who is very chubby. There is Danny Little-Wing, a Native-American dude who is the second fattest kid at school, and also Carlos a Latino gang kid. Brandon's other new friends include Zach, a pot-bellied gainer whose girlfriend feeds him, and Rex Watson, the school's smallest kid who skipped a grade. None of the fat kids call themselves "obese" except a dude named Jason Bray who hates being fat and is always talking about losing weight but who never does.
Most of the story takes place between the start of school in September and Halloween at the end of October. In these two months, Brandon not only learns all about being a fat kid in this society, including the world of gainers, feeders, admirers and encouragers, but he also learns about his multi-racial friends. This is not just a story about fat kids. There is surfing, skating and various adventures. We also learn how easily our minds are controlled by TV, movies, and the so-called news to make us hate anybody we are told to hate and never ask why. We are also conditioned to buy and consume from the minute we watch our first TV show. The big question is not whether it's always unhealthy to be chubby or fat, instead it is how far do we let ourselves be brainwashed into thinking that everybody has to be the same size and look like a Hollywood star? And if they don't, should me make them?
Adolph Hitler said, "A German boy should be lean and mean." The health-nazis today are saying the same thing. (