Special Events

Diet Free Day is an international day of celebration of body acceptance and diversity that originated in England in 1992. It is acknowledged every year on May 6th. Mary Evans Young from Diet Breakers established the celebration as a way of responding to and defying sociocultural pressures to be thin and to diet.

Diet Free Day is a celebration which encourages people to adopt healthy, fulfilling lifestyles, regardless of size and weight. (For information about the dangers of dieting go to 'before you start your next diet' )

Some of the goals of Diet Free Day include:

• Celebrating the beauty and diversity of all our shapes and sizes
• Affirming everyBODY's right to health, fitness, and well-being
• Declaring a personal moratorium on diet/weight obsession
• Learning the facts about weight-loss dieting, health, and body size
• Recognizing the dangers and futility of dieting
• Increasing public awareness of society's obsession with slenderness
• Helping end weight discrimination, sizeism and fatphobia

Ten ways to enjoy Diet Free Day

• Enjoy foods you have been denying yourself
• Give away clothes you have been waiting to 'diet' into
• Don't compare your body with someone else's. Celebrate your uniqueness
• Don't comment negatively on your own or somebody else's body
• Do something you've been putting off until you were 'thin enough' to do it
• Make a top ten list of things you love about your body
• Borrow a book from the library on ways to develop body satisfaction
• Organise a shared meal with friends and include celebratory foods
• Throw away your dieting paraphernalia (scales, diet books, etc)
• Spring clean your environment and remove any stereotypical images of 'ideal' slenderness

Suggestions for Diet Free Celebrations in schools: Help make your school a 'diet free' zone. (EDEN is available to support your activities: contact us)

• Enjoy lunch! Arrange a special celebratory lunch where there is a range of foods available. Really savour the foods, and avoid labeling them good or bad.
• Refrain from conversations about dieting and body evaluations.
• Create a list of ways to improve self esteem and body image that don't involved trying to change your body. Pin them up in the classroom and publish them in your school newsletter.
• Hold a debate on a related topic such as 'labeling chocolate as bad leads people to eat more chocolate' or 'Ken and Barbie are good role models for young people'.
• Check the school for posters, books, magazines, competitions, videos or activities that endorse striving for a narrow ideal of beauty or portray a stereotypical view of fat/thin people.
• Hold a video screening and discussion group for students, teachers, family and community members
• Develop a school policy or code of conduct based on respect for diversity and a no tolerance approach to weight harassment of any kind
• Hold a classroom discussion on what is 'normal eating' versus 'dieting'